Ask HN: How do you prevent the impact of social media on your children?

I don't yet have children but having grown up during the rise of social media, it's clear to me that the way it is used now by young children and teens has transformed even from when I was their age (approx 10 years ago). It worries me for when I myself have to manage their exposure to things like this. On one hand, I feel it would be in their best interests to be completely shielded from it as I personally feel it isn't beneficial for them on the whole at that age. However, it's undeniable that at that age it's all about fitting in and it would likely make them feel like a bit of an outcast if I were to limit them from being a part of it, like I imagine every other kid would be.

I'm curious to know what kinds of methods you have implemented to manage this or whether you feel the same as me

That is pretty dangerous position to take. “That much” is a very vague line.

It is more true that more kids turn out to be fine when their parents care, than when they don’t.

We don't micromanage their online access, but we do try to encourage being online in healthy ways:

We did no smartphones before high school. (Have had zero problems with that in terms of their social acceptance) Also, no computers in their rooms - everything is done in more shared space, with monitors facing the rest of the room. We talk about what kinds of content to watch out for, how to think critically about it, and what kinds of content or people are more serious, that they need to let us know if they run into. (Stalkers, scammers, other such actively harmful stuff.)

That does give them enough freedom once they hit high school to be more secretive about what they do. But we feel that is also more appropriate as they grow older. There have been problems. When they occur, we talk openly about them and help them both resolve the problems and learn from them. We are big believers that wisdom comes from experience, and experience comes from doing, so we try to focus on letting them expand their autonomy as they grow up, while at the same time minimizing harm when mistakes are made and learning from them.

They don't really have any interest in social media as we use them. It's likely there will be some other new form of social media, probably something more metaverse like Roblox or Minecraft.

As a kid, I remember we had these things on TV and people would dial on phones just to have messages show up on TV. It seems kind of the same with Gen Alpha and YouTube. There's all these things like Discord, but they feel more like being lonely in a group.

> They don't really have any interest in social media as we use them.

This seems misleading, even if it's true. My kids keep asking for TikTok/Instagram etc access. Because their friends have these apps.

Seeing certain messaging will them have a similar impact that it does on older individuals.