Is Twitter safe for a boy 13 years of age?

[barefootmeg]

Well, let me start that I think parents should always be aware of what kids are up to online and should step in once in awhile with some guidance. On Twitter that might mean looking over the list of who your son is following and glancing through the Tweets that are coming in just to make sure they're all on the up and up.

But that said, I think a 13 could safely do Twitter. Twitter doesn't really come with much in the way of options, but one that they do have is the ability to make your account private. What this means is that no one can follow you without you first approving them. And no one can see your Tweets unless they're following you. So from the "going out" point of view, you can have controlled privacy.

From the "coming in" view, I think you can still follow anyone you want. And in my mind, that's the bigger worry. I follow lots and lots of folks on Twitter and for the most part, people are posting details of whatever the latest "big thing" is in the world (elections, deaths, swine flu, the latest TV show, etc.). So, for the most part, Twitter is pretty harmless. But I do occasionally see profanity or links to news stories that are really more adult in nature. This is where I'd probably want to know who my kid is following and what those folks are saying. As long as they're OK, then the Twitter experience will be OK.

The next step is figuring out How to use Twitter. Just viewing Tweets on Twitter.com is a horrible way to try to get through all those tweets. I recommend downloading a program such as Tweetdeck or Seesmic (or my favorite, Nambu, but it only works on Macs) to read through tweets with. You can also do searches and make groups, which makes following tweets a little easier to sort through.