For those who don’t know, Chatroulette is the latest form of social media—social voyeurism. You sit (or not) in front of your PC’s webcam. You appear in small box on the lower left of the screen. On top of you appears a blank black box. Press F9 and you’re put in contact with a random stranger (literally named stranger). You can romp through these one-on-ones with complete strangers and move on to the next whenever you get the urge.

Chatroulette

Of course there are rumors about Chatroulette. While I only encountered one in the act of masturbating in front of his webcam, it was the topic of conversation for most of the others.

At four in the afternoon East Coast time, I found myself transported to bedrooms in Wales, the UK, and Australia. Impassive young men stared blankly into their webcams.

Stranger 1: I swear this guy just had a photo of himself as a place marker. I don’t know if he would have showed his face if I’d been more his type, but I got no movement—not even an eye blink in response to my friendly waving.

Stranger 2: A sweet 20-something in a tie-dyed shirt and big headphones. Willing to talk. Said he liked to chat but that there were far too many naked guys jerking off in front of their cams for his taste. When I said it was time for me to move on, he teased that “he liked older women and that I should stay a while.“ It was my Mrs. Robinson moment on Chatroulette.

Strangers 3 and 4: They whipped right past me before I even knew what hit me. They must have decided that they didn’t care for my looks before I even registered their presence.

Stranger 5: Had a really cool LCD projector in his room. I thought that he was standing in front of an outdoor billboard. Not too cool on my part.

Stranger 6: A guy who looked a bit closer to me in age. He was from France. Then my phone rang. It was my daughter, who is probably older than most of the guys I’d been talking to. I felt totally weird and told the Frenchman I had leave.

Stranger 7: Wow a girl…at least I think it was a girl. She vanished so quickly all I saw was a waiflike body and some shoulder-length hair.

Stranger 8: Finally, the moment I’d feared but also sought out, arrived. Eight clicks into Chatroulette and I had my first naked masturbator. The camera was nowhere near his face; his pants were down around his knees. I had the feeling of interrupting something very private.

According to the Huffington Post, Chatroulette is 13% pervert, 89% male, and 47% American. Well, two out three ain’t bad. I did not meet an American (or one who would ‘fess up to being an American) in my Chatroulette travels. I met no people of color, no Asians.

I won’t be going back to Chatroulette anytime soon. In comparison, it made what little I can remember of the singles bar scene seem like an enlightened place. Without reading too much into my sub one-minute encounters, there was something sad.

And now that I’ve learned that Chatroulette maps, a mashup that lets you locate the people you’re talking to by tracking the location of their IP address, can put your photo on its big board, that’s enough for me. Voyeurism in the name of research is not my game.

Soon after, when it expanded to include high school students, it dropped the .edu address requirement. It wasn’t too hard for me to backdate my life and get myself a high school account. Today, everyone over 13 can have a Facebook account.

But, as the constituency grew, so did the capabilities and complexities.

Here’s an original Facebook page from 2004.  Notice the pervasive college feel.

Here’s my Facebook page from 2006. Clearly a database of my personal interests. 
Now, here’s today’s latest welcome to my page.

What you should notice: My new page has more icons per square inch than a Japanese schoolkid’s backpack.

First are the three icons on the upper left corner that call out: friend requests, messages, and notifications.  The shades of difference between a notification and a message are lost on me.  I was perfectly happy to check the right side of my screen for the occasional new friend and avoid this icon corner completely.

Number two. The left nav bar can now go on for miles.  It includes the new hallmark of Facebook: apps and marketplace. Not only can I have my own list of apps, I can see which apps my friends use. 

The marketplace is populated by ads and offerings from my friends, friends of friends, and people I’ve never heard of.  I get it. Facebook wants to be the CMU (Center of My Universe) but personally I’d rather see Facebook classic.

Finally, number three: some pretty good privacy. Once you get beyond brainteasers like this one from the privacy setting page: Story on your profile is now controlled by the privacy of the content itself, rather than an additional setting. For example, only people who can see both your Wall, and the Wall to which you posted would be able to see a story about you writing on a friend’s Wall. You cannot completely turn off recent activity stories anymore.   You’re offered a fabulously nuanced degree of control, but the exercise gives reading for meaning a new meaning.

