Featured Guest Article

by Ann Handley

Greetings all staff and stakeholders of Coddled Teenage Boy Enterprises:

It has come to my attention that there has been some confusion about your roles and responsibilities within the organization, which has led to infighting, yelling, and name-calling—this happened just yesterday, prior to 7 AM.

Such behavior is both unprofessional and unwarranted, and it is my job as the CEO and central “brand” of this enterprise to address this situation before it begins to negatively affect morale as well as my performance in the marketplace, also known as “school and social life.”

The Memo

First, a word about the incident that prompted this memo and took place at headquarters yesterday. Many of you, I know, heard it—or heard of it—and I need to clarify actual events to dispel any notion that the CEO of Coddled Teenage Boy Enterprises was at fault.
Because, as you know, it’s never my fault.

The Incident

The incident took place in the early morning. It concerned the crazy idea that two individuals traveling to the same school campus should to be liveried in the same vehicle, and therefore ought to be ready to depart at approximately the same time, even if one of us requires more careful and meticulous currying of my excellent hair and a careful consideration of which band T-shirt looks most awesome with my jeans.

There was yelling about did I know the price of a gallon of gas, and the driver’s own needs (not sure what that means), and something was said in a rather overwrought tone about how It’s all about you, isn’t it? 

All of this made the second and final shuttling to school tense and unpleasant, and left me grounded this weekend, which is a wholly unacceptable result of what I see as a giant misunderstanding.
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Featured Guest Series

by Todd Jordan

In part one of this series, Keeping Kids Safe – Parental Control Software, I talked about software suites like NetNanny. These aren’t the only tools available to parents. For those of you who are less technically inclined who may find a package of programs complicated, browser replacements are much easier to manage.

Internet Browsers

The majority, over 80%, of internet users are using Microsoft’s Internet Explorer to access and visit web sites, with a handful more using other browsers. In most cases, concerned parents are not given the expertise nor are the parental control settings adequate in these browsers. To make life a little easier for parents, especially those with younger children, easy to use browser replacements are available.

Locating And Evaluating Browser Replacements

It’s easy to locate these browser replacements by doing a good search engine search. Here is the search criteria that I used. I would like to point you to a couple of promising choices:

• KidRocket
• KidZui

I’ve only mentioned two, but there are several choices available. The key point to understand is that each bowser offers a different experience at a different price. It is worth your time to spend a little time evaluating the differences and finding the right choice for your family.

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“You are Democrats and Republicans and Independents.

But you all served together, and fought together, and bled together under the same proud flag.

You did not serve a Red America or a Blue America – you served the United States of America.”

— Barack Obama VFW National Convention August 19, 2008

Quick Question

Are you a Republican? A Democrat? An Independent?

Quick Answer

I don’t care about your political preference, this is a rhetorical question.

With the upcoming presidential election, many American’s have drawn their lines in the sand. We hear ‘military’, ‘troops’, or ‘soldier’ and man y people relate it back to the war, the current president, or a political party.

The effect is that many people are confused about their support for such organizations as eMail our Military. I think Barak Obama making this and other statements will help bring healing and a realization that these soldiers are American’s, just as each of us is. Any line drawn in sand can be easily erased and is not permanant.

“eMail Our Military is composed of volunteers from all walks of life who understand that regardless of our political views, our military service members deserve our respect, support & encouragement.”

— Trish Forant, founder eMail Our Military

What Is eMail Our Military?

Due to the anthrax scare, two major letter writing campaign’s to our troops were canceled. These programs were the Department of Defense’s “Any Service Member” and Dear Abby’s “Operation Dear Abby“. When Trish Forant heard about these campaigns ending, eMail Our Miliatary was founded in 2001 as direct response to the cancellation of these two programs.

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Facebook Tutorial (Interview with Parent Power Index)

by MacKenzie Lovings

This tutorial is part of an interview that Remarkable Parents did with Parent Power Index. Some of the responses our only on their web site and you will need to follow the links to their site.

Overview of Facebook Tutorial

In our first interview, Vicky Hennegan definitely provided food for thought as to why “blogging” and other new Web technologies are helping to form new bonds between parents and their children. That interview also included the “5 Steps Toward Technology and Social Media Use” which Vicky feels are an essential base for us to have as we build our technical knowledge and technology skills.

Vicky is back to discuss Facebook, one of the most popular social media services on the internet. It has recently been gaining exposure as a social tool useful to a wide audience.

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Facebook Interview Questions

MacKenzie Can you give us a brief history describing the background of Facebook? How it got started, how people use it, and who the original creator was?

Vicky Below I have answered 5 Basic Facebook Questions. This will give readers an idea of the original intention of the application as well as it’s evolution over the last few years.

5 Basic Facebook Questions

1. How did Facebook start?
Facebook was begun by Mark Zuckerberg a student. Initially Facebook was available to only students. In a fairly short period of time, Facebook would go through four additional iterations, each time giving new audiences access to this web-based application.

The second expansion made Facebook available to other Ivy League University students, while it’s third iteration allowed it to add further to this base age group by including all university students.The fourth iteration expanded the age group to include high school students and the final iteration made it available to anyone over the age of 13 years old.

The final iteration was when Facebook began to really become a main stream social tool with the diversity to appeal to a wide audience.

2. Why was it named Facebook?
It’s name refers to the printed, paper face books that are made available in some American colleges and prep schools. Leave it to some young whipper-snapper to go ‘old school’ on all of us parents and use a name that not only makes sense, but that has to do with such classic elements as print and paper.

The original printed face book purpose was to provide incoming students, faculty, and staff with a way to get to know the other people.

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Featured Guest Series

by Todd Jordan

In those days, things were much simpler.

When we were growing up, what our parents worried about, when trying to keep us safe, is much different than what parents need to know today!

What Has Changed?

Parents once focused on keeping kids safe in their neighborhoods and warning them of the dangers of talking to strangers. Today’s parents still must warn and educate their children about strangers, with the difference being, that strangers now have global access. Threats can come from around the corner, a neighboring state, or across the country. Our access to the online world predominantly comes through the use of our web browsers. Popular web browsers include: Internet Explorer, Safari, and Firefox.

Through these browsers, our children don’t just have access to read content, but to view photos, download music, and to privately chat. The ability to be watchful is quickly exceeded and becomes out of our immediate reach! So what are we to do? It’s no longer as simple as keeping questionable things physically out of their reach.

Your Online Safety Arsenal

Their are numerous tools and ways for parents today to keep their children safe online. A child’s safety can be increased considerably by implementing some or all of the suggestions in our new series "Keeping Kids Safe" online. The series will consist of three main articles which are outlined below.

Keeping Kids Safe Series

Part 1: Keeping Kids Safe – Parental Control Software
Part 2: Keeping Kids Safe – Internet Browser Replacements
Part 3: Keeping Kids Safe – Increased Knowledge of Internet Safety In this first article, "Part 1: Keeping Kids Safe – Parental Control Software" we will use NetNanny software for our case study. Parental control software is designed to control and filter access to the internet. Let’s examine what it is and how it is used. More… »