Halloween and Mediocrity

Halloween and Mediocrity EpisodeWhat do we do on Halloween instead of trick-or-treat, festivals, or costume parties? Our family enjoys each others’ company like we do many other nights throughout the year because in our family we believe that Halloween is Optional.

Ericka over at Large Families on Purpose asks if you are going to have a “Happy” Halloween? Her birthday falls on October 31 and that seems to make people think that she is an expert on the traditions of Halloween. And given her blog post and the number of positive responses, I would say that she is more than an expert than most on this subject.

Family Travel Adventures

Check out our Daddy Life Facebook Fan Page to see us kissing the yard of bricks at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. We were traveling with our son Caden who has servere medical special needs related to 22q11.2 (DiGeorge Syndrome).

Mysterious backyard sound – What or who is that Owl talking to?

TECH TIME

Amazon Kindle store does not filter adult explicit and erotic book results from searches.

 

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Kindle Free Time – Parents Need More


Kindle Store Search Results for American GirlSetting time limits offered in the new Kindle Fire Free Time parental controls is easy, but in my opinion it is all just window dressing for a much deeper problem with putting eReaders in the hands of kids. Sherry and I are debating whether or not to give my old Kindle (2nd Generation E Ink) to Riley as a 10th birthday present. This kids reads like no one I have ever met and we believe he would love the high tech way of accessing his favorite series.

So what’s the big deal?

A couple of months ago a parent asked me how to control search results when browsing the Kindle Store. And by the way, this question applies to all Kindle devies, eRaders for other devices like the iPad, or just searching within a computer browser. Her 11 yr old had saved money to buy her own Kindle Fire and was freely browsing for her favorite children’s books.  When searching the Kindle store for “American Girl” which is a popular book series 11 yr old girls, the mom was shocked by some of the results her daughter was exposed to. As shown in the photo above, as of today the 12th result in the Kindle store for the search term “American Girl” is a very explicit/erotic eBook by the same name. It is certainly not appropriate for an 11 yr old by the standards of any parent that I know. So if the above image and the sub-title of “A Carnal Story” don’t give you a hint as to why, then I can assure you that the description Kindle Fire would remove all doubt. I recommend that you spare yourself the trouble of looking this up and just trust me on this one. My answer to the parent was that she would most likely have to manage Kindle Store access if she wanted to protect her 11 yr old from being exposed to this type of content. And even doing that is near impossible on older devices and free Kindle readers like used on desktops and smart phones. The challenge that parents face with the Kindle Store is that there is no “safe search” feature or filtering by age. Many books including some of the American Girl books are not categorized by age even though it is widely known in parenting circles familiar with these books that they are targeted at early readers (3rd grade and up).

Initial reviews of Amazon’s Kindle Fire Free Time Parental Controls are pointing to a less than stellar answer to the above mentioned challenge. Parents should be careful with simply handing over any model of Kindle to a child without first giving careful consideration to how they will supervision the shopping for books in the Kindle Store.

5 iPhone, iPad, and iPod Security Settings for Parents

There are some basic settings that parents should configure on their iPhones, iPads, and iPods.  If you are the parent of older kids who have their own iPod, iPad, or iPhone then you should add these practices to the list of things you want to share and train them in while using their own devices. Please remember that kids are more likely to say what you say, do what you do, and they are less likely to do what you say. So set a good example and use these tips on your own devices.

1 – Lock the Screen

Go To:  Settings/General/Auto-Lock

I recommend you adjust this setting to “1 Minute” so that the device screen locks after one minute of inactivity. This prevents little kids from inadvertently accessing, deleting, or altering content on your device.

2 – Set a Password or Passcode

Go To: Settings/General/Passcode Lock

Select “Turn Passcode On”. Set “Require Passcode” to immediately so that the device cannot be used without the passcode once the device screen locks. This passcode will also be required to change the passcode settings in the future even if you allow your child to use the device unattended to play Angry Birds. The reason why on this one is obvious. Auto-locking the screen is useless if you are not going to require a password to unlock it. That would be like locking a door and leaving the key in the lock.