Bottom line:  Like any six-year-old, Facebook is expanding its world, and starting to see things from the other person’s point of view (hence all the customization).  That’s great.  OTH, I miss the pristine neatness of my Facebook of yore.

There are many new solutions that provide younger folks with a proving ground for experiencing the Internet and social networking. One of the newest is FaceChipz. FaceChipz is interesting for two reasons. First, it has a physical component. You buy a pack of five FaceChipz at retail. Second, you are limited to having a one-to-one relationship with your FaceChipz friends. Think of it as a sort of permanent BFF relationship. FaceChipz is about you and your friend (not plural) having an online relationship.

Here’s how it works. You purchase a five-pack of FaceChipz at places like Toys”R”Us. A chip looks very much like a colorful poker chip. Each chip has a unique ID number on it. You enter the website using the unique ID found on the chip.

Here comes the unique part. Once you’ve registered your chip you can hand it over  to your BF (Best Friend). They enter the same code from the chip into their PC.  When they do you and your friend are connected on the FaceChipz site. If you don’t  physically exchanged chipz your profile remains hidden. In addition, parents need to sign up their children to be a part of the site, which increases the safety aspect.

Once you’re signed up and have a friend, you can use FaceChipz similarly to how you use Facebook. You create a profile,  post pictures, and share electronic trinkets with friends. The FaceChipz sell in packs of five for $5 and there’s a one-time $1 fee for processing the parent’s application.

Parents are enamored of this newcomer because it provides a low risk, controlled taste of social networking. I was a bit put off by the fact that  creating a group of  friends requires a convulted sharing of chips. If I invite you and you invite a friend, I need to get a chip from the new friend in order to become a group.  I tested it with some 10-year-old kids  (as well as some adults) and they had a similar reaction.  They’d prefer a site where they could have multiple friends  created  with less work.  Still, if you’re looking for a training wheels approach to internet safety consider Facechipz.

So what was going through Dad’s head when he invited everyone in his AOL address book to join him as a friend on a porn dating site? According to Dad, his friend Eddie made him do it. Dad fell for the old “can’t-say-no-to-a-request-from-a-friend”; that’s just part of his upbringing.

Eddie never sent the invitation out to his friends either. Both of them received messages from people they knew really well, asking them to become friends. Once they accepted, the site asked if they would like to invite others to be friends. Once Eddie and Dad clicked on the “yes” to invite others, the site’s program went to work, looking at all of the email addresses in their address books and immediately sending out the same “join my group” invitation.

But it was the reaction of family and friends to Dad’s invite that showed how different generations react. In general, the elders fell into two categories: naïve enough to accept and then send out their own invites or mortified, terrified, and violated. I got the same Desktop Dating invitation from a few other “mature” relatives the next day. They did it because it came from Dad.

The younger kids didn’t lift an electronic eyebrow. They hit the delete key. Of all of the many young cousins, grandkids, nieces, and nephews, only three of them made any comment to their parents. It was something along the lines of “Got a weird email from Grampy today.” My own daughter warned me of Grampy’s request by forwarding it to me with the comment, “looks as if Grampy’s new computer is lonesome.”

The best response came from an octogenarian. Cousin Marty wrote my dad a rather lengthy apology for not accepting his date. “I’d love nothing more than to be your desktop date,” said Marty in his email to Dad, “but it seems as if Verizon does not want me to be your date. They won’t let me join.” He went on to offer a solution: “I’ve forgotten my password on Facebook, but I do have an account. Maybe we can date there instead.”

Dad’s a bit PO’ed by the whole event. He hates looking dumb (and haven’t we all been there). The elders have proof that the kids don’t react much to out-of-the-norm web events. The grownups are reminded again that even your best friend Eddie can be someone else on the web. I’m reminded of the big gap between the two and wondering how my kids’ kids will react to it all. I’m also reminded of how great it is to have your extended family as web friends; the generation gap has always been there, but now we get to experience it in all sorts of new ways.

