privacy | Parenting In the Loop

We all want to believe that Facebook takes parents’ concerns about privacy seriously. But the truth is that Facebook is a publicly traded company that cares first and foremost about making its shareholders happy. We have no idea how far it will go to do so, especially since the company is not extraordinarily profitable right now. But what we do know is that Facebook is pushing our boundaries now, often, to see just how much of our privacy we’re willing to give away.

Why I’m Done Posting Photos of My Kid On Facebook.

Over the last few years, since I began blogging, I have been surprised how much and how often moms share pictures and stories about their children. Their photos are usually gorgeous and give beauty and faces to their stories about events here there and everywhere. Many blogs are running chronicles of what life is like in a given family. It is a social media reality show of real life parenting in many cases.

Facebook and Instagram house many family photos and tales. Sites like Babble and their bloggers often share photos and stories about parenting issues from single parenting moms and dads, to families dealing with sleep issues, discipline, feeding and various and sundry situations of family life.

Many times, I have wondered how much is too much sharing on Facebook, Instagram and personal blogs. Occasionally, the comments can get quite nasty and personal too.

I have wondered what the children of today’s parents are going to say when they realize that they have lived in a glass house like the movie, Truman Show that starred Jim Carrey, where his life and all his movements were being filmed without him even knowing it.

The Truman Show is a 1998 American satirical comedy-drama film directed by Peter Weir and written by Andrew Niccol. The cast includes Jim Carrey as Truman Burbank, as well as Laura Linney, Noah Emmerich, Ed Harris and Natascha McElhone. The film chronicles the life of a man who is initially unaware that he is living in a constructed reality television show, broadcast around the clock to billions of people across the globe. Truman becomes suspicious of his perceived reality and embarks on a quest to discover the truth about his life.

via The Truman Show – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

This kind of exposure of children and the internet is uncharted territory. In some cases we are only getting a glimpse of what this type of exposure is capable of doing to our privacy.

Are we as parents willing to take that chance with our privacy and our children’s right to privacy?
Have you drawn boundaries when it comes to social media?
Will you set up rules for your kids as they get older and want to share on Facebook?

As a grandparent, I wonder how it will play out…I trust today’s parents will figure it out…Right?

The New York Times declared her to be “Queen Of The Mommy Bloggers,” but it’s been fully a decade since Heather Armstrong started her blog, Dooce, lost her job because of it, and embraced not without difficulty motherhood — all in public view.

via Top 100 Mom Blogs — all the Best Mom Blogs, including Dooce.

MOMMY BLOGS AND “TMI” (Too much information)

Are too many kids making guest appearances on their mommy’s blog, on instagrams or on Facebook pages?

I find this a serious question and somewhat of a dilemma.

As to what is the right answer, I am stumped.

How much is too much when it comes to exposing our personal life in photos and words online?

….Children are appearing in droves on social media. These appearances will be visible forever and ever…and it is not the fairytale forever and ever where all live happily ever after.

Blogs by moms are so popular especially if they are authentic and share honest feelings about motherhood…all that is good…all that is bad and even at times down right ugly. Sometimes the bad and the ugly win out when it comes to viewership which is what counts if you want to entice brands to advertise on your site and actually profit from your work.

Is this not a type of exploitation of our children? And is it all bad?

I love photos and children’s photos are so innocent and beautiful without being posed…so why not share them? But do you ever wonder as I do, who actually is viewing your photos?

How tight should our boundaries be??? Should we be reconsidering how much we discuss our children online? Are there situations and anecdotes that do not belong on line in a blog?

A seasoned writer, whom I respect, recently said to me, “This generation is not afraid of the internet as our generation is and they are not as concerned with overall privacy“.

I struggle with privacy and boundaries whenever I write about family and children. Literally, I have thousands of photos uploaded from which I could draw, but I find myself searching “Flickr’s Creative Commons” for an appropriate picture.

I love reading the “Mommy Blogs“…many of them are so beautifully and sincerely written and when photos are included it just adds to their overall beauty and authenticity.

The questions that I have about our children’s privacy are important ones in my eyes. They are influenced by my social worker lens from which I view kids and boundaries.

I hope that you can help answer some of my questions and that my blog is a good balance of what I can share and what I feel is too personal to print.

Talking About Kids Online: Whats Too Much Information? | Strollerderby.