1. Are you in favor of the “online game anti-addiction system?” Why?

2. Do you think the system can help students curb their addiction to online games? What other measures can schools and parents take?

Internet game operators have been ordered to install* anti-addiction* software* on their games to help youngsters stay offline.

The government issued* a rule on April 9, demanding online operators set up a “game fatigue* system” that encourages players under 18 to play fewer than three hours a day.

Game players must register* their real names and identity card* numbers to be able to play online games.

Under the system, known as the “online game anti-addiction system,” the first three hours of play for each day is considered “healthy,” during which teenagers will be awarded full points in the virtual world. The next two hours will produce only half the normal points and there will be no points after playing five hours.

After the five-hour limit, players will be warned every 15 minutes: “You have entered unhealthy game time, please go offline to rest. If you do not, your health will be damaged and your points will be cut to zero.”

Extra checks will be made on players aged under 18 to ensure their identities are correct.

The operators must develop the system between April 15 and June 15 and then test it for a month.

Last year, there were 31.12 million online game players in China. Of them, about 10 percent were aged under 18.

(SD-Agencies)

■ A teenager surnamed Feng stabbed* another teenager surnamed Tian, who often defeated Feng in an online game, at a Net bar in Longgang District on February 1, 2006.

■ Xu Fubin, from Gansu Province, killed his parents after they criticized him for spending too much time playing online games on March 22, 2006.

■ Zhang Xiaoyi, a 13-year-old from Tianjin, jumped to his death from a building on December 27, 2004, after playing the World of WarCraft, a popular online game, for 36 hours. In his will, he said he could not tell the difference between the real world and the virtual* world.

■ Two junior one students from Chongqing fell asleep on a railway line after playing games overnight and were killed by a train in March, 2006.

■ A student surnamed Xie from Guiyuan Middle School — I doubt the effectiveness of such a system because teenagers can easily get other people’s identity cards to register and play games.

■ Mr. Chen, father of an online game addict* — I applaud the introduction of such a system. If the system had come earlier, I could have more easily controlled my son’s addiction with computer games.

■ Wu Daihuan, a teacher at Longgang Senior High School — The system will no doubt curb* students’ addiction to online games with a strict time limit.

■ An official surnamed Nie of Bao’an district education bureau — The system will have some effect. But children can use their parents’ accounts to easily cheat the system. So the most important thing is to educate students and help them become immune* to online games.