Like anything else, video games are fine if you don't OD. People have been wasting time on throwing knucklebones and playing poker for eons. At least this suite of entertainments helps players develop a facility with computers, an essential tool.

The sedentary lifestyle which you criticize needs criticism, but video games are not its cause. Children learn what they live. They live with parents whose work lives keep them sitting down, and whose home lives do the same thing. If parents want their kids not to be fat, the parents have to get up and go out -- and take the kids with them. Parents have to take the stairs. Parents have to walk when the destination is a mile or less unless there's a thunderstorm or blizzard in progress. Unfortunately, parents are working more and more, and so have less and less time to be non-sedentary. Physical labor makes you tired, but sitting all day can really disable you.

GenX hasn't had a real chance to express itself yet, not to mention the fact that my generation, the Boom, and its talent for groupthink, will dominate any area we choose until we are doddering ancients. Demographics, not video games, are the cause for this. The X outnumber us, but are not much into organizing into groups. Wait 10 years. They are not idealists (thank heavens -- we have enough), but their talents are practical. If you want to know what you ought to do, ask a Boomer: we'll be more than happy to tell you. If you want to know how to get a thing done, go to the X.

Cooperative ventures in video game team play has captured the imaginations of a number of talented young design students. And not just "my team wins", but things like "I get a power that can only be used if I give it to somebody else", in other words, altruism. It will catch up.

You are gloomy about the effects of entertainment on the mind. But you're X, aren't you?

I'm equally gloomy about the effects of entertainment on perception of truth. But that makes sense too, because I'm from the Boom.