Snap chat? Musically?

[Anonymous]

Please tell me about this app - the good, the bad, what to watch out for. Navigating the world of social media and tweens is a bit overwhelming.

[Anonymous]

Musically I don't know much about except the videos kids make are utterly cringe-worthy.

Snapchat - these days not about sending nudes like it was originally for. It's more generic social media, you send snaps to your friends to talk to them and friends can follow what's going on in your day if you post to your "story". Lots of cute and prettifying filters on selfies that kids of all ages love. However it's a huge time suck and still makes it easy to send inappropriate messages and photos without you as the parent being able to see what was sent since they disappear.

[Anonymous]

The bottom line is there is absolutely no way for you to monitor what goes on on snapchat bcs it was designed expressly so prople's digital trail wouldn't follow them around for the rest of their lives. It's not to say someone receivig the snap can't preserve it if they really want to but you can't see a snap after it's been exchanged.

Having said that at some point my kid's friends all migrated to snap from texting and we went with it bcs I trust my kid.

[Anonymous]

From my close friend who works at the FBI, " Never let your kid have Snapchat." That's the rule in our house, for our 15 and 13 year olds. Nothing can be downloaded on either phone without us entering a password. Despite the continued request every few weeks for Snapchat, they don't have it, and won't be getting it. There is absolutely no way for parents to monitor who is sending what to them, or what they are sending out (although in our case, I'm less worried about that). However, it does seem like every single one of their friends do have it.

When they have their own phones, and they are paying for those phones, they can do what they want. As long as I'm paying the bill, they cannot have Snapchat.

Don't know about Musically, neither kid has requested it yet!

[Anonymous]

The best rule is keep accounts private and kids can only be connected to people they know in real life. Zero tolerance policy on the latter.

[Anonymous]

You know your kids. We have no problems with any apps or any controls regarding phones at home. Kids had smartphones since early age.

[Anonymous]

You can see who is sending your kids snaps and who they are sending to. So I know who these other kids are.
It is easy for someone to take a screen shot of your snap.

[Anonymous]

No clue about Musically.

Snapchat is absolutely banned in my house. If they want to send photos to friends, they can always use their smartphone's build in texting capabilities.

The way I think about it is that the only reason someone would want to use snapchat over just texting photos is, well, to hide what they are sending from others (in this case, their parents).

And BTW, I'm less worried about nudes or dickpicks. A friend of mine who is a police officer says there is now a large segment of drug dealers using snapchat as their primary communication tool as they (mistakenly) believe whatever they send will just disappear and not be traceable. Also, especially for teens, snapchat allows them to document drug and alcohol use in a way that parents cant see it or do anything about it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You know your kids. [b]We have no problems with any apps or any controls regarding phones at home. Kids had smartphones since early age[b].

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:From my close friend who works at the FBI, " Never let your kid have Snapchat." That's the rule in our house, for our 15 and 13 year olds. Nothing can be downloaded on either phone without us entering a password. Despite the continued request every few weeks for Snapchat, they don't have it, and won't be getting it. There is absolutely no way for parents to monitor who is sending what to them, or what they are sending out (although in our case, I'm less worried about that). However, it does seem like every single one of their friends do have it.

When they have their own phones, and they are paying for those phones, they can do what they want. As long as I'm paying the bill, they cannot have Snapchat.

Don't know about Musically, neither kid has requested it yet!

Kudos to you as a parent. Too few parents are actively parenting their kids' smartphones these days. Signed, a school technology specialist

[Anonymous]

There is no way for you to monitor what your child does on SnapChat.

Therefore....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:From my close friend who works at the FBI, " Never let your kid have Snapchat." That's the rule in our house, for our 15 and 13 year olds. Nothing can be downloaded on either phone without us entering a password. Despite the continued request every few weeks for Snapchat, they don't have it, and won't be getting it. There is absolutely no way for parents to monitor who is sending what to them, or what they are sending out (although in our case, I'm less worried about that). However, it does seem like every single one of their friends do have it.

When they have their own phones, and they are paying for those phones, they can do what they want. As long as I'm paying the bill, they cannot have Snapchat.

Don't know about Musically, neither kid has requested it yet!

Kudos to you as a parent. Too few parents are actively parenting their kids' smartphones these days. Signed, a school technology specialist

Are you the reason my kids can't do their homework because of poorly installed security systems that prevent them from login in? It's been several days now, another "security" update fail.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:From my close friend who works at the FBI, " Never let your kid have Snapchat." That's the rule in our house, for our 15 and 13 year olds. Nothing can be downloaded on either phone without us entering a password. Despite the continued request every few weeks for Snapchat, they don't have it, and won't be getting it. There is absolutely no way for parents to monitor who is sending what to them, or what they are sending out (although in our case, I'm less worried about that). However, it does seem like every single one of their friends do have it.

When they have their own phones, and they are paying for those phones, they can do what they want. As long as I'm paying the bill, they cannot have Snapchat.

Don't know about Musically, neither kid has requested it yet!

This is pretty hilarious. If I were your teen, I'd learn how to root my phone and use Signal, encryption, and Tor as soon as possible so I can stick it to you and your FBI friend. You can't prevent a kid from having apps unless your kid is a dumbass.

[Anonymous]

Instagram has disappearing pictures now too. It's really no different from snapchat anymore. Y'all ban that too?

It's funny to see parents way up there on their horse about snapchat but all this about protecting your kid is very performative and often not based in reality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:From my close friend who works at the FBI, " Never let your kid have Snapchat." That's the rule in our house, for our 15 and 13 year olds. Nothing can be downloaded on either phone without us entering a password. Despite the continued request every few weeks for Snapchat, they don't have it, and won't be getting it. There is absolutely no way for parents to monitor who is sending what to them, or what they are sending out (although in our case, I'm less worried about that). However, it does seem like every single one of their friends do have it.

When they have their own phones, and they are paying for those phones, they can do what they want. As long as I'm paying the bill, they cannot have Snapchat.

Don't know about Musically, neither kid has requested it yet!

This is pretty hilarious. If I were your teen, I'd learn how to root my phone and use Signal, encryption, and Tor as soon as possible so I can stick it to you and your FBI friend. You can't prevent a kid from having apps unless your kid is a dumbass.

They all use snapchat as a way to socialize. If your 15 year old doesn't have it, he or she will soon be out of the loop if not already. And for the ones already using it, it's only a matter of time when they realize it is a total waste of time and move on. If you don't let your kid figure it out for themselves at an early age, they will be hopelessly socially awkward on social media. It's almost as bad as not allowing play dates.