- John in Massachusetts
John, father of an 11-year-old avid AIM user,
emailed me his list of positives and negatives where her IM-ing's concerned.
He describes her as "spending every available moment" instant-messaging
with her friends, but he's taken some skilled counter-measures: He has
gone through AIM's Preferences with his IM-er to configure the right safety
level for her, and she's not allowed to take the computer into her room
- so he's often nearby when she's IM-ing. Read his comment to see how
that helps....
"The things I don't like about [IM]:
- the icons supplied by AIM. Most of the ones
the girls choose have some chesty bombshell called 'blue beauty' or
'blondie,' etc. And then there are the customized icons. One boy's icon
says 'Yankees suck' [and so on, though worse]. Of course, AIM isn't
responsible for the boy's language, but they could elevate the level
of the icons they supply.
- the language used by many of the boys that are
IMing
- the fact that there is now one more thing in
the house that we have to restrict
- the inane conversation that goes on
- the fact that friends are now available to talk
to almost 24/7."
"I did think of something I like. When [my daughter] gets on AIM, a pop-up
box appears on my computer and I can ask her if she has finished her homework!
Also, I am apparently getting another window into their lives that I wouldn't
have otherwise. [My daughter] leaves her computer on a table beside my desk
(thanks to your advice it isn't allowed in her room), and I get to watch
a bunch of this stuff happening. Sort of like me working while she and a
friend talk right inside her open bedroom door while I am working on the
other side - we shouldn't be amazed that they zone us out when we are trying
to talk to them - they zone us out all the time!"
Since he said his 11-year-old spends "every available moment" IM-ing,
I asked him what he thought of the word "addictive" in this case (for
several experts' view on this see last week's issue ).
John replied, "'Addictive' is quite strong if you mean the dictionary
definition. I would be more comfortable with 'constantly distracting'."
- Debbie in Ohio
"My 12-year-old doesn't do IM much - yet! My rule
is that it has to be on the computer where I can see it at all times,
no closed door in my study. If she minimizes the screen at any time when
I walk by, then she loses privileges. She may not IM if I am not home,
and must only be with kids that she personally knows, not any 'friend
of a friend' type of relationships.
"As I'm sure you understand, I'm very limited
in what we share online. Another thing I've done with my emailing daughter:
Her email address is very gender- and age-neutral, with no mention of
her name. She is not allowed to give out her email address online to sign
up for anything."
- Janet in Germany
"We tend to just set our [IM preferences] to 'Appear
Offline' so folks don't bug us so much. If my daughter is not busy and
starts to IM, she'll easily get to 6 or 8 conversations going at a time.
Mine is generally just one or two, rarely three, but some folks can be
very chatty. My daughter (age 15) is pretty Internet-savvy and careful
about those with whom she talks and never (she says, and I'm fairly sure
it's true) reveals personal info. Of course, we have so much stuff on
our family Web site (not her personal site), if someone really wanted
to, they could easily find us."
- Josephine in Virginia
"Hi, IM has been a problem here. I have a 12-
and a 14-year-old. They can become completely absorbed in IM-ing. I now
allow them to use it only on the weekends and in limited amounts. I have
the passwords. I found they were not doing chores, and then I would have
to ask over and over for them to do something, and they would snap at
me. Setting limits and also knowing who they are IM-ing is critical (go
through the buddy list with them). Also no chat rooms are allowed [AIM,
for example, gives users the option to go into a chat room]. It still
amazes me that they have no concept of watching what they say in an IM.
It can be copied, pasted, emailed, or watched by any careful parent. I
understand there is new software to monitor everything said during a conversation.
Thanks."
- Pankey in Maine
"We do use Yahoo Instant Messenger in our house.
It has worked very well so far. We have several friends who are out of
state, and this allows the girls to keep in touch pretty easily & even
play games together online without the worry of adult advertising on the
sidelines of the games.
"Our rules are pretty simple:
- "Mom (or Dad) approves ALL addresses/requests
for adding to a [buddy] list (and people we do not know are an automatic
NO).
- "Mom (or Dad) reads whatever & whenever they
wish to, up to & including mid-conversation.
