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In Reply to: Re: Another "wonderful" side of facebook... posted by Farmer on November 16, 2009 at 07:52:28:
Facebook is like a lot of things. Bad people can use it for bad things.
I first got on facebook a few years back when Ironsides (the ex-member, not Raymond Burr) invited me to be his friend on it. I signed up, then I sat there with Ironsides as my only friend for a couple of years.
Then somebody found me, and next I started getting invitations from people from all kinds of times in my life. High School, College, people I know in the convention business... some people I really haven't heard from in 30-40 years. That part of it has been a lot of fun. I had been on "MySpace" for years and found more people I knew on Facebook.
A few months back somebody figured out my password and sent all my friends spam about some get rich quick scam. I was on vacation at the time and didn't find out about it until I got back. I was surprised at how many of my friends fell for it and asked me follow-up questions about if whatever it was really worked. I changed my password, and it hasn't happened again.
Going back over 20 years ago when I started my BBS service, I remember everybody saying that was just an excuse for pedophiles to exchange child porn and go after kids. I even had the L.A. Times call and try to interview me about that. I honestly didn't ever see anything like that on BBS systems at that time, and wasn't aware of any kids that used the service. I think there were only one or two women that were callers. It was mostly guy computer geeks and we were sharing programs we wrote.
My understanding these days is that the place a lot of actual going after kids online are these webcam sites. Underage kids have webcams, and sexual predators talk them into doing things on the webcam.
Back when I was running my BBS people used to ask me if their kids were safe online. My standard answer was that they were probably as safe online as they were in a public toilet. If they were worried about their kid going alone into a bathroom in a public park, they should probably watch closely what that same child did online. We only have one kid left at home, and I do keep a close eye on her MySpace and Facebook pages. She is 15 now, and that generation has never known life without the Internet, cell phones, etc. I still watch what she does online and who she communicates with.
