Protecting Teen Reputations on Web 2.0

In this latest phase of the Web, when anybody can be a publisher, videographer, or instant celebrity, many parents are concerned about what can happen to their kids' reputations and future prospects. We're beginning to see news reports picking up on this (see "What you say online could haunt you" in USATODAY, "Whose space is it, anyway?" in the San Jose Mercury News, and a more recent piece in the Grand Rapids [Mich.] Press). It's getting to the point where kids will need spin-doctor skills.

Parents' concerns are valid for several reasons: 1) The "you can't take it back" issue - people's photos and comments can instantly be passed along and/or archived on the Web virtually forever, beyond the original uploader's control; 2) reports are multiplying that school administrators, law-enforcement people, and other authorities are checking out teens' blogs and profiles (and probably anyone considering them for job or academic opportunities); and 3) somebody needs to be thinking about online teens' futures, because - though this is changing as public awareness grows - teens themselves say they don't think about this much as they do their blogging and social-networking.

"Parents are well advised," said Mary Leary, deputy director of the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children's Office of Legal Counsel, "to realize that whenever images of a child exist, no matter the context in which they were created, that child is at risk of exploitation as long as cellphone cameras, the Internet, email, etc. exist, and children should avoid such images ever existing. They are images over which these children will never have control."

There are two basic ways content lives on forever in cyberspace:

Peers pass stuff along

Well, peers and strangers, but more likely someone a teenager knows. Teens can lose control of their words and media in way too many ways, e.g., a comment, photo, or video emailed, uploaded, IM'd, or shared on P2P file-sharing networks or in old Internet technologies like newsgroups. Once something's in a Web site, shared via P2P, or sent to a friend by cellphone, IM, or email, anyone can grab it, copy 'n' paste it, pass it along, or upload it to a myriad sites and services. It may be something a friend shares unthinkingly, or it might be passed along "as a joke" or maliciously, by an ex-friend who somehow got the originator's IM or email password. A tragic example is detailed in "Teen photos & a police officer's story," in NetFamilyNews 1/20/06. If it's in somebody's personal Web site somewhere, it could be there forever, accessible to anyone's favorite search engine.

A somewhat strange example is a Kansas City dad's apparently well-intentioned attempt to alert local parents to kids' risky online behavior by creating a Web site that lists and links to local kids' Xanga and MySpace profiles, in alphabetical order by their first names.