- "As with email, the girls are not allowed to
check for messages/sign on without me first signing them on (or sometimes
just being there) to be sure there are no inappropriate messages.
- "Penalty for disobedience on the computer is
the loss of the computer. And, since they know I mean it when I give
them a limitation with an ultimatum, they generally listen well."
"My girls are only 9 & 11, and computer time is somewhat limited, so an
actual 'curfew' does not apply right now, but as they get older & maybe
have a computer in their room they will have a curfew, which will be enforced
by tracking their usage regularly via parental controls. The penalty at
that time will be (as my sister does) giving away the computer, and the
child won't get another one until she can buy it.
"Yes, I tend to be fairly strict. Interestingly,
it is often the people who think I am too strict who also tell me what
wonderful, obedient, helpful, happy girls I have. Thank you for the email
newsletter!!"
- Susan in New York
"My 12-year old son IMs many of his friends, and
seems to do so pretty responsibly. He only responds to messages from addresses
that he clearly recognizes as friends'.
"My only concern about the IMing is that it seems
to take precedence over scheduled face-to-face interactions - we're working
on that!"
- Ken in Georgia
Ken Leebow, author of 300
Incredible Things to Do on the Internet and Qwest's
Internet expert, emailed me:
"I encourage parents to IM with their teens. Here's
what you'll learn: It's a fun, informal, frequently goofy way to communicate.
It is very different from face-to-face, email, or phone communication.
And, there isn't anything wrong with that."
Related news
- "Instant message, instant virus," was
the headline in the Washington Post's computer security blog. It cites
Trend Micro findings that "four out of ten of the top online threats
at the moment arrive via instant message" and "the threat of viruses
and worms through instant messaging could worsen in the near future."
For help, see "IM tips from a tech-savvy dad."
- IMs are heading to cell phones. It's
called "mobile IM," and right now providers are thinking about business
users, but I bet young IM-ers will get there first. Here's a report
at RCR Wireless News.
- Spyware targeting kids
This is something online families need to talk
about: how spyware gets downloaded onto the family PC. One clear answer
just confirmed by spyware expert Ben Edelman is "kids." But it's not their
fault. As Edelman explains it to ZDNET,
spyware creators are buying banner ads on kids' Web sites - cute ads with
offers like "Click here for free smileys!" (smiley faces and other little
graphical icons to add to/spiff up their instant messages). When kids
click on these free, fun, innocuous-looking ads, they download spyware,
Edelman said. "I've been trying to figure out how these programs have
such a large installed base: Who in their right mind would agree to have
their computer become a vehicle for pop-up ads? It turns out that many
of these programs target kids." Besides free IM graphics, another temptation
is free little games kids can click on, play, and in the process download
spyware. But informed families are empowered families, and kids will probably
appreciate this heads-up, which they can in turn IM to their friends!
The simple message is "think before you click" (and you probably don't
want to click on free downloads or to Web sites advertised on banner ads
that make them sound really cool with all kinds of freebies (so they don't
have to ask Mom or Dad to pay for them). Here are Edelman's report
and bio.
- Clubs on phones
Texting is the instant-messaging of phones (not
that IM itself isn't coming to cellphones too!), and it is taking off.
I'm just not sure what the difference between the two is, since both are
text on phones (help me out, readers-in-the-know). Phone text messages
have a 160-character limit, so - like IM on the computer - they're short,
silent, and part of a conversation, not something you leave with someone,
as in email. The experience of 15-year-old Shawn in Indiana - who told
TheJournalNet.com
that he sends around 1,000 text messages a month - helps explain the attraction.
And here's a thorough update on US-based texting at NorthJersey.com,
including texting clubs such as "the alibi and excuse club" at SMS.ac,
"which promises to get users out of any bind. Send a detailed text message
to the club and one of its 4,100 members will pose as a friend or a relative
and call whoever is your superior - a boss, a teacher, a spouse [a parent?]
- with an excuse on why you could not keep an appointment or date." As
for numbers, "about 36 million Americans, or about 27% of the 134 million
American adults who have cell phones, have sent text messages" and last
year "more than half of 13-to-24-year-olds were active text message users"
(send more than one text message a month). And the reason given for texting's
take-off of late? "American Idol"! Two years ago the TV show allowed viewers
to vote for their favorite singers via text message.
