Social Networking
Social Networking web sites
such as MySpace.com, Xanga.com and Facebook.com are becoming very popular with
young people. The ability to post a personalized web pages
at no cost to the user appears to be very popular with youth today.
To start a page, most sites
ask for minimal information such as Name, age and zipcode. They also ask you to create a userid and password.
Once logged into the site you may choose to upload a picture, link music
to your site, post personal information about your self or invite friends who
also have web pages to visit your page.
In most cases the site will provide an information template that you may
fill out or skip. It is here that some
children are simply sharing to much personal information.
Social Networking sites give
you the option of setting your page to private, which
means only those friends or members that you have invited may view/access your
page. Once you have become a member of
one of the social networking sites you are able to invite friends to your page.
In most cases children are
ahead of their parents in the area of social networking.
MySpace.com is a social
networking Web site that has been in the news recently because of concerns
about content and the young viewers present on the site. We will explore in more detail MySpace.com in
the following areas:
History of MySpace.com & Current Statistics
MySpace.com is a social networking Web site
that allows members to post pictures, comments and music at no cost to the
member. The members are able to create a
personal web page that is at this time mostly unregulated. It is this difference that has made
MySpace.com the choice of young users over other social networking web sites
like Xanga.com and Facebook.com.
News Corp. bought
MySpace.com in July of 2005 for $580 million.
Rupert Murdoch, owner of News Corp. saw the site as a means to increase
his advertising revenues by moving into the Internet and the proliferation of
high-speed Internet connections. Mr.
Murdoch purchased News Corp. for 1.3 billion along with other Web based sites
aimed at videogames, movies and sports fans.
MySpace.com topped all other
Social Networking Sites over the last year as seen in the table provided by http://www.nielsen-netratings.com/news.jsp
Top 10 Social Networking
Sites for April 2006 (
|
Site |
Apr-05 Unique Visitors |
Apr-06 Unique Visitors |
Growth |
|
MySpace |
8,210 |
38,359 |
367% |
|
Blogger |
10,301 |
18,508 |
80% |
|
Classmates Online |
11,672 |
18,508 |
10% |
|
YouTube |
N/A |
12,505 |
N/A |
|
MSN Groups |
12,352 |
10,570 |
-14% |
|
AOL Hometown |
11,236 |
9,590 |
-15% |
|
Yahoo! Groups |
8,262 |
9,165 |
11% |
|
MSN Spaces |
1,857 |
7,165 |
286% |
|
Six Apart TypePad |
5,065 |
6,711 |
32% |
|
Xanga.com |
5,202 |
6,631 |
27% |
Source: Nielsen//NetRatings,
May 2006
The freedom associated with the
MySpace.com site is what is driving the growth of this site. The freedom provides continually refreshed
content provided by the members. The typical amount of time spent by a user on
the MySpace.com site is roughly two hours.
It also has the highest retention rate of users, 67%.
What brings members to the
MySpace.com site, freedom of expression is exactly what has possible
advertisers worried about investing large dollars with the site. Contracts are being rewritten with release
clauses shorted to two or three days as opposed to the traditional two weeks. Allowing companies to pull their ads quickly if the site should
sour over night.
The user base is also a
point of concern because the youthful consumer has been know to quickly change
allegiances from one product to another with little or no warning.
Also interesting to note
that the Webby Special Achievement awards for Webby Breakout of the Year is
being awarded to social networking Web site MySpace.com and its founders Tom
Anderson and Chris DeWolfe.
My Space Content Issues for Schools
MySpace.com has made
headlines over the last year because of concerns among parents, educators and
authorities that the content is to risqué for the young audience drawn to the
site. News items such as:
·
Playboy Enterprises has launched a casting call for a “Girls of
MySpace.com” because of the number of sexually explicit photos found on the
site.
·
Several states
are conducting investigations into sexual abuse allegations resulting from
online predators meeting children via the site.
In response to this News Corp. the owner
of MySpace.com has appointed a “safety czar” to oversee the site. Responsibilities of the safety czar include
an educational campaign to schools and the public encouraging children not to
reveal contact information, limiting access of certain groups such as
“swingers” to those over age 18, blocking search terms that online predators
might use to locate children and encouraging children ages 14 to 16 to make
their pages private.
News Corp. has stated that
they do review all photos posted to the site but admits that very few are
rejected. They also note that in many
cases the users are linking their pages to sites such as PhotoBucket.com and ImageShack.us which
to date are allowing explicit material.
Schools and Libraries are
required under the Children’s Internet
Protection Act of 2000 to block or filter all offensive content from
internet connected schools. As such
social networking sites such as MySpace.com are being blocked from access by
students. But they are able in many
cases to circumvent these filters by reading detailed techniques provided by
sites such as letmeby.com or unblockmysite.com.
Another work around students are using is connecting via an IP address
to a friends web server and then out to the site of their choice.
