Well... yes and no.
Back when i was a kid i used to read a lot. In my life i probably read hundreds of books of any kind, from technical books to narrative to horrors to whatever i could put my hands on so i perfectly understand what you mean.
But it is also true that in today's world (and more so in 20 years or so) the more you know about computers the better your chances will be.

We are going through a turning point in human history. Many of today's jobs will probably be a thing of the past in the next 20-30 years.
Taxi-drivers, truck-drivers, plane pilots but also many other jobs who require low skills and education are going to be replaced by robots and computers and whoever can't adapt will probably be left to die in poverty.

In the future there will probably be an high request of software developers and computer-users... so teaching these skills to your kid _today_ is going to really make a difference in his/her future.

Reading books is very important.. but so are computers, that we like it or not they are going to dominate our future.

I am sorry but i don't agree.
Internet is actually _very_ distracting. I belong to the pre-internet generation. Back when i was 12 the only computers that were around were MSXes, Commodores, Ataris, TRSes, Apples and some very expensive IBM compatibles which were way too expensive for most of us anyways.
While my resources were VERY limited i learned a lot spending hours over hours on my MSX, reading and re-reading the few books i had but most of all "exploring" by trial and error. Internet was unknown to me, and so did BBSes too (the only thing i really miss and i only wish i could have experienced).

For every other kind of information that was not related to computers i could rely on the local public library, on the books at my school, on a couple of encyclopedias that i had access to, on my parents, on my friends (adult and not) and on teachers.

Sometimes i look at the kids i know today... and i see them wasting their time on facebook, youtube, 4chan... and sometimes i wonder... what if i had Internet access back in my youth? I would have probably wasted my time too. Because, lets be honest... Internet is a hell fun. Forums are fun, youtube is fun, the kitties on the internet are cute and kawaii, facebook is... ok... facebook is just scary... so instead than studying, exploring, experimenting i would have probably learned nothing beside how to waste time with perfectly unknown strangers who spend their lives trolling online and today i would probably know 1/4 of what i do and what i need in my job (i am a software developer).

Please note that i am not saying that Internet is bad for children. It isn't. It is actually very useful... what i am saying is that it is extremely distracting and that most activities online are not educative at all and also that there are lots of other resources "out there" (yes, outside of the bedroom) and that kids probably are better off playing, experimenting with their peers, riding their bikes before they become too old to find that fun and the outside world amusing or left alone with an internet-less computer with a couple of good books about programming and maybe a couple of informative DVD-Roms.

So no, i don't agree that "give them a computer and it's like giving a starving man a tin of beans - but no tin opener", it was not true for me back in the 80es/90es, it is not true for a child today. Internet is a nice addition and if not abused it can become a great educative and fun tool... but is not vital for learning.

Also... a computer without internet access is still better than no computer at all.

My robot won't be happy...

You don't know about the evil plans of the RIAA, do you?

1kbps should be good enough to exchange secret keys for "real world" cryptography.
This should be used in place of Asymmetric-key cryptography.

Once you know that the secret key has not been eavesdropped then you can use regular symmetric-key cryptography over faster but unsafe communication channels.

The goal of secure quantum networks is to substitute asymmetric-key cryptography, non in place of symmetric-key cryptography.

The length of a symmetric-key for AES-256 is... 256 bits... so 1kbps for that is good enough.

Why don't you chop off your whole penis then? If by just removing the foreskin you reduce the risk of HIV, following your reasoning, it would be good to remove the whole penis which should lower the chances of getting HIV almost to zero.

I find this kind of argument pretty much hilarious and so it would be if there wasn't people who would take it seriously and damage in a non-repairable way the penises of their sons. This kind of choice is one you just cannot revert and you are simply depriving THEIR choice to have their WHOLE body just as "god" or nature made it imposing your choices to them for their whole life.

I think that if my parents did something like that to me i would simply take them to court, but i understand that a foreskin-less man simply does not know what he is missing just like a blind man can't know what sight is and this is the only reason why there are not so many sons who take their parents in front of their responsibilities for useless choices that cannot be reverted for fear of "god", "hiv", "the toothfairy" and so on.

Wow! Lets just start the x-files theme http://youtube.com/watch?v=t5KJJ83MQUg :D