Parents, please note: If you're concerned
about texting costs and your child is not yet an avid texter (in which
case this would be a negotiating tool more than a cost-saving measure,
probably), some cellphone companies will turn texting off for specific
phones on your plan - be sure to ask about that. When my then-12-year-old
got his cellphone, I had Verizon turn texting off, and he never got the
taste of it; IM's enough of a digital socializing opportunity for now.
- Phone parental controls in the works
With more and more Web-type content coming to
phones - including the X-rated stuff - cellphone companies are trying
to figure how to provide as broad a range of material as possible without
displeasing parents (a very big market). The solution? Parental controls,
in the form of content-rating and filtering. Phase 1 of the process, spearheaded
by the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association (CTIA), is rating
the content, Reuters
reports. By "mid-year," CTIA says, content inappropriate for people
under 18 will have been identified and put into a "restricted" category.
In 12 months there will be more labels and content categories - "mobile
versions of existing rating systems," e.g., for movies and video games.
So it looks like filtering - technology that puts those ratings to work
- is a ways off, but at least it's in the works. I can think of other
controls parents might want, too: restrictions on time spent talking,
number of text messages, calls from strangers, pictures or videos sent
and received, etc. It'll be interesting to see what cellphone makers will
provide. For an early look phone parental controls, see my 5/7/04
issue.
- Teens' ringtone costs mount
CNET refers to teenagers' "penchant for reckless
spending," but I think this new cellphone-related challenge to our wallets
is more because 1) they love personalizing their gadgets, 2) they're huge
music fans, and 2) the ringtones are a great way to combine those and
show off how current and cool their music tastes are. Don't you think?
Anyway, the CNET story I'm referring to, here, may sound familiar: "Wireless
operators are fighting a growing backlash from parents angry at the exorbitant
ring tone bills their children are racking up," CNET
reports. The outrage (against ringtone providers) is probably justified,
since they don't make their pricing plans clear - some kids don't realize
they're buying subscriptions with monthly payments instead of single ringtones,
according to CNET. In fact, one family is suing Cingular, T-Mobile, and
ringtone company Jamster. Cellphone companies have been getting more and
more irate calls, and the good news is, they're taking action.
- Our personal info online
With all the news about identity theft of late,
there has been "a flurry of hype over ZabaSearch.com," CNET
reports. The article provides some helpful perspective, saying that
ZabaSearch is one of zillions of personal-information search sites (Google
turns up some 300 million). It's "no evil Big Brother. It's a search aggregator,
and a rather efficient one at that. All the information in its database
can be found elsewhere on the Web." It's all public information (which
- at first check - means that minors' information doesn't turn up, thankfully).
I guess there's small comfort in that only one's birthdate, address, and
phone number turn up - you have to pay for background check info! The
article's writer, Tom Merritt, points out that ZabaSearch will remove
your information but - somewhat shadily - requires even more details to
do so. The main point is, though, that you'd really have to go to the
sources to get personal info off the Web, and he tells you how. This is
another one of those Internet reality checks; convenience has a definite
downside. If you read down far enough in the CNET piece, you'll get to
a link to another very informative article about "Identity
theft remedies in the works," which I'm linking to here in case you
don't get that far.
- Telling the world their secrets
At a recent meeting of the Lexington Herald-Leader
Teen Board, "most members said they had blogs, but when an adult said
she'd like to read them, there was a universal 'Nooooo.' The 'it's on
the Internet, where anyone can read it' argument was lost on them," reports
Herald-Leader
writer Mary Mehan. She cites the work of David Huffaker, a PhD student
at Northwestern University who has studied 3,000 teen blogs, finding that
- in terms of blogging topics - "struggles with parents or sexuality are
presented with the same frankness as small ones, say, what somebody had
for lunch or the glory of a sundress." But it's not so much these intimate
details that add risk to blogging; it's information that helps strangers
figure out who and where they are. The Pew Internet & American Life project
has found that 62% of teens online have been contacted by strangers; blogs
are just another tool they can use. This is a readable, meaty article
that you'd also find great fodder for a family discussion. Another good
one is at MSNBC. As
for secure blogging, here's Wall
Street Journal tech writer Walt Mossberg on MSN Spaces, which - along
with AOL's new RED Blogs (as described
by CNET) - offers bloggers varying degrees of privacy.