Organizations like WiredSafety, FOSI, getNetWise, NetSmartz, Pause, Play Parents, and Common Sense Media are all committed to helping parents understand the dangers of the Internet, offering tips, advice, and survey data. Sometimes the messages are the same, sometimes not. The Department of Justice, the FBI, the Federal Trade Commission, and the FCC are just a few of the government agencies that have their hands in the Internet safety pie, too. And the Internet safety industry has grown its own brand of celebrity: John Walsh, Parry Aftab, Donna Rice Hughes, and others who have been delivering the safety stump speech for over 20 years each.
For years, Internet safety messaging was based on fear. Fear of predators coercing children to meet them in the real world. Fear of adults soliciting our children for various forms of online sex. These issues have not gone away, but it turns out that while predatory problems are the headline makers, they are not the most frequent problems.

Today’s Internet problems are more nuanced and require a more nuanced approach to safety. The groups that “get it” are shifting away from the scare tactics and looking at ways to help kids protect themselves (often from themselves). Sexting, cyberbullying, and sharing of private information are the activities that are more likely to occur on a daily basis.

What will it take to bring Internet safety advocates into modern times?

1. Recognize the ubiquity of the Internet: We’re not just talking about protecting your PC any longer. Mobile phones, game machines, handheld devices, music services–these are all equal opportunities for predatory behavior.
2. Involve the hardware manufacturers: Fostering a culture of responsibility and awareness takes the efforts of all involved. Companies like Verizon, Disney, Microsoft, and AOL have all played a part in shaping the Internet safety environment. Conspicuously absent in the conversation are the hardware folks. Giving kids tools like smartphones, PCs, and netbooks demands that their makers have a stake in the process too.
3. Get the schools on the program: Recognizing that Internet skills are arguably the most important skills to cultivate for today’s students, schools should be doing much more to incorporate best practices. Computer ethics, codes of conduct, and other Internet behaviors should be part of the curriculum. Use of social networking and other popular technologies should be incorporated into academia so that kids can have good role models for how to use the technology.
4. Disclose funding and consolidate: When it comes to Internet safety we may have too much of a good thing. The sheer number of sites and bloggers devoted to keeping kids safe detracts from the message. A bit of consolidation would be beneficial. At minimum, sites should state where their funding comes from since funding sources can certainly affect the tone of a site.
5. Get kids involved in dialogue: Creating Internet savvy kids means including them in the conversation. Everyone knows that when kids learn from other kids, with humble opinion instead of dictum, the message is likely to create a deeper impression.
6. Be a role model: Parents who steal music and software, or are flippant about their own privacy and security on the web reinforce the notion that the web is the not subject to societal laws.
7. Create a national program: We ask kids to take a test to prove that they’re ready to get behind the wheel, and many states have implemented graduated licenses where you earn driving privileges (like driving at night) one at a time. Learning to navigate the Internet is at least as important as learning to drive a car, so maybe there’s something to be learned from the driver’s license model.

There are a number of high tech companies seeking to save consumers from themselves by helping them curb overspending. Some of the ideas are quite novel, and if you’re tempted by a big luscious ad or you’re someone with a gift list as long as War and Peace, check out these clever shopping restraints. (Just remember they want you to buy, too.)

Take Facecard. It’s an alternative to debit and credit cards and one that helps anyone who wants to manage their finances. Like other prepaid credit cards, you can only spend the amount that’s on the card. No overspending or overdrafting. Where Facecard gets interesting is with its prewards program-–sort of a virtual coupon. You’ll get discounts at participating merchandisers but you won’t need to rifle through your handbag only to find your expired paper coupon: The benefits of coupon shopping with the protection of a finite shopping limit. Plus, there are some monitoring controls (no shopping at a certain store for instance) to help parents keep a handle on young consumers. Available for free until September (with a nominal fee plus minimum balance in your account after September), the Facecard is accepted everywhere that MasterCard is. 

Or look at SmartyPig. SmartyPig is sort of a virtual lay-away plan with a social networking twist. You tell the site what you’re saving for–whether it’s a vacation, a new TV, or even a college education. They’ll tell you how much you need to put away per month and for how long.

As you put away the suggested money in their online FDIC-backed bank, they pay 2.75% interest (as long as you keep $10 in the account) on your account (and provided you put at least $10 in your account each month). Then you get a SmartyPig widget to put on your Facebook or other page letting your friends and family know what you’re saving for. They can donate to your cause or just offer moral support.

