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Comment by temiri | Hacker News Reader

I think this is terrific.

I was 14 when I joined Facebook, in 2008. My dad, who is no dummy, laid out a series of rules for my Facebook use (he had been on the site for a year or so already).

One of those conditions was that he had my password and could look at my behavior on the site at any time. Occasionally I'd post something that he thought was inappropriate, and we'd talk about it, and I'd get embarrassed.

But in retrospect, I'm grateful. Everyone needs guidance as a teenager, and this is especially true for behavior online. Online behavior is at least as permanent as IRL behavior, and the consequences are often more public or serious.

I think it's really important to guide your kids online. Though your 13 year old may not appreciate it at the time, s/he will when s/he's 20 and has only half as much embarrassing teenage material floating around on their Facebook timeline (or Twitter account).

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I think, at least from the sounds of it, the nature of the rules your dad set for your Facebook use might be a tad different than the ones this woman set for her kid's iPhone use. It is not so much that she is setting rules, but rather projecting her own values and pet peeves on the child. I mean, look at this:

Don’t take a zillion pictures and videos. There is no need to document everything. Live your experiences. They will be stored in your memory for eternity.

What a crock of horseshit. Yes, I hate it as much as anyone when Miss Lisa Gorgeous posts on Facebook a photo of the ice cream she is eating just to get 'Likes', but I'm not going to demand that my kid refrain from that. It may be a bit stupid, but it is ultimately harmless. Not only that, but she is patently wrong that the child's experiences will be "stored in her memory for eternity." We are not computers. We forget stuff. And documenting the things we do is the most reliable way to relive them.

I agree 100% with the stupidity of the memory statement. And I think the rest is actually worse than you say: the mother doesn't appear to be talking about publishing the photos or videos anywhere, just taking them, and this should be perfectly fine.

Ah, yeah, I agree. There's a fine line between setting good guidelines for safety and enforcing rules based on highly subjective and personal ideas.

I was mostly impressed by parts like point 18:

>> 18. You will mess up. I will take away your phone. We will sit down and talk about it. We will start over again. You & I, we are always learning. I am on your team. We are in this together.

That kind of learning is important.

I don't think she was saying never take videos, just be measured. I read an article a while back where the mom said her kids merely lived life as a source of content for their Facebook feed -- and I see the same thing around me. This parent is just trying to help her kid come out well-rounded and balanced (which is not necessarily what we see with kids who are buried in screens all day). Kudos to this mom.

I learned a different way. My parents were neither super open nor super repressive. Instead, I had a good system where my cousins would guide me by sitting down with me and talking through whatever was going on at the time. It taught me the right ways to behave but more importantly, I reached these conclusions through my own reasoning with guidance when I felt I needed it.

These rules are pretty silly and disrespectful. It is a message from the mom to her child letting the child know that she does not trust him enough to think on his own.

Which is pretty justified, in my experience. There's a reason 13-year-olds are called "minors"; most of them are not yet mature enough to make good decisions on their own, so guidance is necessary.

Of course there are exceptions to the rule, but the mother certainly knows her child better than you or I do.

Oddly enough, or not, 13 is also around the time where kids start puberty. It's not just a physical change, but also a time where kids are most impressionable. The "kids toys" get put away and they stop behaving like a child, because they are old enough to understand certain things. In short, they are becoming little adults.

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