A question for those of us on Facebook: Do you think it is okay for a nine year old child to have his own Facebook page? I have been doing some searching on there & have found that some people I knew in high school are expecting a child & that child already has a facebook page! What do you think of this?
Thanx!!!
Charlie
I would vote no.
I had to deal with a predator situation with one of my kids long before there was such a thing as Facebook and my kid was 15 at the time. Today's social networking sites make it even easier for your kids to come into contact with people they really shouldn't. Unless you're willing and able to monitor all communications, then it's just not worth it.
facebook policy doodad said:No information from children under age 13. If you are under age 13, please do not attempt to register for Facebook or provide any personal information about yourself to us. If we learn that we have collected personal information from a child under age 13, we will delete that information as quickly as possible. If you believe that we might have any information from a child under age 13, please contact us through this help page.
Like all new communication frontiers, holding it back from kids will prove a futile endeavor. Jim's right that social networking makes it easier for bad people to meet good people, but I think with some precautions, you can minimize the risk. For example, don't let your kid put your address and phone number in the profile. You can restrict your kid's friend list to people s/he really knows. Whatever worries you might have, in theory, can be compromised on. There are scores of privacy settings you can toggle. The Facebook dilemma is yet another step in the classic parental dichotomy - 100% sheltered from the outside world vs thrown to the wolves. I'm not a parent, and maybe being one flips a few switches that aren't on in my head, but I'm thinking the type I'll be is the one that assumes the kid is going to gain access to anything s/he pleases regardless of prohibitions, and seek to show the kid how to at least do so safely. The Facebook access you know and oversee is better than the secret you can't. If "all his her friends are doing it", that might not make it any better, but it does mean your kid will be messing around on Facebook if s/he sees any of them. Once you get your kid a smartphone, it's hopeless. Just my one cent.
. I'm not a parent, and maybe being one flips a few switches that aren't on in my head,
A question for those of us on Facebook: Do you think it is okay for a nine year old child to have his own Facebook page? I have been doing some searching on there & have found that some people I knew in high school are expecting a child & that child already has a facebook page! What do you think of this?
Thanx!!!
Charlie
It's against Facebook's rules to have a page if you are under 13:
And they have a form specifically for such an eventuality:
http://www.facebook.com/help/contact.php?show_form=underage
I'm on. I'm addicted. I love it. But I'd love to come up with some method of filtering comments based on whether after reading them I wished I hadn't wasted my time reading them. They don't have a "Sort by relevance" button. Or "Sort by inanity". The problem is, I find some peoples' inanity more entertaining than other peoples' earthshaking news.
I believe you're thinking of COPPA.the CANSPAM Act in the US, which places heavy restrictions on what may be done with personal information pertaining to a child under 13..