HELPING YOUR KIDS TO NETWORK SAFELY

Instead, you want to help them enter this world safely. You have to teach them to cover up in public. Your teens cannot disclose their address, the name of their school, or the name of the mall where they're planning to meet this weekend.

Steps to MySpace Safety:

• Sit your kids down with the tips (see below) for building a MySpace page and make them promise they will only grant access to a limited list of friends and relatives.

• Find out what they think is real and what is fantasy. It's tempting to start a new relationship with a person who sounds really cool, but if that person is asking your teen to keep the relationship a secret, there's something wrong. Explain that any new online friend who asks your teen to keep their relationship a secret is probably not on the up-and-up.

• Ask to see their profile page. tomorrow! This gives them a chance to remove everything that isn't appropriate or safe. and it becomes a way to teach them what not to post instead of being a "gotcha" moment! Ask if you can see their page again every so often.

• Join WiredSafety.org and help create a local cyberneighborhood watch program in your community.

• And, finally, tell your teens-repeat after me- "I'm still the parent!" If they don't listen or follow your rules, get help from organizations like WiredSafety or Teenangels.

MySpace and other social networking sites are here to stay, and your kids must learn to deal with them safely. .. Bill Pfleging is the former Director of Community for Lycos Networks and technology writer living and working in Woodstock, New York, and is the co-author of The Geek Gap published by Prometheus Books.

How to Build a MySpace Page:

1. Click "Sign Up!" on the main page, and then fill out the basic information page with your contact information. Click "Submit".

2. Upload a picture, or click the "Skip for now" link.

3. Invite friends or relatives to your new MySpace page by putting in their email addresses in the "To:" box. Or click the "Skip for now" link.

4. Open your email with "MySpace Account Confirmation" in the subject line. Click the link to confirm. Now it's created! But wait, it's still public. Let's make it private.

5. Go to MySpace.com and sign in your email address and password. Click the link for "Account Settings" next to the space for your picture.

6. Click the red text next to "Privacy Settings" that says "Change Settings", and check the box that prohibits receipt of any emails or newsletters from MySpace.

7. At the bottom, you can choose to make your site public or private. If you want it private, just click next to "Friends Only" and then click the "Change Settings" box below that.

• Previous Page
• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4

Issue: November 2007