“My philosophy is that for education you need to start at a really, really young age,” Mr Zuckerberg said. “Because of the [legal] restrictions we haven’t even begun this learning process. If they’re lifted then we’d start to learn what works,” said Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook — the largest and most popular social networking site in teh world. When he says “really, really young age,” he’s referring to children under the age of 13. He also stated that he intends to challenge legislation preventing children below that age from legally signing up for Facebook “at some point.”
In 1998, the Federal Trade Commission signed into law the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, making it illegal for websites to collect information from children under the age of 13. Since then, we have become so used to entering our birth dates each time we sign up for any free or paid online service that we hardly blink about it anymore. One obvious problem with this legislation is enforcement: all you have to do to get an account somewhere if you are under 13 is just enter an acceptable birth date when prompted. There is no real way to ensure that pre-teens will not sign up. But if they do, at least the company is not held liable for any damages that may ensue because of someone’s dishonesty.
Legal implications aside, I find Zuckerberg’s stated reason for wanting kids younger than 13 on Facebook to be absurd. The still boyish looking Facebook founder believes that his social network bears some educational merit, and that the restrictions currently in place present a barrier to learning. His statement implies that education is not working in its current form, but by freeing younger children to sign up for Facebook accounts, we could collectively discover what works.
Oh really, Mr. Zuckerberg? What educational authorities did you confer with to arrive at this conclusion? Yes, we know you had dinner with Steve Jobs and Barack Obama earlier this year — but let’s Face it, their credentials in education are not working, either. Let’s just admit that this has little (if anything) to do with a genuine concern for education, and more to do with expanding the Facebookverse. I’m not saying that’s a bad idea; just that it isn’t something that needs a contrived reason to work towards. Maybe the world needs a special haven within the hallowed halls of Facebook, where they can be safer and not have their data collected by you at all. That would be generous, but dangerous, because then, people could sign up as “kid” accounts who aren’t really kids, etc….
There are all kinds of problems with implementing the letting in of a younger demographic, and I don’t think Facebook is going to pioneer the way through that tangled maze of legality, morality, and plausibility anytime soon. Getting back to the point I made earlier, kids younger than 13 are already all over Facebook using dishonest birthdates. My nephew is one of them. He’s 8 years old. His step-mother completely backed him signing up, and she is a high school principal. What sort of message is this sending our young people? That people on the Internet aren’t real, so it doesn’t matter if you lie to them? That people on the Internet are somehow less imminent than people you encounter each day, so you never have to worry about them getting very involved in your life? That if being dishonest gets you what you want and doesn’t appear to do any tangible harm, it’s perfectly fine?
We need to consider all of these aspects of the education we are really giving our kids and have open discussions about them, rather than dismissing federal laws just because people break them all the time anyway. This sort of moral relativism is paving the future of the world. Now, that’s education.
