June 22nd, 2006
No Change at MySpace.com
By Jimmy Daniels
Contributing Writer, RealTechNews
I can’t help but read about the new changes at MySpace and laugh, how are these changes going to help anything at all? All people have to do is signup as a teenager and they will be allowed to keep doing what they have been doing, contacting the younger users of MySpace. This is pretty much what they said:
MySpace users who are 18 or over will not be allowed to request to be on a 14- or 15-year-old’s friends’ list unless they already know either the youth’s e-mail address or full name, which means they will no longer be able to access personal profiles of kids under 16.
Under the changes announced Wednesday, any user will still be able to get a partial profile of younger users by searching for other details, such as display name. The ONLY difference is that adults can no longer request to be added to a youth’s list to view their full profile as that option will disappear for adults registered as 18 and over.
Those under 18 will still be able to make contact. Without age verification, adults can sign up as teens and request to join a 14-year-old’s list of friends, which would enable the full profiles.
We Say: How does this help anything? Wouldn’t pedophiles who are already on MySpace already be signed up as teenagers? Why would they be signed up as over 18 when they know that MOST kids probably wouldn’t react to them the same as they would if they thought they were the same age. And why aren’t they trying to protect the 16 and 17 year olds? I just don’t see how this helps the users they are trying to protect, am I missing something?
syp says:
I find it strange that myspace is only implementing security of any sorts just now.
Ive been on friendster for a while now and you cant add anyone to your friend list unless you know their first/last name or email address. Your friends will have to explicitly message you to add you as a friend and give you the email or under what name they signed on as.
You can also choose which parts of your profile are open to the public. You can also choose wether 2nd (friends of your friends) or 3rd degree friends (friends of your friends friends) can view your profile or to block everyone but 1st degree friends.
I never signed on to myspace because i have had friendster.
Im not bashing Myspace or saying friendster is better. I just assumed all networking sites behaved the same way. I guess not.
June 22nd, 2006 at 10:57 am
Stephen says:
I don’t see what the point of this editorial is. Unless MySpace required 100% age verification there is no way to police the site. How will a minor verify their? Through a parents credit card? What if the parents don’t have a CC? What’s to stop an adult from verifying themselves as a teenager?
As long as there have been chat rooms on the net there have been adults trying to meet minors. The only difference between then and now is that Myspace is a much higher profile business.
We can turn the internet into the cyberspace equivalent of a “papers please” totalitarian country but I don’t think anybody wants a net where you have to constantly prove your identity at every site that allows communication between individuals.
June 22nd, 2006 at 10:58 am
Shannon Dix says:
I agree, I am not sure what the point of this announcement is for MySpace–how can you set ‘age rules’ without ‘age verification’. It is really just marketing hype in reaction to the lawsuit. I think if they really want to make a difference, they really have to put a process in place to verify age. Look at the lengths folks like Industrious Kid have gone to in order to truly keep kids safe with their new imbee.com site–it seems like MySpace could be doing a lot more–OR figure out a way to not mix kids and adults at all.
June 22nd, 2006 at 12:04 pm
yups says:
Sounds silly to me, especially since I use Myspace for a Film Fest and have a youth entries showing, am I no longer allowed to contact young filmmakers for legit reasons? What about bands, church groups, or other groups out there that are youth oriented?
June 22nd, 2006 at 3:37 pm
SURVENT says:
MySpace Efforts To Stop Online Child Predators Criticized
MySpace announced last week that it will implement new security measures this week in an effort to protect children using the site from online predators. These new measures came under scrutiny and criticism even before the official announcement was mad…
June 25th, 2006 at 9:23 pm