Because of the laws
governing schools and offensive content they find themselves potentially liable
if students access these sites on school property or at home using school
property such as a laptop computer. Thus
schools must take every step possible to prevent such access.
Some schools are using
Acceptable Use Policies (AUP) to address the issue. Students must sign the AUP which includes
agreeing to policies restricting them from social networking sites,
cyber-bullying and privacy of personal information. Other schools are adding lessons on the
social networking sites to their curriculum to educate students about how these
site work and the dangers of sharing too much personal data. It has been found that many students are
unaware of the fact that the “public” can read their personal diaries that are
found on these sites. Because of this
false sense of security children share personal information and thoughts that
they might normally keep private.
These sites have also been
seen as a place where adolescent behavior such as bullying can become out of
control because of the lack of immediate social interaction. And schools are holding students accountable
for what they post on these sites, particularly if it is hurtful to the school
or another student. The information that
a student posts on their page is public and can be seen by other students and
the community and they should understand this when they choose to post
disparaging remarks.
A firm in
A proposed law, Deleting
Online Predators Act, was just introduced by the House Republicans on May 9,
2006 which would require schools and libraries to install software on their
computers to bar students from accessing social networking sites. The In most cases, schools are already doing
this.
Security
PC World published an article on June 2,
2006 concerning Phishing scam targeted at
MySpace.com. The scam begins with a
message sent via an instant messaging program.
The user response and is directed to a fraudulent MySpace.com login
page. As the user logs in, they are
accessing the actual MySpace.com site by now doing it through the hackers software, thus giving the hacker access to personal
information contained in the users MySpace.com page. The site located on a
Psychology of ‘bloggers’
A whole new vocabulary has
grown from the cyber world and the blogger, terms such as dissociative anonymity (You don’t know me); solipsistic
introjection (It’s all in my head); and dissociative imagination (It’s just a game) are all
part of what is known as a digital
identity.
These behaviors exhibited by
bloggers are online disinhibition behaviors and are directly
related to the fact that the user is in cyber space. A Wall Street Journal
article on the subject describes disinhibition as “what the world would look
like if everyone behaved like Jerry Lewis or Paris Hilton or we all lived in
An article by John Suler's The Psychology
of Cyberspace details all of these behaviors as well as others related
to communicating in cyber space. It
differentiates disinhibition as toxic or benign. Benign is simply an open exploration of ones self
in a non harmful manner to the public.
But toxic disinhibition has a negative affect on society and is
described in the article as “rude
language and harsh criticisms, anger, hatred, even threats. Or people explore
the dark underworld of the internet, places of pornography and violence, places
they would never visit in the real world.”
An example of toxic
disinhibited behavior would be disinhibited vocabulary. As noted above, rude language or harsh
criticisms are becoming the norm in places it was never expected to be found. Places like the Daily Kos, an influential blogging site in
Democratic politics. It is commonly
found on television shows such as “The Sopranos” or stand up comedy routines.
And much of the popular music is a clearly exhibiting disinhibited vocabulary
in its songs.
At what time in the history
of civilization has there been a communication vehicle that brought vast
numbers of people together interactively?
How does society address the issue of online disinhibition made possible
by this new Wild West called cyberspace? These are questions that society will
have to struggle with over the next several years. Too many these issues are a grave concern.
Conclusion
As children we are taught
not to talk to strangers and not to give our address or phone number to any one
other than a police man. But it was rare
to find oneself in a situation where we were being asked for our address or
phone number. Today that is simply not
the case. Children sit down at a
computer to do research or play a game on a website and they are often prompted
for personal information. This
information is often required if they want the information or to play the game
they seek. With the advent of social
networking the idea of sharing this type of information has become “cool” for
many young people. But just as we were
taught to respect fire or water because they could hurt us, we must also teach
children and in many cases ourselves that the internet is to be respected
because it to can cause us harm. It can also be a tool that can add value to
our lives but only if we use it wisely.
To some degree the internet
has disarmed us we don’t see it immediately as a threat to our personal
privacy. Our natural instincts to be
afraid of something simply do not apply to sitting in our homes surfing the
internet. After all we are safe in our
homes. But sites like MySpace.com and
other social networking sites has raised concern that young people especially
need to be educated about the internet and the dangers that exist in
cyberspace. These dangers are two fold, first there is the internets ability to put us at ease
thus allowing disinhibited behavior.
Even in its benign state the user is sharing too much information with
strangers. The second risk is the
predators or criminals who lay in wait for us to cross their paths. This risk can be much more harmful in the end
but it would be much less likely to occur if the first risk did not exist. Parents and Educators must teach our youth
how to use the internet to their benefit and not become victims of
cyberspace.
Sources:
Wall Street Journal
Online: http://online.wsj.com/public/us
PC World Magazine Online: http://www.pcworld.com/
Education Week Magazine Online: http://www.edweek.org/ew/index.html