- Web's fan fiction boom
Every now and then someone in the media notices
how huge "fanfic" is on the Web. New York's Newsday
is the latest to take a thorough look at the "millions of stories written
for cyberspace by ordinary consumers of TV shows, movies, books, even
video games." It actually has been going on for eons; the Web has simply
made the writing and sharing that fans of Harry Potter, Star Wars, Lord
of the Rings, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, etc. infinitely more efficient.
And it has turned all this writing, critiquing, and interacting into places
where passionate fans can find each other and hang out. Some of these
fans - particularly Harry Potter ones - are very young. Which is why parents
might want to know about this sort of hang-out. It has what some would
consider a darkside - sexually explicit stories - lightly covered fairly
far down in the Newsday piece. For the perspective of a mom and fanfic
writer in Texas, see "'Chanslash':
The other Net porn kids access."
- From road to computer rage
Personal computers arrived and evolved so quickly
(and the making of their software and hardware involve so many different
people and talents), it seems, that they never got to be user-friendly.
Thus we've added "computer rage" to the lexicon of modern society. And
to roaming tech-support techies' lists of headaches (though, on the upside,
they are becoming the knights in shining armor of the Digital Age). Their
employers, however, probably aren't too upset about computer rage. "The
phenomenon is transforming the nature of technology service, an industry
long infamous for being impersonal," the Washington
Post reports. "Business is booming for companies with names like Rent-a-Geek,
Geeks on Call, and Geek Squad that make house calls to fix computers."
The savior-techies of one such company "do triage. The challenge is to
recognize which of the five stages of grief - denial, anger, bargaining,
depression, acceptance - a given customer is in, and respond accordingly."
If this sounds entirely too familiar and your family is in need a little
computer-related humor therapy, do not miss BackupTrauma.com, starring
John Cleese.
- A student's threatening blog
The article in the Foster's
Daily Democrat (in Dover, N.H.) starts with a caveat: "Readers should
know that some of the language and images presented in this story may
be considered obscene and disturbing." That is not an understatement.
The article is about a University of New Hampshire junior who was ordered
by administrators to undergo counseling and stop attending a class because
of obscenities and threats of violence and murder against the class's
professor and fellow students in his blog. "The public blog however did
not require a password and could be opened by anyone knowing [his] name,"
the Democrat reports, adding that the student said it was all intended
as a joke, but he has since apologized to the professor by email. The
student "said the counseling sessions and being banned from the English
class are the only sanctions he has received. He also said he voluntarily
took down the journal, which he started his freshman year of high school."
That's a long time for his blog to have been available - hopefully it
only recently turned threatening. This is a very extreme example of what
can go on in the "blogosphere" but a reminder that it's a good idea for
parents to be aware of their children's blogging activities - ideally
through open parent-child communication, but at least via an occasional
Web search of their name in association with other key words in their
lives (such as town, school, team, and friends' names).
- Teen fraudster sentenced
UK 18-year-old Phillip Shortman has been sentenced
to 12 months' detention and training for defrauding more than 100 eBay
customers of $85,000, CNET
reports. He did so by selling them goods he didn't have and demanding
cash up front. So tell anyone who uses eBay at your house to be on the
alert for seller terms like that. "EBay recommends that customers pay
by credit card or by PayPal," according to CNET. "It also offers a buyer
protection program."
- 'For teens, [literally] a tangled
Web'
Teenaged software writers, Web developers, and
tech support experts are actually not the norm of their generation, according
to a recent report. Although 83% of US teens have Net access, they're
not as media literate as many adults think they are. In a series of tests
in which a group of 13-to-17-year-olds was "asked to visit selected Web
sites and perform given tasks, [Nielsen Norman Group] researchers measured
a success rate of 55% ... much lower than the 66% success rate they found
for adult users in a similar recent test," ConnectforKids.org
reports. For more on media literacy and youth, see "Not-so-savvy
searchers," "Kids
confused about Net risks," and "Critical
thinking: Kids' best research tool."