3 – Turn Off Unused Services

Got To: Settings/General/ [Bluetooth, Network, and/or Location Services]

If you are not using Network, Bluetooth or Location Services then go ahead and set them to “Off”. This prevents accidental access to unsafe networks and lowers your rick of getting hacked by someone who knows how to break into these services.

4 – Use Restrictions

Go To: Settings/General/Restrictions

There are a number of things that can be restricted, but I want to focus on content in this one. By default everything is allowed. This includes Allowed Content such as Explicit Music and Podcasts, Movies rated up to NC-17 (including R), and TV-MA. My wife and I don’t even view movies above a PG-13 rating so we certainly don’t want our kids accessing mature content via their iPod.

5 – Restrict In-App Purchases

This is related to the previous item, but warrants its own bullet in our house. This is the area where you restrict your kids from inadvertently buying something via those pop-up ads that kids like my little Caden enjoy clicking while playing Angry Birds.

Remember: Technology Safety is more about Behavior than the Technology!

Podcast Episode 2 – Video Gaming, Internet Safety, Podcast History

Below are show notes for DaddyLife.net Podcast Episode 2

Links from the Podcast:

Larry Collette’s guest post – Important tips for Parents of Gaming Children
ESRB game rating website – http://www.esrb.org/
Training kids to use the Internet Safely
Caden’s Page
Cliff Ravenscraft – The Podcast Answer Man
Android Podcast Recording App – HiFiCorder
This episode of the DaddyLife.net Podcast is now available for download right here or you can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes, RSS, or the Blackberry network.

Important Tips for Parents of Gaming Children

Gaming is becoming more and more embedded in children’s lives.  It is likely that your children will witness another child gamer in some form or fashion, whether it be an arcade, portable like a Nintendo DS, PlayStation Portable (PSP) or iPod Touch, or home console.  It is almost inevitable that your child will eventually ask you for a video game system, if you haven’t gotten one already.  But if you are a parent that has never got into gaming, then there is a good chance that you still think video games are still a children’s toy.

I’ve been gaming since the early 80’s and I’ve definitely seen the evolution of video games in my time.  Since the days of the 8-bit pixels, games now-a-days are fully detailed textured polygons.  What does that mean?  It means everything looks real and sometimes it can look too real.  No different than computer technology, video games try to keep up with the hardware requirements.  As the hardware improves, so does the software and the storage media.  Video games now are comparable to a fully interactive movie, some complete with violence, gore, sex and adult language.  To many parents, whom are not gamers, think that these games or all games are designed for kids.  No.  These games are designed for adults that were once kid gamers.  During the Atari and Nintendo era, the graphics were very limited to blood and gore.  The technology the, didn’t have the capability to generate sound, so text was a form of story telling that had to be read.

In case you weren’t aware of it, many of all video games now have a rating system.  In the United States, the video game rating system is provided by the ESRB (Entertainment Software Rating Board).  This board is not made up of gamers, but they are a group that reads the release of all games and it is the video game publishers responsibility to disclose any and all types of material to determine the proper rating for video games.  This rating system was implemented back in 1994, shortly after some controversial video games like Mortal Kombat (which showed a graphic image of a head being ripped off a man’s body, followed by blood spewing from the neck) along with several other games.  While Mortal Kombat at the time was initially an arcade coin operated game (later ported to the console), games like this started surfacing and some parents starting becoming concerned of what their children were playing.  Nintendo, for the longest time, would not license any games with excessive violence, blood, gore, smoking, drugs or sex until a rating system was officially in place.

