I guess I figured that it would come to this one day, though not entirely surprised that it has; you walk into the library and some kids are getting picked up by truancy officers because they're skipping school chatting online through social-networking sites. Which should pretty much be banned because when they're not complaining about it they're kicking kids off of computers, or kids are hovering around, like 5 to a PC, because one is waiting for the other to finish, and so on and so forth. Hey, if you want to really make some money, you should open up a massive cyber cafe, like a 5 story building with like 300 PCs and take kids lunch money and everyone who really wants to use the computers in the public library could. You can even use Media Center Edition and rotate rap videos on the plasma out in the lobby. Sarcasm, perhaps, but is this what it has really come to, when patrons are stuck in the middle between waiting for the mob to pass, and the computer to become available?
Perhaps librarians, systems administrators, whomever, could simply block MySpace for viewing on the PCs in the library, the way that they do sites with profane and obscene material on them. It isn't as if that material isn't on MySpace; but that's a slippery slope, because if they do that they have to block a lot of other free websites that have disclaimers, but aren't really that serious about monitoring their traffic. Eventually MySpace will have some form of authentication, and hooked kids will be stealing credit cards so they can log on and talk to someone. MySpace is the way that it is, because of the quick society that we live in. MySpace kids with profiles are the latchkey children of the 80s; just that instead of the television set its downloading music, networking, and hooking up, all through one multipurpose site. But these are the same kids that were creating their own chat rooms and building their own websites anyway. Yet we complain, instead of taking it as an opportunity to learn more about technology ourselves and bring us up to speed; it could be an opportunity to connect with your kids and teach them something about life for a change. The old adage of keeping the computer in the middle of the kitchen or living room means nothing if you're not there and your kid has a cell phone where they can text everyone anyway. These days you can chat and get in plenty of trouble without being secretive about it, if you've any discretion; yet we're betting that our kids will be stupid and do dumb stuff right out in the open so we can intervene.
Social networking sites offer an invaluable service for individuals who may otherwise never get out there and make the effort to connect to society, or those who do not have the time, energy, and initiative to find people with whom they have much in common with. At the end of the day, sites like MySpace, regardless of their unintended consequences with school aged children, are simply the new places in cyberspace for individuals to “hang out”, and much of the controversy and complaints about them are similar to those people have always had when it kids congregate in the same place. When everything goes well, and everyone “plays fair” it is nice not to have to deal with the kids so much, but when the same old social dynamics that rule real-life situations come into play these sites are a nightmare; particularly for those still trying to navigate through them and learn new technologies. At the same time, in an age where there is little encouragement or motivation for kids to be in front of anything other than a television screen, a gaming console, or a computer monitor; I can't necessarily say that I blame them either …
