Smokescreen

An online game to teach young people (and maybe old people as well, I don't know, I haven't really played it yet) about the issues surrounding social networking and online privacy.

Might be worth a look - I'd appreciate any feedback about it.

Tweeting Police

Looks like the cops are now using Twitter (and maybe other stuff) to try to do the whole community policing thing in a more 21st Century sort of way.

There's a BBC article that explains all this and focuses on a jolly nice police person called Ed. He is not, as far as I am aware, a duck. Which is good.

"Posting a message on Twitter warning about a spate of burglaries in an area is a similar concept to pinning up a poster on the local parish council noticeboard."

"Doing either in isolation might be fine, but by doing both we can spread that warning even further."

Almost certainly useful for Jan10 exam.

And...

Greater Manchester police have been signing up users to get Facebook updates on crime in their area. More than 25,000 people seem to have signed up. Sign up! Get the updates!

Some of the links from these articles might be handy to take a look at as well.

Your mum on Facebook?

This kinda made me laugh more than anything when I first saw it.

Stanford University is running classes in how to use Facebook - for parents.

Stanford is a top class uni by the way, this isn't some local community college running a class. The class (which is also a research project interestingly) deals with the Six Stages of Facebook Mastery amongst other stuff.

There is a serious side (other than the research bit) of course, connected to internet safety, the longer term risks of publishing those oh so funny photos (err, job application time anyone?) and whathaveyou.

Shouldn't Facebook be private though? Should your mum be able to have a handle on what you're saying online? Hmm...

Some parents worry about joining Facebook because they don’t want to intrude on their child’s privacy. They see it as spying in their kid’s bedroom. This view -- Facebook as private bedroom -- is not accurate. This is not a good way to think. Why not?

#1 - Strangers don’t enter a kid’s bedroom. But on Facebook, kids can interact with strangers.

#2 - In a bedroom, acts are not observable by hundreds of people. In contrast, what your child does on Facebook is widely observable.

#3 - Finally, what goes on in a bedroom is not recorded online, potentially forever, as it is on Facebook.

In short, we believe that if you view “Facebook as private bedroom” you will make mistakes in parenting.

From Facebook for Parents

Interestingly a group of parents came up with a list of 10 "commandments" for Facebook users. I wonder what you think of it:

1. “Friend” your family members on Facebook. If your child won't friend you, have at least one parent/guardian friend your child.

2. Teach your family about privacy settings. Discuss settings often.

3. Help loved ones think about the ramifications of posting & tagging photos.

4. Use Facebook so you understand it.

5. Turn "questionable actions" you see by others on FB into teachable moments for your family.

6. Help loved ones protect reputation by teaching that everything on FB is potentially public.

7. Look at the Facebook Walls of family members.

8. Review privacy settings monthly & share what you are doing with your family.

9. Help loved one see that FB is a public place where strangers can visit.

10. Talk often about FB with your family.

From: Facebook for Parents, Top 10 Ways to Protect Your Family on Facebook

My mum's not on Facebook though. And I should think that if she was I'd be looking to migrate to the next cool thing in social networking. Tweet anyone?

Careful what you type!

Hmm, so my meetings are boring?

Good job I didn't put that up on Facebook or somewhere then; I could get sacked, rather like this Essex teenager did:

A 16-year-old girl from Essex was fired after she described her office job as "boring" on her Facebook page.

Kimberley Swann, 16, of Clacton, had been working at Ivell Marketing & Logistics, in Clacton, for three weeks before being fired on Monday.

"I think they've stooped quite low," she said.

Facebook remark teenager is fired, on the BBC Essex site

"Stooped quite low"?

Of course, if she hadn't added half her workmates as friends then I don't suppose they'd have seen the comment. Some people might say this raises issues about privacy and the internet. Yes, it might - but it also raises issues about how careful you have to be about putting stuff up on the internet that you don't want other people to see.

It's all very easy to quickly blog something, or stick it on a Facebook profile or Tweet it or whathaveyou, but once it's there it can be tricky to get rid of, particularly if you put it anywhere near the public domain.

So, hard done by for getting sacked? Or a little bit naive about what the internet and the ubiquitous computing it brings with it means?

