Where Can I Find My Child in All This?

Posted by Ken

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I had the pleasure of speaking to a group of parents at a local school last week. I presented information on Internet education and safety. One of the questions asked of me was, “How do you know if your child or a friend of their’s has a MySpace account?” Well, you could search on the kid’s name, assuming they’ve got it on their space.

With what I’ve seen on these sites, a lot of kids give a great deal of information about themselves, so it is possible to find someone by searching their name. However, the drawback is that, in some cases, you end up with over a thousand results, depending on the name. I’d have to be really determined to search for one person out of that many people to find them. But, honestly, it’s like looking for a needle in a haystack, and that’s never an appealing setup.

And that, IMHO, is one of the attractions for teens who have an online presence at one of these sites. It’s hard to find someone among many people, so it’s unlikely a parent will even take the time to hunt down someone in particular. Since it’s social network, that means they’ll invite their friends by sending them their specific URL to go to their space.

You should narrow your search by entering unique keywords about the person you’re looking for. MySpace has a robust search engine allowing users to search on a plethora of characteristics (i.e., city, state, name, username, religion, sexual orientation, gender, etc.). It’s important to remember, however, that those characteristics are only as good as the people who entered them in the first place — the kids with an account.

So while it is possible to find someone in a social network, you’re better off asking your kid directly if they have such an account. Tough? Maybe, but the right thing to do.

Internet Safety