Nashville Area Parents Create Safe Social Media Site for Their Kids and Yours

I saw an article in my local newspaper about a couple in Brentwood who launched a "safe" social media site for their kids called NeighborDog.com.  It's similar to Facebook and YouTube with more privacy settings and helpful editors.  It has safety features built in like avatars, tips for young users, neighborhood administrators, links to safety sites, and tips for parents.  It pitches a kid-friendly user interface including some tips and examples from [I assume] the family dog Floyd Goodneighbor.  

 

So here's my take.  I think this is an excellent idea.  The built-in security features and education in security is very good.  The FAQs are well written and provide much better instructions than Facebook or YouTube.  The logic is sound.  Since kids are naturally drawn to social media sites, why not create one that is focused on kids that includes good security?  Will it be successful?  Who knows?  I suspect even if it catches on there will be peer pressure to 'graduate' to the real world of Facebook and YouTube.  Do Facebook and YouTube not offer security?  They do.  You can use privacy in a similar manner.  However the focus here is on security and YouTube for example suggests you mark your videos 'public' even though you can make them private.  I like the idea of user-friendly editors for photo and video making the site better than Facebook, YouTube, or Flickr.  This should increase the likelihood that the kids will use the site.  The site is paid for through ads like the other social media sites.

So what don't I like?  I noticed a footer ad that reads, "Watch Kristin Cavallari's Best Moments on Laguna Beach".  Since it pictured a pretty young girl, I did some research.  Laguna Beach is a popular reality show on MTV focusing on wealthy teens.  Here's what Wikipedia had to say in its Criticism section: "The Parents Television Council argued that the sexually explicit and profane content in the series makes the show inappropriate for its intended audience".  Here's what CommonSenseMedia had to say:  "Parents need to know that this show offers plenty of mild profanity, sexuality, and other possibly objectionable content."  It could be that this is the best of the junk on MTV and since kids are drawn to this channel anyway it makes sense to use an ad.  But my view is that not only should this site not have used the ad, it should seek to take great care to not take on an ad that in any way is provocative and make this part of their charter.  I know they need ads to fund the site, but this is the kind of ad that will turn off parents. Note:  I commented to the newspaper article about this and the site owner replied that they do plan to ensure the ads are appropriate and that this is just a space filler. 

All in all I like this concept and except for the one ad it appears to me that they have nailed it.  My suggestion for the future is to keep working on the security piece.  You might consider a monitoring application [which you could sell] to parents that would enable them to have access to their kids' activities covertly.  You might consider a blog written by the family dog that addresses security without being preachy.  You could even get guest articles written by other animals which could be the alter-ego of security experts.  An extreme example might be a story of a kid who was hurt through a social media communication written by one of the law enforcement experts who pretends to be a kid as told by Mr. Boots his cat.  You might consider making the abuse link more obvious, i.e., a call to action button that reads 'Report Abuse'.  My final advice is to not stray from your niche; safety.  Don't go after location based features like Foursquare or Gowalla due to the potential abuse.  Be careful where you advertise.  As an example I would say it would be OK to advertise on Hanna Montanna, but not on Miley Cyrus.  Develop a parents' site or blog that is more direct with regard to security to bolster your credibility in the arena.  This way you can reference existing and new articles without having to create all the content.  You might contact every organization or publication that promotes child safety to help get the word out about your site.  Finally manage your growth so you are not pressured to take inappropriate ads and your network has the capacity to survive a viral event without crashing.

Good luck to the McCurrys.  I hope your site goes viral.  Here's a family photo:

 

 

Comments

[coach factory stores]

I LOVE this! SO cute!*