Don’t worry about hidin’ yo kids, Mark Zuckerberg isn’t after them. Several news outlets made a lot of hay out of the Facebook CEO’s comments at an education conference last week, seemingly suggesting that the company was ready to remove its requirement that users be over the age of 13.
Not that it matters: a recent study indicated that a third of those under 18 were below that minimum age, and often using Facebook without any parental supervision. That’s a problem, since estimates say that about a million children were cyberbullied on Facebook in the past year.
Zuckerberg argued that the press had taken his comments out of context, and rather he meant that bringing children online on Facebook was not a priority for the company. The site may consider doing so in the future, but not now. It may not really matter in the end anyway, given parents are already allowing their kids on the site regardless of its rules.
In the end, it’s the parents’ responsibility to know what their kids are doing online. Facebook’s not meant to be a babysitter.
By Ed Oswald | Wednesday, May 25, 2011 at 7:04 pm