<p>We are just getting into the world of Facebook at our house and I am wondering if you veteran parents have any advice about how your teen can protect their privacy, and anything else (good or bad) that has occurred in your child’s life because of sites like facebook?</p>
<p>I have encouraged my kids (not that they’ve listened) to set up separate groups for their actual friends and for everyone else. Kids around here seem to friend-request anyone they’ve ever met, even those with whom they have an open antipathy, and it’s expected that these requests will be accepted. If the kids set up two lists, one for “real friends” and one for “facebook-only friends,” they can then set their privacy settings so that only their real friends can write on their walls, see what they post, tag them in pictures, comment on their stuff, etc.</p>
<p>Even if not willing to go this far, make sure your kids check their privacy settings and change them to “friends only.” The defaults for some things is friends-of-friends or even “everyone.” I see no reason why a kid should have his/her entire wall open to the world.</p>
<p>Facebook can be very useful for finding out about activities–in my kids’ case, auditions and performances and the like. But also brace yourself for finding out about activities from which your child was excluded–kids routinely take pictures and post about every shopping trip, slumber party, barbecue, outing to the movies, and whatnot, and it becomes very easy to find out what your “friends” are leaving you out of. If this is an issue for your teen, some hurt feeling may be in the works. It also makes it possible for your teen to wind up hurting others’ feelings in the same fashion. Even the simplest act of posting a “note” with one’s freshman schedule offers the opportunity to “tag” about 20 friends specifically…which 20 will your teen choose? Who will feel slighted by this? (My teen doesn’t tag anyone for this reason.)</p>
<p>Use the privacy settings, and set them all to “friends only.” And remind your teen that they don’t have to respond to every friend request they get - if they click “ignore,” the friend request goes away - but here’s the important part - the person who requested them does NOT receive any notification that they’ve been ignored. They just never get a response to their friend request. If it’s a casual friend, recent acquaintance, or some creep just randomly “friending” people, most of the time they’ll probably forget they even sent the request.</p>
<p>Agree with lafalum. Use tightest security settings on all options and ignore friend request form someone they don’t really know.</p>
<p>I agree completely that kids shouldn’t accept friend requests from people they don’t really know–and they will get them. However, the local expectation here is that kids will request/accept such peripheral acquaintances as every member of the cast of a two-week summer drama camp, whom they may or may not ever see again. (Some of the impetus may come from the desire to be able to tag people in pictures that were taken of this specific shared experience.)</p>
<p>My daughter has 52 pending requests she hasn’t accepted, but probably 3x as many she has who are not really her near-and-dear. By setting up a “less access” list that is functionally excluded from the things that friends can do, it is possible to limit what mere acquaintances can see/do.</p>
<p>(I do this with my own friends lists.)</p>
<p>
If they click “ignore” that person can then friend them again. Sometimes people forget who they have friended. I find it easier to actually just ignore it. Then on their list it’s shown as “pending” and they can’t ask again.</p>
<p>On the other hand, it prompts them to remember that they once requested you.</p>
<p>Some of those requests come from people the kids meet at a party or weekend retreat or two-week summer program…those people might never think of you again. So in that case, clicking “ignore” (vs. literally ingoring) a pending request may be the way to go.</p>
<p>I know she’s in the minority, but fwiw, my D (hs senior) is pretty adamant about not using fb or other social media sites.</p>
<p>Reason 1: she’s a fairly private person, and the idea just doesn’t appeal to her.</p>
<p>Reason 2: her freshman year, a young woman (early 20s?) came to her school and spoke about a pretty horrific stalking episode that had resulted in several awful experiences for her and an overwhelming disruption of normal life for her and her family. She told the audience what had happened to her and offered several pieces of advice to make sure they were never victimized as she was. The number one piece of advice? Shut down your fb and other social media pages immediately.</p>
<p>Now I realize this may have been rather drastic advice from someone who’d had a really, really bad experience, but my D was shocked by her story and how easily this smart, conscientious girl was taken advantage of…and decided then and there she wanted nothing to do with this technology. Incidentally, recently our Chief of Police spoke to a parents group and told of the increase in identity crime as well as stalking-related crimes they’re seeing that emanate from, or involve, fb usage.</p>
<p>My D is involved in many ECs, including music and theatre productions for which auditions and frequent communications among directors and cast are critical. Although some of these groups rely on fb, my D simply explains, "I don’t use fb, here’s my email address. So far there’s never been any pushback, and she gets all audition/production notices just fine.</p>
<p>I think if kids and parents want to use fb, and are aware of the risks, that’s fine. But you don’t have to be on fb to stay in communication about important events. There are plenty of other (safer) communication routes.</p>
<p>OTOH…My D was also heavily involved in EC’s in hs, and she found FB to be a very valuable tool. Most of the groups she was involved with - her sports team, the Class officers, National Honor Society - set up FB Groups. Then when they needed to reach each other, they just messaged everyone in the group. Everyone else in the group can see the chain of the conversation, too. A very easy, convenient and quick way of getting the word out that “the pasta party is cancelled cuz my mom has the flu!” or “Mrs G needs us all to be at school a half hour early tomorrow so we can organize the ticket sale” (to which there might be a reply, “If we have to be there early then I need a ride” and another reply, “Susie, I’ll pick you up.”) There was one girl whose mom did not allow her to have a FB until she was a senior, and the kids were always having to remember to have someone email or text Megan so she wouldn’t be left out.</p>
