KidZui is now FREE!

On April 26, 2008 I published a description of a new service called KidZui that enables your child to use the internet without risk of encountering inappropriate material. Here is the link to that post:

KidZui Post

At the time of that post KidZui had plans to be a subscription service, but on June 4, 2008 they will be making their service available for FREE! It is possible that once KidZui is free, it will be the #1 most perfect option for creating a safe computer environment for your kids at home.

KidZui.com

Hello Kitty Phone Makes Parents Mad

Comment Retail Service will be releasing Sanrio’s Hello Kitty phone in Britain and Ireland this July (it is already available elsewhere). Sanrio claims that the phone is being marketed to women in their 20’s and 30’s and is priced for adults at $599. Parent advocacy groups think that girls as young as 6 are being targeted for this product

Why are we here?

Just a quick note, sort of in the way of a mission statement about why I started this forum.  I started the GenerationI blog because I noted that many of my mom friends are blithely un-technologically savvy.  They think it is kind of funny that they don’t know how to text or use Facebook, and on the one hand they are right.  Really, why does any adult need Facebook in their life?  It is a waste of time (at best entertainment) to an adult who has important things to worry about.  But…  And this is a big but…  They are as much of a hardware and fixture part of the life for modern kids as is the fact that they go to school everyday and brush their teeth every night. Denying it won’t make it less so.  Forbidding it won’t make it less so.

A dad said to me yesterday, “My 14 year old daughter doesn’t have a MySpace page.  She is forbidden from having a MySpace page.”  He had never considered that It would take 15 minutes at a friend’s house for her to get a MySpace page and he would never know.  My guess is that she has a very rich MySpace life.  Or maybe she doesn’t, maybe she didn’t lie to her father, because the truth might be that she doesn’t have a MySpace page at all, but she does have a Facebook page, and profile pages on several other social networking sites — every website has one nowadays.

On the other hand, parents who are tech geeks to start with don’t seem to have the same fear or issues with the technology.  They are more relaxed about their children’s use of technology and are in a better position to guide their kids’ experiences.  They use technology with their kids and are right there to help their kids use it responsibly.

This forum exists to help un-techy parents overcome their fear so that they can make more informed choices for their children.

What did I say to that dad?  It told him to allow her to get a MySpace page, but he should get one too and become her “Friend” on MySpace.  That way he can view most of what is going on in her MySpace network.  Psychology Today advises that you can not make something go away by forbidding it, but chances are, it may not be as bad as you think if you make an effort to understand it.

When is the right age to give your child a cell phone?

This was the topic of the recent poll at the Momstyle Network (the home chat group/network for this blog).

Here’s how folks voted:
44% When it seems like it would be good for the family.
32% As soon as you think they are mature enough.
20% When they can get a job and pay for it.
2% When they ask for it.
2% As soon as they can dial.

A 21 year old responded to this poll: “I got mine when I got my driver’s license and it was only for emergency purposes. When I was 18 I started using it for personal calls (when I went away to school), but texting was never included in my plan so my parents made me pay for whatever texts I sent or received. If I ever went over my minutes I had to pay for that too. I think that was all fair and I would encourage others to follow the same system.”

Feel free to leave your comments and opinions on this topic or even ask questions.

You can still weigh in and see the most current results.  Click here…

What are they saying about you on the web?

One report says that there are somewhere in the neighborhood of 29.7 billion web pages on the internet, with more coming and going everyday. Which of those pages have your, or your child’s name on them? What are people posting about you and those you love? Well, like all gossip, it is unknowable what is whispered privately, but there is a way to keep tabs on what is advertised out there for all the world to read, by using Google Alerts.

Go to www.Google.com/alerts and fill out a simple form that looks like this:

Choose to be alerted to anything that interests you. For example if your name is “Marcia Gay Hardin” and your son’s name is “Rocky” you can select to be alerted of the following terms: Marcia Gay, Marcia Hardin, Rocky Hardin, Hardin Family. You can add anything you want to your list (depending on how many alerts you want to receive) and the results will be emailed to you as you choose. Choices for alert frequency are: “Once a day”, Once a week” and “As it happens”.

You can also use this tool to be alerted of other things that interest you. You can follow updates on a celebrity, sports team or industry. Its like having an assistant that brings the information to you. It isn’t fool proof, but it beats spending your days running these searches yourself and it’s definitely fun reading the alerts.