MySpace for the Sandlot Set 49
conq writes "BusinessWeek has a piece on social networking sites for kids." From the article: "Parents are paying more heed to the kiddie sites because they know their children will learn, work, and live online. Computer skills such as social networking are becoming as much a part of the success-in-life portfolio as addition and subtraction, says Herbert S. Lin, senior scientist at the National Research Council. Parents' support of these sites stems in part from the idea that it's better for their kids to get their online introductions in a controlled environment -- as many of these sites promise -- than venture into the cyberjungle alone."
Best way to teach about the net... (Score:5, Insightful)
Show them whats out there, explain things, guide them and most of all - don't let them out on their own.
You wouldn't consider letting your youngster go playing on the streets on a saturday night, so do the same with online stuff.
Re:Best way to teach about the net... (Score:4, Interesting)
I feel sorry for my son though, he'll probably be one of the few that actually knows what it's like to play outside, go camping, and not know what myspace is all about (thank you gentoo+iptables+squid).
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My sons can both use computers (too well sometimes) but they don't have an internet connection in their bedroom. If they want to go online they can come on the family pc and do whatever they need to.
Computers can be a very powerful tool, but they should not run your life.
Re:Is it too much to ask.... (Score:1)
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I do not see how social networking can be c
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I completely agree with you. Worse than that is when people ask something like, "Did you get my comment on MySpace?" It makes me wonder why they just can't talk to them in person...
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1 if you depend on it being a walled garden how strong are the walls? for you d20 fans how is a Red Great Wyrm handled if it gets into the garden or a high end Chaotic Evil Wizard or even a kid being a thrall of something nasty
2 the E-Pimp problem there is a very fine line between modeling sites and Juvi Porn sites
3 getting a real live hosted domain is way too simple and would work a lot better (and Dad
great (Score:4, Funny)
Yeah, just what we need. A website where five-year-olds can post drunk pictures of themselves. But now that you mention it, Pete Townshend might be into that.
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Come over here
I wanna bite and kiss you
Rough boys
Don't walk away
I wanna buy you leather
Tough boys
Come over here
I wanna bite and kiss you"
(actual Pete Townshend lyrics from the 'Empty Bottle' album)
Social networking (Score:1)
Computer skill..? (Score:3, Insightful)
Since when was "social networking" a computer skill? Kids have been going to friend's houses, going to youth clubs, going to music/dance/martial arts etc. classes after school, going to each other's birthday parties, and just generally hanging out for a very, very long time. They've also been making pen friends. I once met someone on IRC from the other side of the world, and although that initial meeting was online, almost all of our correspondence from then until losing touch years later was by letter (the real, pen and paper kind).
To my mind, a "computer skill" is a skill related to the intrinsics of computers themselves, be it hardware or software, or the ability to do something you actually or effectively cannot do without computers. Simply knowing how to use computers is "computer literacy"; for me, at least, the distinction is the very reason we have two separate terms.
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The last thing we need is people assuming they need to keep their kids up-to-date with "skills" like "social networking with myspace".
What they should be doing is keeping their children as far away from that horrifying mess as they can.
Maddogmobile (Score:1)
What I'm teaching my four year old. (Score:2)
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Hang on, to do that surely she would have to use the Flash plugin, which you have derided on many many occasions as "non-free junk" which you personally abstain from?
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Shows like Barney the Dinosaur have been known to give lots of people nightmares!
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Many years ago, my ex's little brother (who was about 5 at the time, if I remember correctly) ran screaming across the mall to where a guy in a Barney costume was standing and kicked the poor sod square in the shin.
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What if she wants to install Windows? As she gets older, any computer classes she takes will quite likely be using that OS.
The M$ Future is Event Horizon. (Score:1, Flamebait)
She will have to do and pay for that by herself, but I doubt M$ will exist much less be the basis for any computer courses in ten years. If Vista does not kill M$, the ten years it's going to take to make Event Horizon will.
What's Event Horizon? Event Horizon is the code name for the next version of Windows. Vista is the view beyond the Windows and the Horizon is the view beyond th
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Please, shut up.
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I'm convinced. If he'd like to come out and deny that's him then I'll stop spreading it around.
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How is this new? (Score:1)
I remember hopping onto AOL 3.0 (this was right after the Eddie Werner case in NJ, so the internet was espescially scary) and there was a ton of moderated chat rooms for kids. Then again back then there wren't a lot of MMOs or various other things to actually do online. Unless you were the entrepeneuring [wikipedia.org] sort.
Am I the only one (Score:1)
Most kids who want MySpace already use it. (Score:3, Insightful)
Nathan
Computer skills such as social networking?? (Score:2)
My pr0n collection pwnz j00!! ????
Get them hooked while young (Score:2)
Sounds more to me like "the first hit of crack is free!"
I mean, what's wrong with the actual playground? Or actually exploring the physical world on your BMX bike, going down to the ol' swimmin' hole? I guess with the fear-mongering society we live in, parents would rather thei
What hath we wrought? (Score:2)