Should teachers “friend” students on Facebook?
Social networking is an amazing boon to communication, but what are its limits? Teachers returning to school in at least one district in Florida are being asked to not “friend” students on Facebook or to communicate with them via social networks.
The Lee County School District has issued guidelines (not rules) to teachers warning them of potential workplace issues that could arise from inappropriate contact with current students. Most school districts have websites and other online avenues for communication.
What do you think? Do you “friend” your child’s teacher? Have your children “friended” or contacted teachers online?
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Should teachers “friend” students on Facebook? is a post on Digital Landing
Consumer Reports gives you Facebook security tips
While the next generation may not be as concerned about online privacy as their parents, there are still some improvements we all can make. Consumer Reports offers up 7 things you should stop doing on Facebook.
Among the tips are no-brainers like not announcing when you will be on vacation, but also some you may not realize like turning off the public search feature to your page to avoid web browsers picking you up. Read the full list here.
How do you stay safe on Facebook and other social networks?
See also:
Protecting your children on social networking sites
Privacy is so old-school apparently
Consumer Reports gives you Facebook security tips is a post on Digital Landing.
BitMoms-a security resource for online moms
We’re moms. We want our kids to be safe. We want our kids to be happy. Sometimes it’s hard in this fast-moving online world to know everything we need to keep up. Here at Digital Landing we try to keep our readers in the loop with safety and security concerns like cyberbullying, privacy concerns and other 21st century issues.
BitMoms is another resource for moms (and dads) who want to stay-up-to-date on issues and topics related to internet safety for their children. Helpful blogs, member forums and other ways to connect with moms like you trying to figure it all out.
Found via Tech Savvy Mama
BitMoms-a security resource for online moms is post on Digital Landing
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Privacy is so old school apparently
Gen Y thinks posting personal details on the Web is natural according to a new research study by Pew Research Center. Gen Y (those born after 1980) have always been connected and have shared information and aren’t likely to change.
They are “are leading society into a new world of personal disclosure and information-sharing.”"
According to the survey 69% of respondents said that by 2020 members of Gen Y will “continue to be ambient broadcasters” who disclose a great deal of personal information in order to stay connected and take advantage of social, economic, and political opportunities.
The report is part of a multi-year study of the internet and social networking habits of Millenials (Gen Y) the first always connected generation in history.
Facebook to add “face detection” for photo tagging
Facebook will soon add face detection technology to its photo sharing to make it easier to tag your friends on photographs you put online. Similar to digital cameras who can locate faces automatically, Facebook will now pre-select faces and you have only to answer “Who is this?” to tag your friends in albums large and small.
I have to admit when I first read this story I thought that Facebook was going to automatically suggest the name for each person, which I have to say, freaked me out. I’m sure it isn’t far behind (my iPhoto does it now), but somehow the thought of Facebook “knowing” my face from all the millions of faces in its system was a little disturbing.
Fortunately it’s nothing so sophisticated, but it is still probably a little useful.
Togetherville–social network for kids and parents
Togetherville is a social site for kids under 10 to play games, create art, and learn new things alongside their parents and people you know and trust to supervise.
Parents create their kid’s “neighborhood” using friends and family through Facebook.
On the site, kids can play ad-free games, create artwork, watch pre-screened videos and connect with approved friends.
The site says that parents can use the site to help teach their kids to be good members of the digital community.
As we know from other reports, kids are going to need all the help they can get.
Only parents can create a child’s account and parents are encouraged to use a child’s real name and photo to build real-world relationships. Togetherville builds a neighborhood for your child by drawing from the parent’s own Facebook network and linking with friends and children who are using Togetherville.
“Togetherville is social-networking training wheels for families,” said Anne Collier, co-director of ConnectSafely.org and co-chair of the Obama administration’s Online Safety & Technology Working Group.
My children are still a little young for this, but it could be a nice option as they age and start asking for their own Facebook pages.
No Facebook, says principal
A New Jersey middle school principal implores parents to keep their kids off of social networking sites like Facebook and Foursquare.
Anthony Orsini, the principal at Benjamin Franklin Middle School, sent an email to parents asking parents to help him get all of his students off social networks and keep track of their text messages.
He says his primary problem with the sites is that kids are psychologically prepared to withstand internet name-calling. He said that many posts by this age group are mean-spirited and often anonymous.
He writes:
He also rightly points out that the threat from another teen online is more prevalent than those of sexual predators.
According to Facebook, children under the age of 13 are officially prohibited from having accounts.
Talk with your children about their online behavior and set appropriate limits. If you need help, visit wiredsafety.org or other similar sites.
Just Twitter?
So, I don’t Twitter. I don’t care to. I have a facebook account and that’s enough for me, but I sure know a lot of people who Twitter. So as a gadget the TwitterPeek makes some sense.
Billed as a gadget for twittering only, that basically covers all the bases. A screen with a keyboard, not unlike a blackberry, ther TwitterPeek does not check email or make phone calls, it simply updates your twitter account in 140 characters of less. I mean, with an iphone, blackberry, or any other internet capable phone you can already update Twitter on the go so it seems silly not to just invest in a high class phone to feed the Twittering addiction, but hey, TwitterPeek could work.
And a child shall lead them
There is a disturbance in the Facebook force. An uproar over the redesigned Live Feed/News Feed pages on its uber-popular website.
Of course, like anything on Facebook, when people get upset about something they start a group. In this case, it’s the “CHANGE FACEBOOK BACK TO NORMAL” group and it boasts more than 1,500,000 members.
Who’s in charge of the group? A 14-year-old from Apex, NC near Raleigh named Jonathan Woodlief. His parents had no idea until reporters started calling the home to talk with the boy.
He actually didn’t start the group, but noticed it didn’t have an administrator so he “clicked a button” to make himself the admin.
It’s just another in a line of controversial choices by the powers-that-be at Facebook. Facebook contends that it made the changes in response to feedback from its users.
Some have posted workarounds for the new reality, but nothing makes it like it used to be exactly.
The only thing certain in the social media world is change.
Miss Manners for the Tech Set
Wired’s August cover story is “How to Behave: New Rules for Highly Evolved Humans.” It takes a scientific look at how people should respond to new social situations we find ourselves in thanks to the rise of social networking and the like.
The authors interviewed social psychologist, anthropologists and others to get a real look at how we can translate human social behavior norms into the new paradigm. For example, just as apes have a social hierarchy so should we –the article suggests we translate the rules to “friend” our boss but not our boss’ boss.
Some samples of the new etiquette rules are:
- Don’t lie with your Facebook photo.
- If you can’t buy it online, feel free to BitTorrent.
- Don’t hesitate to haggle on Craigslist.
- Don’t Google-stalk before a first date.
- Never broadcast your relationship status.
- Texting in the company of others is OK.
- Never BCC anyone.
- If your call drops, call back.
- Don’t blog or tweet anything with more than half a million hits.
