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Rules for Teenage Internet Access?
Kent Brewster writes "Despite dire warnings, we've gone ahead and put computers with Internet access into our adolescent (11, 12, and 15-year-old) childrens' rooms. We've got a nebulous set of rules, which include several like these: Keep the door open when you're on the computer. Don't quickly exit from everything when we walk past. Don't ever lie to us about what you're doing. Unfortunately we've had instances where all of these rules - especially that last one - have been broken, so now we are looking at getting more specific. We'd be very interested in hearing from both sides of the fence: parents with Net-connected progeny, and those who are chafing under their rule. Parents, once you're past making the huge mistake of actually letting the kids have computers in their rooms, what's a reasonable set of guidlines? Non-parents, what are the rules that chap your hide the worst? Do they actually make a difference in your behavior, or do you just sneak past them anyway? Finally, and this is sort of a meta-question from an exasperated dad, does everybody lie about what they're doing on the Internet?"
Prepare an adequate supply of kleenex or equivalent.
On second thought... just block goatse.cx and you should be fine.
I'm pretty sure my dad's just given up, he's pretty knowledgable about computers (learnt a lot from watching him) but he knows I will find a way around.
We tend to become like the worst in those we oppose. --Bene Gesserit Coda--
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=
As I'm 16 years old, here's probably the rules I'll have for my kids (yes I know, I'm paranoid.. but look what I've done):
Do not let them have access to the internet. With that in mind, if you do let them have access to the internet, only allow port 80. And only let them have access to Yahoo! Kids. Do not under ANY circumstances give them access to IRC. IRC is by far the root of all evil.
If you are going to give them access to the internet, make sure to stick their computer behind 4 bridges, and a NAT. Filter everything that you could possibly do. In all cases, do NOT let them have access to the internet if at all possible.
Snoop on your kids, msgsnarf is your friend. Firewall logs and snort also help you filter out porn traffic.
In essence, do NOT trust your kids. They will break your trust, it has been proven time and time again. I do not remember the last time I listened to my Dad, uh yeah.. haha.
In his case, I just make sure his computer doesn't get infected with more then 10 viruses. Although he is actually a computer teacher, but that doesn't mean he knows anything about computers..
Free means no restrictions, ironic the FSF's GPL forces restrictions, isn't it? What's your definition of free?
one thing windows lets us do is install firewalls, and block certain internet sites. But... one thing I realized was if you talk to them and act mature about it, tell them that the illicit content they are looking at it designed for more mature people, and inform them that you are going to block those sites. If you do that, then their ball is in their corner. They have 2 options: 1, realize you are right and keep off the pr0n, or 2, they override yer countermeasures and you catch them.
Even the most Cyber Baby'esque child in your house can't totally remove the logs of internet traffic.
Basically, if you cant trust yer kids to keep off the pr0n, don't let them have internet in their room... or put the computer in the living room and only let them use it when yer home. If yer kid is looking at pr0n in the living room and masturbating in the relative public of that place, illicit internet use is the least of your worries.
whatever... trust, or force... its all good.
while(1) { fork(); };
I've had a computer in my room since I was eight. Fifteen years later, I'm an out of work web developer who can type really fast and find you a copy of the Paris Hilton video in less than two minutes. Well adjusted? Perhaps not, but my tendonitis/carpal tunnel keeps me company at night and that's all that matters.
I'm tired of bombing the universe
Well I certainly don't read slashdot when my parents are around
Hey! I'm SugarDaddy35!
Which is worse, kids spending their allowance money on drugs or on internet access downloading porn to masturbate to?
"Don't forget to clean off your keyboard when you're done."
"Mom, that wasn't me. Last time, Dad didn't clean off the monitor either. And I didn't visit Jizzfest.cum. He used my profile!"
I find it disturbing and racist that you would make such a statement that separates two groups of people like that.
Irish people are perfectly capable of being paedophiles and I object to your racist and horrific implication that the two cannot coincide, you insensitive clod!
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PORNO FOR THE PEOPLE! [autopr0n.com]
And don't let them view slashdot.
----
Go canucks, habs, and sens!
Peter,
This your dad. Listen, it is 10;30pm on a Saturday night. Why don't you go out and get laid; I'll give some money and point you in the right direction. Otherwise, get your hand off your pecker, close that god-awful slashdot page thing you're so obsessed with and curl up with some milk and cookies.
Love,
Papa Kieser
I am 21 now and I think I turned out okay
We won't really know until you're dead, will we?
Nah, force them to view goatse.cx as punishment for rule-breaking.
The same prinicple applies with many of the evils online (pornogrophy, violence, fostering bad relationships, etc..)
Pornography is evil now? Wow, I'm right up there with Saddam Hussen. But where the hell are my 70 virgins!?
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Going contrary to good advice merely to spite the person giving the advice actually does nothing more than show an overwhelming lack of maturity.
