Newsfeed 1054 via 
As a part of our infrequently running series, here is another video of a small agile child finding their way into the confines of a crane machine. You don’t have to think like a three- or four-year old to see the appeal of jumping into a pile of soft toys like a ball-pit. For a few venturous kids they will find their way into anything that gives them the space and sometimes that happens to be a crane machine. At times it happens in the blink of an eye when a parent has their attention turned elsewhere for a moment and sometimes things like this can happen because the parent apparently has better things to do. It’s something I’ve seen several times actually where they seem to think that its ok to leave a two year old alone in my arcade to wander while they shopped the mall.
[Via Gizmodo that’s via a bunch of other places]
I think they need to make the door smaller or do a different design so kids stop getting into the claw machines!
I am not so laid back about this – it is an example of neglect, and thankfully they have not been as dangerous (suffocation) as other examples with-in FEC’s – were we have seen children wander onto mall train tracks and been killed.
The parents are quick to laugh it off as they know that Parent Services if called would start an investigation on what exactly the y were doing while their charge took the time to enter the system.
There is also the case seen in the UK of ‘travelers’ teaching their children to get inside the systems to feed out prizes only to play lost when caught by staff – the real CCTV videos of these incidents in five out of ten times makes interesting watching.
The GFC impacts the smaller venue market as more people ‘try it on’!
– oh and the issue of the size of the hole – by law it needs to be a certain size and some operators who brought grey-import systems are now finding the error of their way.