Group gifting will be the rage this season. Best Buy is putting the final touches on their new Wish List site where friends and family can help you make a purchase. Bing, Microsoft’s new search engine, has a powerful shopping area called CashBack, where companies give you a rebate (essentially the money they would have spent on marketing) for products that within their universe of merchants.

Those who want to be able to bank as they shop should check out Firethorn–one of the most robust mobile banking systems I’ve seen (though fire and thorn are not my favorite shopping words). They too, offer discounts and offerings for mobile commerce shopper.

These sites, harbingers of things to come, each make shopping fun and a tad safer. Just remember, overspending is soooo yesterday.

As our PCs and our emails hold more and more of our most intimate musings, and as boomers face mortality, the question of how to treat our online lives in the afterlife is a big one. I hear more and more stories of loved ones who die leaving their memories online and inaccessible to their families and friends.

I first looked into what happens to your online accounts after you die in 2006. Most websites were completely clueless, way too concerned with the here and now to worry about future problems.

Today, Facebook has a very clear policy about death. You can decide to memorialize the deceased profile (certain features, like status updates are shut off), which keeps the site viewable but frozen in time, or you can have the site deactivated (which doesn’t remove the contents). What Facebook doesn’t do (at least not without a big fuss) is release the deceased’s log-on information.

That means, unless they’re willing to fight, your family may be unable to use the site—say for contacting your friends with an update. Or finding out who your friends were or, in some cases, even how you might have died. LinkedIn, MySpace, and others have similar policies. You can have an account memorialized (on MySpace) or removed completely, but don’t count on being able to access the contents.

Planning for the Afterlife

Given these policies, like most death-related issues, the best thing you can do is to start thinking about your digital legacy while you’re still alive. Public radio recently ran a story about the legal wrangling of getting access to a deceased family member’s password. The broadcast identified Legacy Locker, a new website that lets you bequeath your online properties as a solution.

Other alternatives involve simple common sense, low-tech solutions.

1. Give your passwords to a trusted family member—an envelope that gets stored in a desktop drawer until needed is the lowest tech way to protect your legacy.
2. Don’t trust the keepers? Provide a list of passwords and account information to your attorney or executor. Ask that your will be modified to include a statement about what happens to your online persona.
3. Lock up your passwords in a vault to be opened in the event of your death. Leave specific instructions as to how to use these accounts.

If you think I’m just finding things to worry about, then think about this. According to a recent census of social media users, 3.24% of all Facebook users were actually dead. Dead MySpace users trumped Facebook at 7.46%. That’s a lot of souls floating around in social networking purgatory.

This notion of favorite play patterns wasn’t lost on Ted Barnett, the CEO, co-founder, and dad behind the new virtual world, SuperSecret. Despite the name, there are few secrets embedded in the game. The secret is how Barnett deftly created an electronic crockpot of everything that kids who are too old for the Club Penguin scene, but too young for Facebook, like to do.

The meat in the stew is a bunch of relatively mindless but fun games—not unlike the games you find on AddictingGames.com or Miniclip.com, two of the most widely trafficked websites for tweens. But unlike those sites, where you feel like you’ve entered a morass of disparate games, SuperSecret plunks these diversions (40 flash games) into a context.

The secret sauce is the virtual world that surrounds the game play. First, there’s you! Your task in this virtual world is to grow up. You begin as a lowly 10-year-old by choosing one of 20 different characters. As you play more, you actually age, and with age comes increased privileges that you’ve earned. Anyone can play for free, but once you’ve aged past 12 you’ll need to subscribe to the service. Each age brings a new set of friends, challenges, games, pets, and surprises. Brilliant. What kid doesn’t want to grow up (virtually or for real)?

And the world itself is a nice mix of not too cutesy cartoony, but still clearly a child’s world of exploration. The locations are fun places like the Quad and Midway. Like Club Penguin, there’s chat of various kinds. In the stuff tweens love category, players can see where their friends are in the virtual world and a cellphone pop-up lets them stay in touch while playing.

In the crowded world of virtual worlds, it’s tough to predict what kids will love and what will leave them cold, but SuperSecret certainly has all of the right stuff to make it a really strong contender.\r\n\r\nSee what USA Today has to say.