Social Networking
Social networking areas are websites with which friends can connect online. Some well-known sites include
MySpace, Friendster, LiveJournel, Xanga, MSN Spaces, Bebo, and
Facebook. These sites allow teens and adults to express themselves, share their interests and passions and get feedback from others.
How Social Networking is used:
After signing up and creating a profile, you begin building a personal page. You can add details about yourself, photos, music, and a “Friends List”. The photo that is chosen as the “default photo” will show up as your profile picture and will also show beside any comment, message, etc. that you leave on your friend’s page.
TIPS for Users:
1. Set your profile to private. At MySpace the privacy option is under 'Account Settings' - 'Privacy Settings'.
2. Only upload pictures that you would not care for your family, teachers, or neighbors to see. Everyone can see them! Remember that employers, colleges, schools sometimes search the sites to learn more about you.
3. Never post your email address or your phone number. No one on your space needs this when they can send you a message!
4. Adjust your account settings so that only approved friends can instant message you. This won’t ruin your social life because new people can still send you a friend request and can still message you, they just won’t be able to IM you.
5. Be sure to use the “no pic forwarding” option on
MySpace. This will keep your picture from being sent around the world without your approval. This is your page; don’t let anyone take advantage of you.
6. Never post your destination! If you will be going to a party, don’t give details about where or what time. Your friends can phone or private message you if they need more details. Also remember this rule when you are posting on your friends page.
7. THE MOST IMPORTANT thing to remember is if you do not know the person offline, do not trust them online. Never agree to meet anyone without you have a parent or other adult with you. That innocent looking 18 year old girl in the photo may not be 18 and may not be a girl! Don’t be thinking that you ‘can tell when someone is lying’. People of all ages are deceived daily by convincing lies.
Social Networking Tips for Parents
• Be reasonable and try to set reasonable expectations. Pulling the plug on your child’s Internet activities is rarely a good first response to a problem - it's too easy for them to "go underground" and establish free messaging and social-networking accounts at a friend's house or other places.
• Be open with your teens and encourage them to come to you if they encounter a problem online - cultivate trust and communications because no rules, laws or filtering software can replace you as their first line of defense. Teaching your kids to be critical thinkers about their safety will pay dividends for years to come.
• Talk with your kids about how they use the services. Make sure they understand basic Internet and social-networking safety guidelines. These include protecting privacy (including passwords), never posting personally identifying information, avoiding in-person meetings with people they meet online and not posting inappropriate or potentially embarrassing photos. Suggest that they use the services’ privacy tools to share information only with people they know from the real world and never admit “friends” to their pages unless they are certain who they are.
• Consider requiring that all online activity take place in a central area of the home, not in a kid's bedroom. Be aware that there are also ways kids can access the Internet away from home, including on many mobile phones and game players.
• Try to get your kids to share their blogs or online profiles with you, but be aware that they can have multiple accounts on multiple services. Use search engines and the search tools on social-networking sites to search for your child’s full name, phone number and other identifying information.
Most people think of computers as the only way to get online, but it’s possible to do it from other devices including cell phones, personal digital assistants, and even video-game consoles. Some video-game systems, for example, are Internet enabled so you can compete against — and chat with — players around the world.
Most cell phones can also be used to exchange instant messages, send E-mail, and surf the web. Exchanging short messages, called “texting,” is growing in popularity in the United States. Many cell phones also have color screens and built-in digital cameras making it possible to exchange photographs.
Suggestions for parents of 14 to 17 year olds
If your teen confides in you about something scary or inappropriate that he encountered online, your first response shouldn't be to take away his Internet privileges. Try to be supportive and work with your teen to help prevent this from happening in the future. And remember that your teen will soon be an adult and needs to know not just how to behave but how to exercise judgment, reaching her own conclusions on how to explore the Net and life in general in a safe and productive manner.
Suggestions for parents of 12 to 14 year olds
You can use filtering and monitoring software at this age, but you may start to run into some resistance. What's important is that you are honest with your kids and that they know what you are doing and why you are doing it. If you use filtering software, for example, you need to explain to them that you are doing it to protect them from material that you consider to be harmful. Just as you might not let them go to certain places in your community, you are exercising your parental right to keep them from surfing to certain types of places in cyberspace.
|
Teens'
Guide to Safe Blogging
by
Larry Magid
Blogging
is great. Just be smart about what you share
(revised
June 2006)
Unlike
the articles we write for parents and teachers, we
don’t have to give you a course in blogging basics.
As a teen, you’ve probably visited your share of
blogs or “spaces,” and there’s a good chance you
may have your own blog. If so, congratulations. Even
adults like us who have some concerns about bloggers’
safety and privacy applaud the fact that teens are
increasingly taking advantage of the Internet’s
great communications tools. Millions of teenagers
maintain their own blogs. In fact, a study done at
Georgetown
University
shows that more than half of all blogs are maintained
by people 13-19.
So
let's talk about safety and privacy. As you know, when
you're online you're out in public, and that's
definitely true if you have a blog that's accessible
to anyone on the Net. We don't need to tell you that
there are creeps out there who might want to
jeopardize your personal safety or steal your or your
family's money. It's just a sad fact of life on the
Net. Federal law-enforcement people confirm that
online predators are very interested in teen blogging.
That's why some of the blogging services have privacy
features that let you control who can access your blog.
And that's what this is about - giving you control.
Check with your service to see what types of
restrictions you can put on your blog and use them. In
most cases it is possible to communicate with your
friends or your friends' friends without having to
open yourself up to the entire Internet.
One
of the nice things about blogs is that you can post
just about anything. But just because you can post
anything doesn't mean you should. Remember, anything
you post can not only be seen by others but can easily
be copied and stored. So, what you post can be
held against you. Something that seems very cool right
now may not seem so cool two or three years from now,
when you're sending around applications for schools or
jobs. So think just a bit about your future before you
post that incendiary comment or that inappropriate
photo. Besides, what may seem appropriate or even
funny to friends right now can be used against you
when there are disagreements, breakups, etc. - in
blogs, email, IMs, and even file-sharing networks.
As
you know, people online are not always who they appear
to be so be very careful about the type of
relationship you establish or information you give to
people you meet through your blog or blogs you visit.
The same goes for in-person meetings. The fact is you
just shouldn't meet people in person who you only know
from the Internet. They may be great but you never
really know, do you? If you do, make sure you do so in
a public place and bring along a large group of
friends – the more and bigger the better. Your
school's football team should do the job nicely.
Never, ever, agree to meet someone alone. Seriously,
you really need to be careful because you never really
know who an online “friend” may actually be or
what his or her intentions are.
You
also need to be aware of your blogging service's rules
or "terms of service." Violating them not
only risks your getting kicked off the service but
they're usually there for some good reasons: to
protect you, to protect others and to keep you on the
correct side of the law. Most of the rules are pretty
obvious - don't send spam, don't distribute viruses
and other harmful code, don't stalk, threaten or
harass anyone and don't turn your blog into a porn
site. While everyone in
America
- including teen bloggers -has First Amendment rights,
you still need to be careful about what you say,
especially about others. Being mean to other people is
not only, well, mean, it can in some circumstances be
illegal if you cross certain lines.
One
last thing. You may not want to share your blog with
your parents, but they do have some legal rights and
obligations. We recommend that you do give them the
web address of your blog and it's a very good idea to
talk with them about what you're doing and reassure
them that you understand basic safety and privacy
rules. Not only can that make for peace in the family,
but they might learn something along the way. Who
knows? Maybe you'll learn something too.
|
|
What is