I am talking to your kids and so is everyone else
I play a game on line called World of Warcraft. It is like a big Dungeons and dragons game only the charaters are diffrent if that helps you imagine it a bit. In this game I am talking to people all over the world. (that is SO cool) They are talking to me. We group together to go adventuring together in this game, and we have ways of talking to each other. This game has lots of...... very pretty charaters on it..... that you make and control they are you and you can do lots of things with them (not have sex you cannot do that). BUT it is clear to me that this is a pretty adult type game young adult sure but adult. So what are your kids doing there!!??! Your kids.....asking me stuff like how to get the girl they like to look at them? and what they should do about their sucidal friend?? and if they are coming to me who sits there and says listen I am an old lady at 36 go play with the ppl your own age.... what do you THINK people who like kids the wrong way are doing??? Why are your kids on there for 10-15hrs at a time?? WHY?? I can't protect them this game is huge thousands of people at least are on it with 20+ server and that is just the USA servers. And yes I try and tell them to go to their parents but still....... usually they just move on to the next person and ask them .... I don't know where the parents are..... I wish it was just one kid..... but it isn't..... I really get mad. Grown up things should be for adults, get your kids on a kid game with a high lvl of moderation. Our moderters are not suffecnet enough to take care of your kids. At 15$ a month what did you expect?!!? come on no one gets paied that little to take care of your kids......
posted by achromic at 5:47 PM
12 Comments:
I have a (content)lock on the kid's computer and I drop in on them constantly to make sure they're where they belong.
You're right of course.
we don't know what technology will be like when Baby R is older but we do know that we will be involved. Computers will be out in public rooms and phones too. Just like when I was a kid. Ok, well I didn't have a computer but the phone was.
My parents also made efforts to talk to us about things and also to make sure we had lots of people to turn to if we didn't want to talk to my parents.
It always amazes me that so many kids have such unfettered access to the world. Do people really have no idea of what their kids access when they go online?
I would suppose they don't bacchus..... I cannot imagine what parent would want a 9 yr old or 10 yr old to have unlimited access to adults playing an RP game..... tons of sexual innuendo.... the chara are very sexually drawn and so is some of the clothing that they wear. The people that are on there for the most part are 17-40 from all around the world.. it bothers me greatly that these kids are dropped in there with very little supervion I highly doubt that being in the living room would actually protect the child if they were still allowed to play the game. It is very easy to hold private chat converstions with any body on your server. I don't feel that it is WOW's job to play parent and I like the game the way it is but I don't like that parents seem blissfully ignorant of what their kids are up to or the risk they are in.
LOL nammen yes WOW is one of the lest of the bad places a kid can come but that doesn't mean they should be on 7 days a week for 8-10hrs and I SEE that..... it isn't that I think computer games or socializing on the net is necassarly the worst thing in the world it is just that a kid should be doing in places that are set up for kids..... WOW is not tho they do make some consecion to parents with the parental control stuff. All I am saying is that it seems to me that some of these parents must not understand what their kids are doing or what they are particpating in. Tho' I do my best with the kids that I do run into to offer them a safe haven by running with me I cannot keep them from every child predtor out there. Not to mention that I can't see you appreciating me giving your kid advice on condoms LOL! (I DO try and direct them back to their parents) I think you have a idea of what WOW and other places are and when you child might be old enough to handle themselve approperatly in such a place (I think they should be 17 or older). But I don't understand these people who seem to drop their kid in front of the computer and expect their child to be ok. What is more is I don't want my game to end up like the water down verison of TV where we have to bow down to every parents fear that because they cannot and WILL not regluate their childs TV watching the rest of must be limited to the amount of sex and volience. I like choice. I don't people not watching their kids and therefor limiting my choices.
And trust me, my daughter is an expert on what kids will get away with when parental supervision is lax. I think I was very lucky the internet did not exist when she was growing up and she was very lucky that some of her wilder escapades didn't have more serious consequences. But, obviously, she is preaching to the already converted here. The question is how to reach those parents who are as naive about the internet as I was about how teenagers get away with skipping school and get access to alchohol and drugs. Short of attaching a web cam and recording device to their heads, how do you really ever know what the innocent-looking little devils are up to????
