Piffey

(Via Craphound)

Cory Doctorow, author of the bestselling Little Brother, being interviewed on TVOntario last month, talked about Kids and Technology and brought up some good points on cyber-security and the changing social climate for children in our digital era. When asked about the risks of kids and technology he brought up the fact that the same company’s the parents pay to keep their children safe on the Internet are the same ones logging all of their children’s information and selling it to market research company. People are herding their children away from certain sites because they fear potential risks, the always mentioned looming Internet pedophile, etc. Really is it not more creepy that your child’s every E-mail and move on the Internet is being sold to a market research organization that can cater advertisements to the next generation of consumers? And what sort of things does this snooping tell kids about the importance of private information? I was blessed with being able to explore and play with technology without restriction and have always been shocked by what parents are willing to put on their computers under the semblance of improved security.

The interviewer also brings up the social risks and the loss of reading as a hobby in kids. Similar to Doctorow I think there is this myth that the Internet has caused children to socialize less. In fact, if anything, kids are socializing more and reading more than ever before. There social groups are just expanded on the Internet and the things they choose to read are not books which as Doctorow points out: “Reading novels has never been a mainstream activity.” The myth of the culture that curls up and reads the classics on the couch is nothing more than that: a myth.