What an interesting idea! The new beanie babies!

Many companies are making creative efforts to attract the interests of children. A study shows that the majority of children born after 1990 spend most of their time indoors. In order to get social networking to move away from computers and enter the corporeal world can be a pretty unnerving experience. Ganz has manufactured these plush toys which aim to target elementary-level children into the world of Web 2.0 in a cute and non-invasive manner. Known as the Webkinz, these stuffed animals exist in both the real and virtual world, where the latter is shown as an avatar that is capable of interacting with others in an online community. Just like Beanie Babies, the Webkinz are up for grabs only for a limited amount of time before being retired, in order to make them more desirable. A quick check with eBay show that the retired Webkinz Cheeky Pet Dog and Cat are at a whopping starting bid of $3,000. In order not to miss out on this craze, the Love Puppy retails for a mere $99. They’re apparently pretty hot stuff at events where kids get together, such as Easter celebrations, church functions, and birthday parties. 

KidKountry.co

KidKountry.com showcases the acting, artwork, music, singing, writing, sports and all around talents of today’s kids and teens. These achievements are from kids all ages up to 19-years-old. KidKountry.com is not an agency but works with casting directors and producers to find the young talent they may be seeking for their next project. KidKountry.com hopes to provide a vehicle for talented kids to showcase their special talent and for the rest of the world to see. There are 104,041 members and 730,125 vistors-to-date. This is an excellent site for kids to express their talents and interests and chat with other kids that are interested in the same things. They could even be discovered!

PatchWorx.com

PatchWorx.com is a nonprofit Web-based community for young people facing illness and disability. This is another great site generated for young people with disabilities in general to interact with other children facing the same social problems.
Supervised by adult volunteers, the PatchWorx Web site is a safe, secure online environment that encourages children to minimize the obstacles of distance and disability through computer-mediated communication. PatchWorx online activities include discussions through moderated chat, bulletin boards, member-submitted poetry and artwork, an e-mail listserv, online games and responses to questions from Patches, the site’s mascot.

My little one’s on Myspace.com

Aftering seeing all the reports being done about what children are releasing on online communitites and blogs, I took a closer look at my neice and nephew who are on myspace.com. I was shocked when I saw my 8-year-old neice ask to be my friend, and her profile said an 17-year old female. My nephew who is 11 has his age set at fourteen in order to be able to be on myspace. They both have several pictures of them and their friends, and tell about themselves on their “about me” section. Me being the over-protective aunt have sent them all the stories and studies about children and predators online, and have tried to monitor what they release and don’t. But like many of the studies say you can’t monitor everything these kids are doing online, they both spend on average about 2 hours a day on the computer.

Children’s Internet Protection Act

I found an interesting article online about what is called the Children’s Internet Protection Act. This was passed in 2000 by President Clinton and addressed the situation of libraries having inappropriate material available to children. The Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) was signed into law by President Clinton in December 2000. This law requires public libraries receiving certain federal funds to: (1) adopt Internet safety policies and (2) use mandatory filtering software to block Internet access for children and adults to materials that are obscene, contain child pornography or are deemed to be harmful to minors. Since then of course, most schools do the same thing, since children are accesing the internet regularly at their schools. What a great way to start preventing children getting into bad things on the internet. Too bad they can’t pass a law like that at home.

Alfy.com

One of the most interesting new children communities is Alfy.com. It is safe, free and catching on quickly. This website has chat boards, games, news, giveaways and an American Idol watch. The kids can collect points by playing games and posting on chat boards, and can have their own webpage or profile. This is such a fun way for children to interact, and have fun and win stuff all at the same time. If I were younger I would defiantly join this website. There are several new users added everyday. It’s good to know that children are joining more useful and educational websites for entertainment and communication amongst one another. This appeals to older kids too with celebrity gossip and horoscopes. Very cool website for kids!

Information Revealed

Several Studies have been conducted to findo out exactly what children are putting on the web, as for as their personal information. A particular study done on kids blogging produced several intersting numbers for the extent of what these chldren are revealing. 70% give their first name, and 20% are giving their full-name and full-names of friends on their blogs. 67% give their age, and 61% contact information, which can be all someone needs to track them down or find out where they live. 59% are even flat out giving their location. 44% are giving out their e-mail address and IM screename. This is where predators can even chat and communicate with these children, which aren’t shy about chatting on the internet. Children say this is how they make more friends and meet “cool” people. Too many kids are forgetting that anyone can say anything on the internet, and most predators know exactly what to say to get kids talking.

The new communities for children

Besides myspace.com, one of the biggest social communities that children are embarking on in the new generations, there are several new websites that have developed within the past year. Imbee.com, Clubpenguin.com, and tweenland.com are being used by millions of children as young as 8-years-old. The good thing about these new developing websites is that they usually require a parents credit card number or some type of a signature to join. These websites are very censored towards a young audience which is a huge improvement from things like myspace that aren’t censored at all.  Children are lying about their ages in order to even join myspace, which cannot be a safe place for such young kids.  I have a neice that is 8-years-old and just joined myspace, and her profile says she is 17.  According to parents, their children are spending around 2 hours a day surfing the web, which makes it almost impossible to look over their shoulder the whole time they chatting and interacting in these communities. Larry Magid, co-director of blog safety.com claims that these new sites pose few chances of being entrapped by pedophiles, which is very reassuring for parents. Many studies are being conducted to see if this type of developement for kids is beneficial or not, you be the judge.

Children with Diabetes

An exeptional online community I have come across for children and their families to both participate are medical online communities. One of the ones I have found to be interesting is ChildrenwithDiabetes.com. This is an online community for children with diabetes and their parents to communicate on. There are chat rooms, forums, a Diabetes Team and Care Suggestions. There is a calendar of upcoming events and conferences as well as the latest news on Type 1 Diabetes. This is such a great community for children to have, since the kids with Diabetes really need other kids out there like them to talk to, in dealing with a disease like this at such a young age. As well as the kids, this website makes it easier for parents as well to better assist their children with this type of situation.

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