If the kids were mature, you wouldn't need any rules at all.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
oh. so you're trying to teach them how to navigate a network undetected. :)
====
Crudely Drawn Games
"One horsepower is the amount of energy it takes to drag a horse 500 feet in one second." (unattributed)
That dosn't make any sense at all. It would take far more then one horse power to drag a horse that fast with any resonable amount of friction.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
As any good Christian would.
Yeah, keep thinking your son has not yet discovered the wonders of a http proxy...
Your pizza just the way you ought to have it.
That explains it. If they're Eagle Scouts, then they already see enough porn when the scoutmaster asks them to "stay after".
I looked... I know I am never going to use the internet again. Ick.
If you're worried about sticky keyboards and such, do this. If male, provide condoms. If female, I don't know what would work, I don't know that anatomy personally.
seriously man you should reconsider allowing your kids to have a computer in their room. its a big mistake. take it from me. i am a pedophile. you have no idea how easy it is. i could write on book on this shit. no joke here are some kids internet porn stats: http://www.porndestroyswomen.org/index.html#5
Um, what if you catch you kid with stuff that is like goatse.cx?
*shutter*
That kind of punishment is too brutal for even the worst society can produce..
Except spammers of course.
Learn something new.
>"so son, notice you've been looking at a lot of sex pages..Do you think all women are like that??"
"I dunno, was Mom?"
How did you get 3 kids anyway? Stork?
"..they WILL have sex..." If you find them reading Slashdot, I wouldn't worry too much about this one ;)
Thank god most kids don't think like you.
It is every parent's responsibility to teach his or her children the basics of proxy servers and how to clear the cache.
I can't wait for my son to get old enough to try his first hack attempt on the home network. He'll probably think he's got m4d 5k1llz, but I was phreaking and wardialing decades before he ever touched a keyboard.
Might be an interesting contest... I'm kind of tickled by the thought... bring it on.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
...if they were a girl...I'd probably stop worrying around 13 or 14 or so.
Instant message me when you have teenage daughters please.
It's interesting to read some of the rantings of people who don't have children, but who are (in their opinion) experts in parenting and raising kids, simply because they were once children. This is rather like football players thinking that they can coach, simply because they've played the game. Yes, good coaches frequently were good players, but many of the finest KNEW what to do, but weren't necessarily as gifted at doing it. However, they are almost always the product of good coaching themselves.
... ... ...
Likewise, good parents generally are the product of a good example, even if they aren't perfect and morally pure as the driven snow. Good parents generally trust their children, but also remember what it was like when they were kids themselves, and will use that knowledge to verify that their own kids aren't doing things that might endanger them.
Yes, I trust my sons, but it's not blind trust. They know that I will come into the room unannounced, and that I will want to know who they're chatting with, who they're exchanging e-mail with, and so on. They know why I'll do this.
BTW, on a lark, I posed as an older female one time to chat with my son and one of his friends. It was enlightening (to say the least) some of the language I saw. I offered to "teach them a lesson. They eagerly agreed. My lesson?
"Never
Never
Never
chat the way you have here, unless you are certain you know who you're talking to. This is your dad. Go to bed."
I pointed out that I could have been a nutcase (which I am), or worse, the father of my son's girlfriend. I pointed out that my son would've never seen her again if it had been her father posing as this older female.
Open door where the computer is? Check.
Unannounced walk-ins? Check.
Same rules for dad as the sons? Check.
Trust my sons? Check
Verify that they're being honest with me? Absolutely.
Tim
Or to help stop them from closing applications fast, put goatse as the background image in windows...
I agree, you should make sure you stay away from films and video games in particular. And wear a big sign that says implores bad people to stay away from your line of sight lest you be influenced by their misdeeds.
I see spoiled little shits everywhere that were never taught anything because their parents decided that their little shits were somehow "entitled" more than the rest of the world and, even worse, decided to make their kids believe that shit.
I just have one link for these people...
Beat Your Kids!!
I'd argue that any time you're skipping school to play Doom, there's something wrong.
Absolutely. If you're skipping school to play Doom, you seriously need a computer upgrade.
You do realize porno includes naked women, right? Right?
Everything seemed to be going so nice
'till the end of all beings punched right through the ice
I mean asking slashdot for legal advice is bad enough.
Asking slashdot for parenting advice is amazingly funny.
Next up, dating advice.
dude, you couldn't come home pregnant, that's why you got no curfew.
This
You don't need all these new fangled ideas to stop them browsing porn. Just give them a 28kbps modem, and let them at it. They'll soon get sick of waiting for crap to download and go out and find real people.
mogorific carpentry experiments
Hell yes! What a feeling of pride I will have when my eight-year old son figures out how to connect his (original) iMac (donated by an aunt) to my LAN (which is on another floor, on the other side of the house, with no existing cabled or unencrypted wireless networking infrastructure) and do it with some level of stealth. That day will be a happy day indeed. You won't be able to slap the smile off my face.
dude, you couldn't come home pregnant, that's why you got no curfew.
And everyone knows you can't get pregnant if you do it *before* 9.00pm...
He forget to mention his job as a part-time crack dealer.