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Introducing Messenger Kids

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Re: Introducing Messenger Kids

#71

Post by pythonaut_16 »

I'm shocked by the overwhelmingly negative response here. Honestly I expect better when I come to Hackernews.

Facebook announces a novel app trying to solve common problems with kids using and communicating on the internet and everyone in the comments just comes out with their personal ax to grind with Facebook.

I get it. You hate Facebook, Facebook is a drug, Facebook kicked your dog. All of those might be valid criticisms, and if this was an article titled 'Facebook is destroying everything' I would be very interested in reading those opinions.

But as it is, all I see are shallow criticisms of Facebook as a whole rather than any kind of nuanced discussion of the Messenger for Kids app.

Personally I'm intrigued by the idea. Kids want to communicate using the internet (and before the internet it was phone numbers and texting), but this is the first time I've seen an approach that really helps parents to monitor who their kids are connecting to on the app.

Maybe Facebook is the wrong company to present this app; maybe the connection to Facebook is concerning. But the app itself I think represents the right direction to go in designing apps that minors can use to communicate and helping parents to keep their kids safe online.

Re: Introducing Messenger Kids

#72

Post by scotty79 »

supermdguy wrote: post #65
scotty79 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So companies manufacturing baby phone toys are just sneaky drug dealers trying to addict children to telephone drug? Chat is a communication tool. Why so much hate for facebook chat app? None of that I've seen when facebook dumped ton of brain dead (often pay to win) games on children or when apple did the same with their app store.

> manufacturing baby phone toys There's no market for baby phone toys for adults. However, kids who get into the facebook ecosystem via "messenger kids" could be locked in for years. > Chat is a communication tool. I agree that it's much better than games, but it's still a way to get kids attached to a system that they don't fully understand. Yes, it's just a chat app, but, given that facebook is a business, its ulti…

> There's no market for baby phone toys for adults.

Adult equivalent of baby toy phone is a phone (landline, cell, whatever). You might as well argue that people who as children were hooked on baby phones will use a phone as adults. Which is trivially true because everyone will use a phone as adult.

Same thing with chat. Children addicted to children's facebook chat will use some form of chat in the future because everyone will. They are already using chats. LoL in-game chat for example. Recently 10 year old from my extended family thanked me through Clash Royale in-game clan chat for some random promotional stuff my girlfriend gathered during shopping and passed to him through her brother.

> ... kids attached to a system that they don't fully understand.

This pretty much describes any system kids are attached to and many systems adults are attached to.

> it's just a chat app, but, given that facebook is a business, its ultimate purpose is to make money.

So? Same goes for anything. TV, print, games, sports, clothes, even partially education if you live in US. Should you avoid attaching your children to all of those systems?

The only thing you should do for your children is to make sure Facebook is not the only chat app, that some better chats can be created and alive even if they don't have as much money for lawyers and greasing the wheels as facebook has. You can do that by coercing companies to disclose details of their technology or at least stop helping them protect it. You want to create new chat product? Fine, but you have to release protocol that your chat app uses so anyone can write a client. Your protocol docs are outdated? Company gets a fine of amount associated with their revenue, operational costs or whatever number that correlates with their success that their accountants can't hide.

Re: Introducing Messenger Kids

#74

Post by supermdguy »

scotty79 wrote: post #72
supermdguy wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> manufacturing baby phone toys There's no market for baby phone toys for adults. However, kids who get into the facebook ecosystem via "messenger kids" could be locked in for years. > Chat is a communication tool. I agree that it's much better than games, but it's still a way to get kids attached to a system that they don't fully understand. Yes, it's just a chat app, but, given that facebook is a business, its ulti…

> There's no market for baby phone toys for adults. Adult equivalent of baby toy phone is a phone (landline, cell, whatever). You might as well argue that people who as children were hooked on baby phones will use a phone as adults. Which is trivially true because everyone will use a phone as adult. Same thing with chat. Children addicted to children's facebook chat will use some form of chat in the future because ev…

That's true. Facebook isn't the only problem, and there's not really any way around the new economy of attention in exchange for money. Though it's not particularly groundbreaking, it's frustrating to see yet another instance of a company invading the lives of its users even more.

Re: Introducing Messenger Kids

#75

Post by chrisper »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #49
chrisper wrote: post #9

Just a question of time until Europe starts having issues with this. Rightfully so.

Does Europe have an issue with Youtube Kids? With kids using Facebook / Messenger / Whatsapp / etc without being the age they are supposed to be according to the T&C?

Well, I was thinking of this case (from a German Newspaper, but I am sure there are English sources somewhere as well.)

https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=y&prev...

Re: Introducing Messenger Kids

#76

Post by j605 »

pythonaut_16 wrote: post #71

I'm shocked by the overwhelmingly negative response here. Honestly I expect better when I come to Hackernews. Facebook announces a novel app trying to solve common problems with kids using and communicating on the internet and everyone in the comments just comes out with their personal ax to grind with Facebook. I get it. You hate Facebook, Facebook is a drug, Facebook kicked your dog. All of those might be valid cri…

I would use Signal instead to communicate with my kid if necessary.

Re: Introducing Messenger Kids

#77

Post by pythonaut_16 »

j605 wrote: post #76
pythonaut_16 wrote: post #71

I'm shocked by the overwhelmingly negative response here. Honestly I expect better when I come to Hackernews. Facebook announces a novel app trying to solve common problems with kids using and communicating on the internet and everyone in the comments just comes out with their personal ax to grind with Facebook. I get it. You hate Facebook, Facebook is a drug, Facebook kicked your dog. All of those might be valid cri…

I would use Signal instead to communicate with my kid if necessary.

That works if you need to communicate with them one-to-one. But does Signal let you easily add any other Signal user as a contact? What about when your kid wants to talk to their friends on the app?

To me the appeal of what Facebook is doing here is that it lets you give your kids freedom to use the app while letting you as a parent create the whitelist of who they're able to talk to.

Re: Introducing Messenger Kids

#78

Post by manmal »

I think about 95% of posts in this thread are currently negative (IMO a great thing!). I’d be interested what the reception will be like in the broader population. If this sentiment is universal, Facebook has a big problem - it would mean trust has eroded to the point that most people only grudgingly use it, and to me that cries for disruption.

Re: Introducing Messenger Kids

#79

Post by j605 »

pythonaut_16 wrote: post #77
j605 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would use Signal instead to communicate with my kid if necessary.

That works if you need to communicate with them one-to-one. But does Signal let you easily add any other Signal user as a contact? What about when your kid wants to talk to their friends on the app? To me the appeal of what Facebook is doing here is that it lets you give your kids freedom to use the app while letting you as a parent create the whitelist of who they're able to talk to.

Signal works with phone numbers, so you can talk to any contact that is also on the app. There is no parental control but how do you assume kids can't text random people. Blocking/banning makes users highly creative.

Re: Introducing Messenger Kids

#80

Post by b0ner_t0ner »

pythonaut_16 wrote: post #71

I'm shocked by the overwhelmingly negative response here. Honestly I expect better when I come to Hackernews. Facebook announces a novel app trying to solve common problems with kids using and communicating on the internet and everyone in the comments just comes out with their personal ax to grind with Facebook. I get it. You hate Facebook, Facebook is a drug, Facebook kicked your dog. All of those might be valid cri…

> Maybe Facebook is the wrong company to present this app

Of course it's wrong. Why would you continue giving more free data to this evil monopoly?

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DK2tcZbU8AA0Trn.jpg

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