Day 2: the Industry Day

During the second day of the conference we really got down to the issue of Cyberbullying.

Executives from Newscorps (who owns Myspace), Facebook, myYearbook.com, Oracle, AOL, Jagex (a British gaming company), Verizon and Girl Ambition fettered questions from Dr. Aftab and her top Teen Angels.

Let me begin by saying there was quite a bit of debate during the Community Day about where the fault lay for these Internet safety problems, the industry, parents, or teachers? Maybe a combination of the three? It seems that people place most of the responsibility between industry and parents. As a result, this first panel from the industry had to answer some pretty tough questions about their role in cyberbullying and Internet safety.

Kudos to these companies for making the effort to increase parent awareness and safety controls in a lawless cyberworld. Many industry leaders held the position that the tools are out there, but parents and kids don’t use them.

One of the biggest challenges they face is how to police the Internet without violating first amendment rights. What role can and should schools play in what happens outside of schools and off campus?

The second panel consisted of government officials including two FTC commissioners, two sheriffs including one from Polk County, Florida, made infamous for a cyberbullying incident, employees from NY attorney general’s office, and many other state and local government officials from across the country.

Interestingly both sheriffs stated they don’t want these cases to ever reach them, they don’t want to make criminals out of kids and so the question arises, is this behavior merely inappropriate or is it illegal?

My analysis on the conference:
A law or mandate of some sort concerning cyberbullying, Internet safety, and schools will be passed in states in the next few years.
Perhaps a federal law or mandate will also be passed.
Industry will vamp up security controls and parental features and people will continue to find ways around them.
Campaigns and curricula will be developed to increase awareness of the issues surrounding the Internet.
The law will try and catch up with the technology.

I pose another question to conclude this post: When these children become parents themselves, will these problems still exist or will we merely have new problems, new ways to bully, new ways to commit crimes again children?