Facebook changes ad system

Amid growing flak that its new advertising system reduces users' privacy, Facebook made some changes this week. Now users can "opt in" to having their online shopping broadcast to friends; before they had to "opt out" - a problem if they didn't know their purchasing decisions were being broadcast and they were, for example, buying holiday gifts and wanted their friends to be surprised). "The move comes a week after MoveOn.org, the non-profit public policy advocacy group, joined a growing chorus of critics of the new service," the Financial Times reports. Facebook did stop short of allowing users to opt out of the system altogether, the FT added. The system is "part of an effort to boost revenue growth by tapping into the deep social connections between Facebook users" - aimed at making social networking attractive to advertisers by tapping into the viral-marketing idea that friends are influenced by what their peers buy. Among other concerns was that of a University of Minnesota law professor. Citing his view, a New York Times blog asked the question, "Are Facebook's Social Ads Illegal [in New York]?" And consumer privacy advocates are pushing for greater control for consumers of their personal data on the Internet (see this at the Center for Democracy and Technology).

Uninformed game givers

Sixty percent of kids 8-17 expect to 1) get a game they didn't want or a game for a console they don't have, or 2) not get any or all of the games they asked for, according to a study by Weekly Reader Research cited by USATODAY. It also found that 80% of kids said they'd ask for a videogame this holiday season, and 59% for a game console. Their five favorites are Guitar Hero, Mario Party DS, Super Mario Galaxy, My Sims and Halo 3. Key advice for getting the right games, USATODAY says: know what console the child has and know the child's game picks. I would add: Know the games' ratings! Go to ESRB.org to see if a child's pick is age- and maturity-level appropriate. Meanwhile, as the New York Daily News reviews the three top consoles: Nintendo Wii, Xbox 360, and Playstation 3, the Los Angeles Times reports that Microsoft is pushing to broaden the market for Xbox Live and the online gaming it enables. See also "Support for young videogamers," zooming in on what online gaming can be like for tweens and teens.

Related links

A mom's change of heart. See this from a mom who went from videogame critic to buyer because of research she read about active videogames.

Senators critical on ratings. Four senators, including presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, sent a letter recently to the Entertainment Software Ratings Board calling on it to "review the rating system for video games since Manhunt 2 received an 'M' for Mature" rating instead of an Adults Only one, Information Week reported.

WhatTheyPlay.com's giving guide - for parents who want to learn more about game consoles

USATODAY's "Joysticks to the world: A videogame Gift Guide" for kids, tweens, teens, adults, and older/casual players

Readers, your views and stories are always welcome. Email them anytime to anne[at]netfamilynews.org, comment here, or - ideally - post them in our forum at ConnectSafely.org. I sometimes reprint for the benefit of your fellow readers.

Real music, fake guitars

The two hottest videogame (console, not computer) titles of the season, according to the San Francisco Chronicle - Rock Band and Guitar Hero III - are also among the most social. "The fun ramps up considerably with more players." On the other hand, "there's something mildly distressing about living in a society where cash-strapped public schools are more likely than ever to be cutting their music programs, and yet the must-have game of the season teaches you to play a fake guitar" and "the plastic Guitar Hero guitar is pretty much useless around the campfire. (Even as kindling.)" But writer Peter Hartlaub is only half serious (don't miss the wisdom of his distinction between "happiness" and "fun."

Socializing + gaming: Trend

For once, 30- and 40-somethings may be leading a trend: the blending of social networking and online games. Some analysts call MySpace and Facebook "massively multiplayer games in disguise," the Daily Globe reports. The article's about sites like Kaneva.com that are "less about skill levels and escapism and more about joining friends and strangers in virtual spaces where chatting, comparing fashions, going dancing — and, yes, slaying monsters — are all options." The Daily Globe describes the experience of "a 41-year-old homemaker" who spends "hours online every day playing Kaneva," a "shopping-and-partying game - where she operates a virtual nightclub and hosts parties - because it helps her interact with people, not provide escape from them as traditional games often do." Both sides see financial gain from this trend, with social sites adding gaming features and game sites adding social ones.

PCs for the world's children

I've pointed before to stories on the "Give 1, Get 1" program for Americans to help get laptops to kids in third-world countries, but this one in the Washington Post goes in-depth and shows the scope of the challenges. One challenge for the MIT people behind Give 1, Get 1 is competition at home. What Intel and Microsoft are doing to seed new markets around the world, though, is a benefit too. "By the end of the year, Intel [for example] will be running laptop pilot programs in schools in 30 countries with an eye to figuring out what kind of software services, Internet connectivity, local educational content and technical support are needed." There are also projects by Microsoft and NComputing (spinning off of eMachines). But the MIT program is focused more on children's education than on markets, its leaders say. What do they see in it for kids? "[Nicholas] Negroponte and [program president Walter] Bender believe that playing with their own laptops will engage children's intellects, spark creativity and provide an outlet for self-expression." Bender told the Post that, like vaccines, laptops aren't a cure. Vaccines allow bodies to manufacture cures; laptops alow brains to engage in education, to manufacture learning. [See also my earlier post on this.]

Parental controls improving

We - parents - are the winners in the "showdown of new parental controls in Apple's Leopard versus Microsoft's year-old Vista," CNET's Stefanie Olsen reports. The reason is, filtering, monitoring, and time-control features are increasingly built in right at the operating-system level on both PCs and Macs now. That means it's all easier for parents to use and tougher for kids to find workarounds (younger kids, anyway). The huge key thing parents need to keep in mind, though, is that the idea of "the family computer" is beginning to fade - at least in the world's wealthier, more connected countries. More and more households have multiple computers, which might require rules restricting kid use to particular computers. But even so, the Web is available on more and more devices, most of them highly portable. It's also available at friends' houses, or course. The friend's house (or public library, or local wireless hot spot, etc.) is probably the No. 1 "workaround" for which no parental-control software you buy or set up works. Even so, Olsen reports, "parents are clearly paying more attention to technology for managing their children's computer use, especially as more kids venture online at younger ages." She cites NPD research showing that "sales of parental control software were up 47.3% percent in the first nine months of 2007 over the same period last year," and some of the top-selling off-the-shelf parental-control products are Enteractive, Microforum, and ContentWatch.

Parental controls improving

We - parents - are the winners in the "showdown of new parental controls in Apple's Leopard versus Microsoft's year-old Vista," CNET's Stefanie Olsen reports. The reason is, filtering, monitoring, and time-control features are increasingly built in right at the operating-system level on both PCs and Macs now. That means it's all easier for parents to use and tougher for kids to find workarounds (younger kids, anyway). The huge key thing parents need to keep in mind, though, is that the idea of "the family computer" is beginning to fade - at least in the world's wealthier, more connected countries. More and more households have multiple computers, which might require rules restricting kid use to particular computers. But even so, the Web is available on more and more devices, most of them highly portable. It's also available at friends' houses, or course. The friend's house (or public library, or local wireless hot spot, etc.) is probably the No. 1 "workaround" for which no parental-control software you buy or set up works. Even so, Olsen reports, "parents are clearly paying more attention to technology for managing their children's computer use, especially as more kids venture online at younger ages." She cites NPD research showing that "sales of parental control software were up 47.3% percent in the first nine months of 2007 over the same period last year," and some of the top-selling off-the-shelf parental-control products are Enteractive, Microforum, and ContentWatch.