Keeping MySpace a Safe Space

By Chelsea Parrish, 15, and Emma Roy, 14, with contributions from Lauren Belpedio, 13, and Paige Gilbert, 11

As the fifth most popular site on the Internet with twenty-one million new users each month, the socializing network MySpace seems to be taking over the world. With most of its users between the ages of sixteen and thirty-four, it has changed the way young people communicate throughout the nation, and the U.P. is no exception.

"I like MySpace because it helps me keep in touch with people that move away or people I know out of town, and it's easy to talk to my friends through it," says Justine LaViolette, sixteen, of Marquette.

On MySpace, users create personal profiles by posting pictures and information about themselves such as interests, activities, likes, dislikes, etc. They also can post comments, email or instant message friends or post bulletins and blogs, which are essentially online diaries.

LaViolette has had a MySpace account for about a year. She uses the email, blog and commenting features. She also likes listening to the music of smaller bands that she wouldn't be able to hear on bigger sites.

"The benefits of MySpace would definitely have to be the accessible music and keeping in touch with all of my friends," she said.

Tiffany Claflin, sixteen, of Gwinn has had a MySpace account for a year and a half. She also enjoys listening to music and communicating with her friends.

"I post comments to my friends, like 'I love you, you're so cute' to my girlfriends to boost each others' self-esteem," Claflin said. "Or I might send a message to them. Then I do kudos. I post bulletins, and I like to see what my friends have. Some of them are just weird, but others are kind of cute. They're like little love stories."

It may be innocent communication between friends, but it can lead to danger if the user isn't careful about what they post.

"MySpace in a perfect world would be an excellent way for people to meet other people of similar ages and interests because there's a wide variety on MySpace for kids and adults to go on. And there's a wide variety of topics that they can discuss and be interested in," said Detective Sgt. Todd Johnston of the Michigan State Police, Negaunee Post. "The problem with MySpace is that you never know who you're talking with unless you personally know that person."

MySpace has no system to verify the identities of their users. Users are supposed to be at least fourteen, but there's nothing stopping a 10-year-old from pretending to be twenty or a fifty-year-old from pretending to be sixteen.

There has been a lot of recent media coverage of internet crimes including several NBC Dateline programs exposing predators who lied about their identities. But does that sort of thing happen in the U.P.?

"Unfortunately, things like that happen everywhere," said Johnston. "It does happen in the Upper Peninsula. It is not a great deal of a problem, but we don't know how many online predators there are out there."

Heather Hollands, an English teacher at Gwinn High School has mixed feelings about MySpace, which she says is extremely popular with kids at her school.

"One day I was talking to the students and I asked them how many chat online or have a MySpace type of site. Most of the students raised their hand," she said.

On one hand, Hollands is happy to see kids writing.

"One of the benefits I see as an English teacher is that students post a daily journal, so they're writing a lot. They're communicating with each other," she said. "Students can make new friends that way."

But on the other hand, she has concerns.

"I asked them how many had ever been approached online by an older man, somebody that they didn't know. And again almost the same number of students raised their hand," she said. I asked them what they do about it and they just said they ignore it."

Hollands is afraid that kids aren't careful enough in what they post or how they post it.

"Students are really advanced in technology, but I think they're naive in thinking that they can post their personal information, and that nobody besides their friends would look at it. I've seen the students would put places they're going, like to a volleyball game or to a dance, and they say when and where it's going to be. I think that's really opening themselves up to a lot of danger."

Claflin feels that she's not putting herself at risk.

"I could be if I was talking to people that I didn't know and giving out information like where I live and all that. But I don't," she said. "But there are other people, some of my friends that are on there, they have a lot of other friends that are not from around here and I know they haven't met before. So they're putting themselves at more risk than I am, I think."

Creating a MySpace account requires only about five minutes and is free. Once this first step is completed, the profile is automatically set to private, which means only people on a friends list - those people you accept - can see the profile. You can change this to the public setting that will allow anyone to see your profile. Each individual blog post can be set to private, friends only or public where anyone in the world can read it.

"It's an easy place to get out my emotions without actually having to tell people because you can make it private," Claflin said.

"I usually only talk to people I know," LaViolette said. " But I have talked to people who know my friends, but I don't talk to strangers."

Claflin and LaViolette say they have heard a lot in the media about dangers associated with MySpace. Claflin feels that the media may be blowing the "problem" out of proportion.

"In a way they kind of are. They think that everyone is out to get everyone, and we're all too young and immature to realize these things," she said. "But in another way it's good that they're so into it because otherwise if we didn't have them bugging us about it all the time then maybe we would be doing bad things, giving out information."

LaViolette doesn't feel the dangers have been blown out of proportion.

"Some of the things that are happening over MySpace are very wrong," she said. "I just think that young people need to be aware of that and they need to take proper steps to protect themselves."

The MySpace Web site has a safety tips page including these tips for its users:

• Don't forget that your profile and MySpace forums are public spaces.
• People aren't always who they say they are. Be careful about adding strangers to your friends list.
• Harassment, hate speech and inappropriate content should be reported.
• Don't post anything that would embarrass you later.
• Don't mislead people into thinking that you're older or younger.

MySpace also offer a tips page for parents, encouraging them to be aware of what their kids do on the site.

Johnston says that parents are the first line of defense in safety on MySpace and the Internet in general.

"There's several different ways parents can be involved by being open with their children and discussing exactly what they're supposed to be doing on the Internet and what they feel is appropriate and what isn't appropriate," he said. "Parents may have to go to the point where they get online monitoring software where they can monitor what their children are doing on the Internet."

The Michigan State Police offer online safety resources on their Web site, www.Michigan.gov/msp.