Does Your Child Blog?
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According to BlogPulse, as of this writing there have been 46,988 new blogs launched in the past 24 hours. That’s a lot of bloggin’!
What’s a blog? It’s a simple, yet effective way to communicate on the Web. It’s basically the same thing as a Web site, but the difference is what tools are used to create it. There are a variety of tools available, some are free or are purchased. But no matter, they all have one thing in common: you don’t have to be a programmer to get one up and running.
This is why blogs have become so popular. Most bloggers have a need to speak their minds and share their ideas with other individuals. Teens are attracted to them because they’re at an important stage in their life where they want to be heard and enjoy exchanging ideas and information.
Some teens, perhaps a great deal of them, use blogs as an online diary. Doing so could be dangerous, however. The traditional paper variety of diary is typically kept private, left only to the whims of siblings trying to sneak a peek. Blogs are anything but private. Even if visitors are required to logon, they’re still public only to a smaller audience.
What better way for someone to get to know what makes you tick (and possibly ensare you) than to reveal your innermost thoughts on a blog for all the world to see? I’m not condemning blogs (I mean, I’m using one aren’t I? :P), but teens have a natural tendency to establish their identity and share with other like-minded teens.
The trouble is that they also lack the experience to discern when they’re possibly giving too much away, or may become too trusting of someone who “really cares”. Just like a sexual predator can learn about someone by viewing their online profiles (e.g. AOL, Yahoo!, forums and chat rooms), a blog can be the jackpot.
So if you’re a teen who likes to blog:
- Be careful of what you post.
- If the only contact you have made with people you blog with has only been online, then NEVER meet them offline and don’t risk giving them your personal information.
- Go to your parents when you encounter something that doesn’t make you feel comfortable, especially if you’ve been asked to meet with someone or to send them photos of yourself, your personal information, or information about your family.
If you’re a parent with a child who blogs:
- Ask them what they blog about
- Do they have a blog? Visit other blogs? Both?
- Are they perhaps spending too much time blogging and not doing other activities that would make them a more well-rounded person?
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[…] in this post — http://www.familywebwatch.com/blog/2005/05/12/blogs-are-not-diaries/ — and others like it, the bottom border is extending far beyond where I want it to. It should be […]