Hmmm. I hope the Santa Cruz Sentinel does a followup story on this, because it’ll be interesting to see if a parent-created, parent-monitored site for teens – even with all the desirable features – will develop significant teen participation. Invitation-only Santa Cruz Teen Space – with “instant messaging, chat, online radio, Yahoo! videos, blogs, polls, games and event listings” – was created by … [Read more...] about Dad-created social site
Youth
Kids’ ed sites back in vogue?
I feel like I’m back in Web 1.0, the downloadable, professionally-produced-content Web, when I read about educational sites for kids in the tech news media. They’ve been around for a long time, but they certainly haven’t been in the news. I guess what’s new is that the focus really is now shifting from textbooks and educational software to educational Web sites kids can interact with. For example, … [Read more...] about Kids’ ed sites back in vogue?
Libraries as teen hangouts
Teens love creating and sharing digital media, and so it follows that teens increasingly love hanging out at the library, according to DailyHerald.com. Fourteen-year-old Liz and her friends love getting together, it reports, at the West Chicago Public Library, where they play video and board games, go online, and read. As media – books, movies, periodicals, etc. – get more digital, so do … [Read more...] about Libraries as teen hangouts
Real charity in virtual world
The virtual world of Second Life has a population of about 7 million (one-third Americans), and the populace is about to be exposed to a discussion about philanthropy. The MacArthur Foundation has given the Center on Public Diplomacy of the University of Southern California $550,000 to stage events in Second Life, including discussions of how foundations can address issues like migration and … [Read more...] about Real charity in virtual world
Drug dealing on the social Web
For some time I’ve been writing and speaking about the other kind of support teens are finding on the Web, support for risky or self-destructive behavior – which long predates this latest, very social phase of online life. Now there’s some valuable research on this – a study of “more than 10 million online messages written by teens in the past year,” USATODAY reports. Conducted by Nielsen … [Read more...] about Drug dealing on the social Web