Wow what an epiphany... If you really want to know who your child is and what they are up to... do a myspace search on your kid.
Click on all of their friends and read comments left by your child.and read comments their friends are leaving them.
Most teenagers have a myspace account and it's pretty amazing what you can learn... be prepared to be shocked however.. :eek:

Hi,
MySpace has been in the National Network TV News frequently. Parents who don't keep an "eye out" with their kids have no idea what kind of information these kids are putting on profiles.
Things like their real names, phone numbers, and real addresses!
Having been an ex Customer Care Representative for one of the largest cell phone companies, we use to think it should be mandatory for customers to take a 30 day class in cell phone use, before they used it. Such as; one had a $1,000 phone bill for one month, thinking "long distance" meant calling England from the US!
How does one teach a parent to supervise their children on the computer? Who knows.

Like rickj said, I should hope it ALL starts here!

If you have to resort to SPYING on your children and INVADING their privacy, then you've obviously done something wrong in the first place

In fact, it is not that hard. Set some ground rules such as never give out your last name, address, phone numbers, etc.

Wow. Sometimes people don't realize certain thing. But a 30 day class? Couldn't all that information be conveyed in 1 class?

I think that Myspace is a beautiful thing, I am of course a teen, and to be honest I have a kind of social darwinism look on this, if a kid is dumb enough to put their info on the internet then they should be prepared to accept the consequences. If you can charge myspace with one thing, it would be making it easier for a kid to make a web page. Myspace is really just a site holding web pages, the only thing is that it's only one web page per person. It still uses an html format and requires html coding for anything that happens on the web page. If kids wanted badly enough to display their life on the web, they could have done it already. I do admit that some people get pretty revealing on their myspace, as for myself I don't really share that much other than my simple likes and dislikes, and my aim and email. All in all it really is a more simplified internet, I mean you could technically do the same thing with web pages, but myspace allows you to have buddies and what not and really it's just a cyber hang out for a new generation of kids. And like anything on the internet you can only take things at face value, and can never be sure who people really are so if people follow the same procedures as when they talk on instant messangers they should be fine, but again it seems that the dumb and ignorant ruin it for the rest of us.

Kids have a sense of invulnerability. They just don't think bad things can happen to them until it does. Kids who put up personal info on places like MySpace aren't necessarily being dumb, they may not know better.

As Rick pointed out the parent needs to set some ground rules before allowing access. Depending on the child, some monitoring may be necessary to ensure the child knows and obeys the rules.

Yea, my Dad was pretty strict growing up, and this made it hard to do anything without him knowing something about it. But I found ways to do it, all kids test the limits, especially teenagers. There is a right way and a wrong way to deal with this, you have to COMMUNICATE with them. This is the only way. Yelling and grounding doesn't always work. I mean, have you seen some of the profiles on their of some of the teenage girls? They look like pornstars in their pictures. Talk about an invitation for a sexual predator. I just think communicating with your kids and telling them how one needs to respect themselves enough not to act a certain way, and maybe put a little fear into them, about how My Space is the #1 site for sexual predators to hang out. Open the door for your kids to be able to come to you and talk to you when something isn't right. I believe this is the key.

I agree you need to have ground rules and keep an eye on what kids are doing on the web! Scott makes a good point that kids just take a lot for face value and may not even know better than to post there details...

This is 100% what the sick people out there pray on.

Yea, I agree, kids think they are indestructable. I know I did when I was younger.

I think everyone to a degree thinks they are invulnerable, or else we wouldn't be living. I mean if all a person did was sit there and calculate the risks of what he was about to do he wouldn't have much of a life. You can say teenagers have an invulnerability complex and they think they are indestructible, but the only way they get past that is by EXPERIENCE, tell a kid a million times that the stove is hot, but I guarantee you that the kid will probably still test the limits as the person said before me and try to touch the stove. As long as you can control those limits then you can raise a healthy teen. It's never going to work to tell someone not to do something because you went through it, in most cases they need first hand experience in order to find out exactly how bad something is or the ramifications of it. In conclusion the invulnerability that is associated with teens is directly related to the amount of inexperience.

You really are a wizzkid, eh? Couldn't rep you again but good post!

Your so wrong for violating your child's space. I think that if your that desprite to know about your children then you must have a horrible relationship with them. To the point that you need to sneak behind their backs. Wow that's low even for a nosey parent. If you really want to know something just ask

Obviously you are not a parent. When you have kids of your own you WILL change your tune.

Speaking as a teenager, it's wrong to invade you're children's privacy. You were a teen once, you should know how we feel!

Speaking as a parent your child's safety holds a much higher priority than their privacy. Yes I still remember what it was like as a teenager, but I understand my parents caring for me much more than I did then.

You guys think us kids have a proberlem! I have to supervise my father on the computer because if I leave him alone the next day there's a stupid virus or its full of spyware!

And children don't lie? Teens don't try to hide things like drinking, drugs, sex, from their parents? So we can ask, but how do we know that it is the truth, peer pressure is tough.

It is very obvious that you are not a parent. And when you do become one, I am sure you will change your tune.

This thread should be closed as it is over a year old.

Speaking as a teenager who does party and do a lot of things my mother probably wouldn't be proud of, myspace is NOT the root of all evils. I know plenty of kids who Don't have myspace pages who are out all the time partying and getting arrested, etc.

The kids who do have a myspace seem to be the kids who have nothing better to do than to sit on the computer all night and play with html and bullitens. Although myspace IS a site for sexual predators online, if your child is dumb enough to talk to a 20-50 year old man woman w/e then they need a serious intervention. Most of the teens who use myspace use it as a way to communicate with their peers and friends and to keep in touch with people from school/work/friends/ etc.

Of course there are things on your child's myspace that they wouldn't want you to know about. That's why 85% of teens myspaces are PRIVATE. Because we're smarter than to give our name,address, personal info, etc. on the INTERNET. If you are dumb enough to do that, you're asking for issues.

All I can say is that my mom really does trust me to do the right things, and even though I don't ALWAYS do right, I always try to make her happy with the decisions I do make and I try my best to learn from my mistakes and be a responsible young adult. My mom has given me a good bit of freedom but she still tugs the leash a time or two. As long as you have a gentle but possibly firm hand with your child and talk to them about these issues instead of stirring up controversy about something you know nothing about because everyone else(who also has no clue) says something bad about it.

Trust your children enough to let them make their own decisions. Ultimately they will find a wormhole in your system of parenting, but the difference is how you handle it and how you face the consequences WITH your child. Ask them why they felt the need to do something or instead of punishing them to make them upset, simply look them in the eye and tell them, "i am severely dissapointed that you would sink to that level". I know my mom NEVER yells at me, but if she does once in a blue moon, I feel horrible to the point where it makes me cry. I hate hurting my mother and knowing that I dishonor her. So just be gentle and delicate with your kids because they will never learn if they have a drill sergeant for a parent

Yeah there are a lot of things like that. But like DrJizzle said "if you have to resort to SPYING on your children and INVADING their privacy, then you've obviously done something wrong in the first place" I totally agree. I am a teen and do have a myspace and I still am appalled at what some of my friends do on their myspaces. My mom has a myspace as well and she doesn't spy on my sisters or I. She comes in and looks at it sometimes but it is all about the trust. Ask your kids one day to see it and if they say "no" you know something is wrong. Then just talk to them about it and tell them what they can and cannot do. There is really no need to spy.