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Facebook Launches New Messenger App for Young Kids -- What Could Possibly Go Wrong? (gizmodo.com)

Posted by msmash on from the watch-out dept.

More than one billion people use Facebook's Messenger app to communicate every month. Now the social juggernaut is going after the younger audience. On Monday, it announced Messenger Kids, a standalone mobile app designed for children age 13 and under. From a report: The app, Messenger Kids, is a messaging service that gives parents authority over who their kids can chat with. Once a parent adds someone to their child's contact list through the main Facebook app, kids can video chat as well as send photos, videos, and texts, or pick something from "a library of kid-appropriate and specially chosen GIFs, frames, stickers, masks, and drawing tools," according to Facebook's announcement post. [...] A Facebook spokesperson said in an email to Gizmodo, "We've built automated systems that can detect things like nudity, violence, and child exploitative imagery to help limit that content from being shared on Messenger Kids. We also have blocking and reporting mechanisms, and have a dedicated team of human reviewers that review all content that is reported."

8 of 62 comments (clear)

  1. Zuckerberg by Zorro · · Score: 3, Funny

    Would YOU leave a kid alone with Mark Zuckerberg?

    He has already raped the internet.

  2. Mystifying by OYAHHH · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It is truly a mystery as to how some people think they can take a product, which should only be consumed by adults, and attempt to reconstitute it into a form which is acceptable to be consumed by children.

    Hey Facebook, they are kids, leave them alone!

    --
    Caution: Contents under pressure
    1. Re:Mystifying by thegarbz · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It's truly a mystery to me that people think communication should only be consumed by adults.

    2. Re:Mystifying by Blue+Stone · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It's truly a mystery to me that people think their communication and relationships with their friends, family members and loved-ones should be watched over, tracked and monitored, data-mined, commodified, traded and exploited for profit by a global multi-billion-dollar corporation.

      --
      Corporation, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility. - Ambrose Bierce
  3. Evil by omfglearntoplay · · Score: 3, Interesting

    They know getting them early is a nice way to get people comfortable (aka hooked). As bad as big tobacco?

    Well, I can't wait for one of my kid's friends to ask for him to get onto Facebook so he can message him. HAHAHA, NO.

    1. Re:Evil by thegarbz · · Score: 3, Interesting

      They know getting them early is a nice way to get people comfortable (aka hooked). As bad as big tobacco?

      Getting people hooked to communicating with other people? Fucking sign my kids up. We have enough anti-social loners in the world as it is.

  4. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 2

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  5. We Need Credit Cards For Children!!! by dryriver · · Score: 2

    Isn't it unfair that adults get to have all sorts of cool stuff, but children don't? That is about to change with the "Kiddo Card". Its a credit card for kids, and it can do EVERYTHING an adult credit card can do. What's the difference from adult credit cards you ask? NOTHING! For the first time, kids get to play on EQUAL ground with the grownups. Kiddo Card - for a better, fairer future for all our children!

    --
    Why did the chicken cross the road? Because Elon Musk put an AI chip in its head.