I'll go for the second of those please Bob.

Oh, I should just say how much I adore the meetings I go to for my proper job by the way...

Nice Face (book)

Ah, now there you go. Facebook get negative press one day and then they come back and seemingly offer "control" to their users.

Actually, it seems like a solid move in the fast evolving world of social networking.

Founder Mark Zuckerberg said the aim was to "open up Facebook so that users can participate meaningfully in our policies and our future".
From Facebook offers control to users on the BBC

Facebook has good market share and has become one of the key "names" in the social networking world. But, what you need to remember with all this, is that names, particularly in the dot.com world, can disappear quicker than a duck into a Ferrari if you're not careful.

Who remembers using Alta Vista as the go to search engine? Hmm, certainly do, but nowadays I never seem to go there. The ubiquitous Google occupies the dominant search engine position and is the name. How about Friends Reunited - once a major name, now who goes there? Or Internet Explorer? (OK, that's wishful thinking, although...)

Anyway, Facebook seems to be giving back some control, perhaps even a town hall type of approach with votes and everything to decide policy. In the increasingly wiki-world that seems like good sense:

"People should own their information. They should have the freedom to share it with anyone they want and take it with them anywhere they want, including removing it from the Facebook Service."

I'd say that's a step forward. And a good way for Facebook to retain their growing status and market share as well.

The Ills of Social Networking (sniff)

Feeling a bit under the weather? Can't shake off a sniffle?

Hmm, so maybe it's all that social networking you've been doing.

Lots of reports about this just now, with an 'expert' claiming that social networking sites could harm your health because they limit your face to face contact with other human beings. I guess that what you make up with in not catching their germs, you lose by, well, this:

...evidence suggests that a lack of face-to-face networking could alter the way genes work, upset immune responses, hormone levels, the function of arteries, and influence mental performance.

This, (the expert) claims, could increase the risk of health problems as serious as cancer, strokes, heart disease, and dementia.

Blimey! Good job I'm old and we didn't have all this internets stuff when I was growing up.

So, if you're tweeting on facebook all the time, maybe you should think of your health a bit more? Do you think??

Mind you, it seems even the trees are getting in on this social networking larch. There's an Activity Forest park in Devon that's got a Facebook profile.

Facebook and what they know...

So, you've signed up to some sort of web social networking thingy? Apparently lots of people have.

Well, what about your content? What about your privacy settings? Can anyone find you, or do you restrict what people can find out about you?

The whole Facebook row which has been in the news is a good example of where this is contentious when changes start to be made.

If you didn't follow the story, basically Facebook decided that they wanted to change their "terms of service" (that's the bit that you didn't read before you ticked the box and hit the I Agree button, OK?) to allow them to claim "ownership" over all the content members put on the site. This BBC story kind of explains it. They then had to back down because lots of people decided they thought this was a Bad Thing - as summarised by the BBC again.

Hmm, please read them carefully? All 6,839 words?! (yes, I counted them...)

All very well - the change of heart is "temporary" and maybe the original plan wasn't actually to claim ownership either, although that's how it hit the headlines which would have put some users off at least.

What is interesting is that all this "new" social networking stuff is basically giving people a free reign over what they put online. The problem with putting content online is that you then lose some element of control over it before you start. Need an example? Ever taken a photo from a website? Or copied some text? Or accessed a friend's profile? (or, more interestingly, an enemy's?!!).

Losing control isn't necessarily a bad thing, so long as you control what you lose control of. Do I mind if the details I put on this blog are in the public domain? No, not really - I've limited what I've put in the profile that goes with it deliberately so that it doesn't matter.

But here's a thing - seems lots of people don't change security settings or have any idea what ticking the box and hitting the I Agree button allows someone else to do:

It is likely though that until the row over Facebook's Terms and Conditions went public, few people knew what rights sites claim over the content that their members upload and share.

"Less than 25% of users are making a specific point of going to the privacy settings and making changes," said Simon Davies, head of digital rights group Privacy International.

From: Whose data is it anyway? (BBC, 20/2/09)

Does this matter? Should people care what companies do with their details or who can access them? What information about you is there online that in 10 years time might come back to haunt you?

Or, for that matter, about me...