While these rating systems have been around for almost 20 years, there are still parents out there purchasing games which I feel are not appropriate for younger children.  While I have no control for those parents that don’t care what their children do or play, this will be just a few personal tips that I can provide to help those parents who need a better understanding of what is an appropriate game for their children to play.  I feel most parents get painted in the corner by their children, “well Johnny’s parents bought him this game.”  While the parent’s think, “well, if Johnny’s parents did it, then it must be okay.”

Easy tips for parents who have very limited knowledge about video games.

Use the rating system printed on the box

It is very similar to movie and music warnings.  It is fairly obvious, E for Everyone, T for Teen (13+), M for Mature (17+) and AO for Adults Only (18+).  If you look on the back, it will go into detail to exactly what your kids will be likely exposed to.  The video game publishers and ESRB are very good at giving a detail of what content is in the box. It is very rare that I found a game that was misprinted.

Use the rating system web site
You can also visit their website (http://www.esrb.org/), if you want to look up the game before you make a trip to the store.

 

Online Gameplay
Many video games now provide an online service with the ability to play the games with other people.  Most online services are not rated by the ESRB, but are written into the online service provider’s End User Policy and Service Agreement.  Most of these services, like Playstation Network, XBox Live or MMORPG like World of Warcraft require the gamer to be at least 13 years of age and have a parents consent.  Be aware that your children have and will be exposed to other older children and/or adults playing these very same games.  They will be exposed to unmoderated voice and text conversations and there is a good chance they will hear content not suitable for their age.  Some of these services give some ability to limiting who they may chat with and how, but these settings are too complicated to configure if you aren’t well versed in understanding the system settings.  It is best to just avoid your children communicating unless you know they are just having one-on-one conversations.  Most of the console systems that do not have a microphone attachment, the conversations from the online players could be played from the television speakers, by default.

If you decide to go this route, read up on how to create private chats channel with your child and their friends.  This is the only way your child may play and chat with your child’s friend without listening to other conversations while in game.

Purchasing Games
Most of the stores like EB Games, Game Stop, Walmart or Best Buy have policies against selling games to underage children.  While it isn’t enforced like guns, alcohol or cigarettes, there will be a store that will sell one to an under-aged child.  This happens and I see it happen more often than most.  While also these same stores have  an open software return policy as well, meaning when you try to return software (e.g. video game software), they will not accept the return of an open video game package.  So, if you find out that your underage child purchased a game that you deem not appropriate, don’t expect to return to the store and expect a refund from the oblivious store clerk.  Be aware of your child’s game purchases, no different as if they were going in to buy inappropriate music or movies.

 

Purchasing Games Online
Xbox Live Marketplace and Playstation Store have services that allow you to buy games online.  Whether you secure your child’s online account with your credit card (this method is convenient, but risky) or you provide your child with a pre-paid card.  They will have the ability to download any game, movie or music that is available at these shops.  There are a few ways to handle this, first is to again, monitor what your kids are buying.  Help them spend their cards and avoid giving them the ability to buy a game outside your knowledge with an account assigned to a credit card.

Parental Settings on Consoles
This is the last and biggest tip.  If all else fails, this one is the most important one when you initially configure your child’s game system.  There is the ability to configure the game system to only allow certain rated games, movies or music to play on your child’s console.  Most of these rating features are embedded into the media, while it prevents your child from playing certain games or media, it will prompt for a passcode to allow you to play the higher rated games or media.

Most modern video games systems aren’t video game systems anymore.  Most people use it as their multimedia device, which allows you to do more than play video games.  I would think that if you are one of those parents who use this video game system more than a game system, then you probably know a lot more on how to protect your kids from playing games they shouldn’t be playing.

Video games are supposed to be fun for kids and adults.  Just some of these games aren’t made for kids and parents just have to understand that these video games are not toys anymore.

Larry Collette lives in South Korea with his wife and five children. He is a web applications developer for the US Federal Government, Military Veteran, Video Game Enthusiast, and a Mac/Linux user. You can read more about Larry on his about.me page and connect with him on Twitter.