MySpace, a dialogue...

A conversation with my 17 year old...

"Argh! "
"What?"
"This weeks 9th,10th and 11th thing is myspace."
"oh."
"I am not looking forward to this. Hon, can you tell me why anyone would want to have a myspace account?"
"um...well...I don't really know. It's like blogging but with pictures instead of words but there are words also but it's mostly about pics. Come and look at mine"
"You made yours cause it was the only way to keep in touch with one of your friends right?"
"Yeah, I pretty much blog with my other friends, or IM or text. There's this one guy who doesn't have anything else but the phone and his family's on there a lot. So, let me log on...ok here is my site."
"Oh it's pretty. But what's this about selling Brittany Spear's hair?"
"Mom! That's a banner. I didn't put that on there."
"Oh, it looks so junky with all the ads on there. 'Guess who makes it to the Betty Ford clinic first, Brittany or Lindsay?' Ewww!"
"Yeah. So, here is my profile, music, movies, books, stuff like that."
"And what's this?"
"Those are my friends. I send an invite and they can accept it or not and then they get added"
"Oh. What if a strange man invites you to be his friend?"
"Gross! Not happening mom. I have security on my site so you can't just browse and get on my site"
"Well, I want to search around"
"That's not a good idea, remember pictures not words. You'll come across skanky stuff"
"I will? Do you search around?"
"NO! I know who has myspace accounts and they are my friends and that's it."
"Most of the kids at the library that I've seen just look around for raunchy pictures. I haven't seen any use this for what it's intended for."
"Yeah, well, that's one of the reasons I'm not comfortable with myspace."
"Your sister has a facebook account."
"Yeah but that's so she can share pics with the students she went to Australia with."
"I guess the library has a Myspace."
"Whatever."
"What's with the cheesy photos that people took of themselves with their arms halfway in the picture?"
**gales of laughter**
"yeah, dumb huh!"
"I just don't get it and I blog!"
"Yeah. It's just another way to communicate but it can be dangerous. You have to be careful."
"So, if I have to set one up will you help me? Am I going to need one of those pics with my arm in it?"
**laughter**
"I will help you, definitely. Yours will be cool."
"Cool's good."
"And Mom, don't search around you'll just get upset."
"OK."