This is one area where I actually agree with you, Achromic. I can't emphasize enough that computers and filters can't replace parental invovlment. In this I mean it takes parents being involved/interested in what their chld is doing on the computer/internet, IN ADDITION to electronic filters and monitering programs. And namaan made a good point, many parents I agree are intimidated by the challenge of trying to supervise internet access or just don't know where to start. You see, this is an issue our library (where I work) has been tackling. Recently our library sponsored a seminar, for parents and children in the community on internet safety. The seminar took a multi-pronged approach 1) We had a speaker from the state police, whom gave statistics on missing and endangered children and the NCMEC website (awareness). 2)A detective specializing in child exploitation and internet safety concerns, gave information on the risks and how to be safer on various websites (i.e Myspace, Yahoo, Facebook, etc.) And he emphasized the importance of parents being involved and aware of what thier children are doing on the computer. (education) 3)A technical support specialist gave information on how to check a child's internet activities (via standard Windows features): history folder, internet cookies, and temporary internet files. But he also noted that many teens are quite savvy at computers and may know how to erase their tracks. So he also discussed parental controls, and various filtering and monitering software(which can be password protected), parents may also wish to utilitize. (safety). I think there's no one easy answer as to how to go about monitering a child on the computer, but rather we need to take a multi-demential approach.
Wow Rachel can we just make that class required for having a child? whats more can we make them go every 5yrs? I am not usually for more gov. and more laws and mandatory anything but the problem seem more like an epdemic nightmare that we don't know about because of the war or that ppl think it is SO complex it won't make a good news story. So many ppl SAY watch your kids on the internet but it is rare that you hear a response that actually gives the details of what needs to be done.
Achromic,
I know what you mean, but first of all, guardians need to be understand why and become interested in keeping their kids safe. We can't force it on them, this is something they need to choose. The website our presentation was based off of I believe is:
http://www.netsmartz.org/
Here's a couple more websites recommended at our library:
http://safekids.com/child_safety.htm
http://staysafe.org/
http://missingkids.com
http://cybertipline.com
Also you can find a list of kid friendly sites at "The Librarian's Guide to Great Websites for Kids"
http://ala.org/greatsites
I would say that parents should find more time for their kids.No tv no video games(don't permit trashes in your living room).If your kid wants to play of course ,play basket,play ball,whatever.When my father did that i said that he was very strict. Now i understand and feel gratefull because he was like that.Character building is the greater deficit of our times.Maybe this war of terror we suffer is because of this.
Visit
http://www.vitamins.info-doctor.com
http://www.info-doctor.com
http://www.selfgrowth.info-doctor.com
Huh.
My whole family plays DDO- which is along the same lines as WoW, except we've been able to 'team speak' from the beginning (former WoW player too- miss my lvl 40 huntress). Anyways, my lil sis is 15- she found the joys of DDO this summer. She went from hanging out with an unsavoury group of friends and misbehaving, not listening, etc, (and don't always blame it on parents- some kids are very hard cookies to crack- she's been to the therapist, she's been to the psychiatrist, she's just stubborn as hell) to actually listening (because there was leverage- she didn't want the computer taken away), helping out (because she wanted game time), and sitting at the computer talking to people under MY supervision (I am her older sister by far too many years!). My 18 year old sister plays DDO, my older (34ish) sister plays DDO, and my husband plays DDO- we all keep an eye on one another.
I DO agree that kids, for the most part, should not be playing MMPORGs- but then again, there are times when it can be an improvement upon what the child would be doing otherwise.
I know on WoW, we preferred our guild to be child-free. Of course, the child could always lie- but then it wouldn't be our fault if they heard the sexual innuendo, etc, in chat.
if a kid comes to you for help you are probably all that they have to talk to so help them and stop complaining about it a little attention could go a long way.
Can anyone recommend the robust Remote Management utility for a small IT service company like mine? Does anyone use Kaseya.com or GFI.com? How do they compare to these guys I found recently: [url=http://www.n-able.com] N-able N-central performance reporting
[/url] ? What is your best take in cost vs performance among those three? I need a good advice please... Thanks in advance!
Post a Comment
<< Home