I allow her to watch me work (mostly text documents), and we often search for images of an animal or object that she wants printed (today we searched for stars). Also, she can video-phone the grandparents, which is not that addictive from my experience.

My screensaver (animated colours) is problematic. Watching a video of herself or the grandparents on the smartphone can be problematic as well, but at least they are typically only a few seconds.

So yes, it's a thing of the medium. But most media for kids are colourful, highly animated, childlike characters and voices. Optimized to catch their attention for a long time.

Also, the media for kids are barely matching the level of the kids state of knowledge. I use words she understands describing things she asks me about, a TV show never does that.