<p>It’s possible to set your FB so that you’re not even search-able. There’s a woman I knew in hs who I’ve seen commenting on other people’s pictures. But clicking on her name leads me nowhere, and searching by that name brings up “no matches.” And not being on FB doesn’t keep people from posting pictures of you on FB. They can even tag you, it’s just that the tag won’t link to your FB page (since you don’t have one). </p>
<p>So staying off of FB is no guarantee of privacy.</p>
<p>I agree if there’s a stalking issue, shutting down FB, Twitter etc is Step One. But not having a FB won’t prevent it from happening.</p>
<p>And if your d is a HS senior, colleges, especially the one she ultimately plans to attend, will have fb pages for incoming freshmen, etc. Some schools use it as a tool for finding roommates. It is helpful more than it is hurtful, IMO.</p>
<p>Facebook is just another mousetrap. If you have close friends, you dont need facebook. You can notify people by email or txt or phone calls. Everyone else is just gossiping and perusing your private life. In essence, its putting your private life in the public domaine. I am certain creeps find ways to break into private groups. Things you say and post can be found and seen by employers, college admissions officers, cops, and creeps. </p>
<p>I have never for the life of me understood the attraction of these social networking sites. Now retailers are using facebook and yes, they use your comments and cookies to track what you want and say and who knows where that database goes? </p>
<p>In less than 15 years we have essentially abdicated our privacy. That is shocking. And once its gone, you cant put the genie back in the bottle. </p>
<p>Sadly, because humans do things in large groups who wield power (like cattle going over a cliff at times) , we have very little control over the direction of our social structure and economy. There are PhD’s doing research on the negative impact of video games, computers, cellphones and ipods on the brain, particularly with regard to social manners and communication skills. From what I read, its not good news. Not to mention how these gadgets have decimated whole industries that employed millions of people. Everyone cheers new gadgets and technology, but I see a large herd of cattle going over a cliff. Call me a neanderthal and old paradigm dinosaur. I don’t care. I have the perspective and vision of living in both worlds. (Age will do that for you.) </p>
<p>I dont know where all this is going, but I am not very comfortable with it at present. Its beginning to look a lot like Brave New World and 1984, the books we read as kids and thought it silly to be so paranoid about Mr. Evil. But we are living it now, it seems to me. </p>
<p>I digress a bit on the topic. Sure, there are some minor positive effects and conveniences. What are collges going to do with their libraries and rare books? The book publishing industry is going to disappear like the newspaper industry is doing now. Its scary. We will all become Know-bots.</p>
<p>wow, ghostbuster Thats awfully cynical.</p>
<p>My one simple rule for Facebook:</p>
<p>Consider it a bulletin board that the whole world may see. If there is someone out there that you don’t want knowing something, anything, don’t post it on Facebook. Photos included.</p>
<p>momofsongbird, my kids are both with your daughter. Oldest son, a college senior, had a facebook page for a while with the tightest privacy settings. He shut it down this summer because he as he said “people keep wanting to talk to me”. Second son, a college freshman has a page that his friends set up and maintain (although he set the privacy settings and has complete control if he wants). He says his page is mostly people placing bets on who is really running the page, since everyone who knows him know that facebook just isn’t his style ( he told me last night that he has 12 friends). </p>
<p>I think the issue here is just that – facebook just isn’t everyone’s thing. For both of my kids the main issue is what you list as your daughter’s #1 – they are both intensely private individuals and they find something kind of creepy about people sharing all the details of their lives with the world. </p>
<p>Like your daughter they find that they get the information they need for their social lives without facebook. Oldest son says that his real friends know to ask him to a party personally (he does have a cellphone and he will read a text although he never sends them). He says he never enjoyed a party where everyone was invited by mass invitation anyway, so it doesn’t bother him that he might miss a party that someone he only knows tangentialy is throwing. </p>
<p>It is helpful to some, but it is not a necessity by any means.</p>
<p>I think facebook is pretty much essential. A lot of professors, coaches etc use it to pass on information- not to mention the purely social aspects of it. I can not imagine a college student not having a facebook account. I almost can’t imagine someone in MY age group not using it. Fortune 500 executives are getting trained on the use of social media and the message is loud and clear “It’s here- embrace it or be left behind.”</p>
<p>
D joined her college’s Class of 2014 group, then a sub-group of kids from our area going to her college formed another FB group/page, and eventually about 18 kids from that group met up and spent an afternoon together and went out to dinner. From that FB group and the dinner outing, D found her roommate and I am SO glad she did. They are an excellent match, get along great, were able to coordinate everything for the room in advance. They didn’t agree to room together until they had met face-to-face and spent a few hours together, but they never would have met if not for the FB group. </p>
<p>
True. Like it or hate it - but learn to use it. And learn to use privacy settings!</p>
<p>lololu-
I assume your s knows that you can set the “chat” option to away, or whatever it is called (don’t recall off the top of my head) so others don’t see him when he is on and won’t try to “chat”. IMO, there is nothing wrong with chatting, and if he is busy and not able to or not interested in doing so, either just say so or ignore the little pop up.</p>
<p>I agree with MOWC. Have found fb (and linkedin) to be very helpful in finding and communicating with people. Maybe those who find it too intrusive might also want to wear a tin foil hat to keep out all the bugs coming from satellite to the fillings in our teeth 
(jk)</p>
<p>In the chat box on FB (lower right corner) click on the box - then on the settings (picture of a gear) then click “Go Offline.” No one can contact you to chat and no one will know you are online.</p>
<p>Thats it, lafalum – thanks. </p>
<p>No takers for a tin foil hat?? ;)</p>
<p>Tin foil hats look lovely with the right accessories.</p>