My kids were not given internet access until they were 13-14. I think my daughter started using myspace when she was 15-16. My niece is 15 and has had a myspace for about a year. My SD's sister has had an account since she was 11 but I think that was too young. She was saying she was 17. Whatever age they are, they should not be allowed to misrepresent their age. Myspace's rules say 14 is the age requirement.

My SD9 has a facebook account that her BM set up for her. I don't agree she should have it but don't have much say in it. She does not use it at our house.

I think whatever age, it is best if child understands that whatever he/she puts on it, including pics, are there for everyone and for eternity. Some children may not understand that -- as a compromise consider asking for them to befreind you or give you passsword-- so every now and then you can look. I would do this upfront -- and differentiate from reading a diary or even emails intended for private viewing.

My son was 12 or 13 (he lied and said he was 14). When I found out about it, I insisted that he give me access and the password, and said I would be checking it periodically. I checked it every few months at first, but not lately as he hasn't posted anything on his own page since he really was 14.

His high school is *very adament* that juniors and seniors 'clean up' their MySpace and Facebook pages as it is apparently pretty common for college admissions folks to check them.

My oldest sd 14, middle sd 12, and ds 11 all have myspace accounts. I do as well. Their accounts are all set so that nobody can e-mail them or request them as a friend unless they know their real last name. So that leaves preditors from being able to talk to them.

Their profiles are all set to private view which means that only the people they accept as friends can see it. They also do not have their town or state or schools listed on their pages.

We have a lot of relatives that live out of state so they mostly use it to talk to them, but they each have a few friends from school on there as well. I am on their friends list so I see their pages and make sure nothing inappropriate is on it.

And we have talked to them about letting us know if anyone they do not know manages to send them a message.

So far no problems. And our computer is in our family room so they never have any real privacy with it. It is actually facing a wall so they never really know when we could walk behind them. LOL.

There are so many different things on the internet me and dh have just decided that we can not say no to it all! So we just set up guidelines and check up on them (without their knowing) on occasion. We have never had a problem with them talking to strangers or sending/receiving inappropriate messages yet.

My X created a myspace for our daughter when she was 12. He just didn't see the big deal, and wanted to be the cool Dad. I contacted Myspace and had it removed. In 8 months when she is 14 she can create a new one. I do not want my daughter misrepresenting herself online at all. She can communicate with her friends through email and text and when she's 14 and doesn't have to lie about her age- she can have a myspace.
My SS9 has one created for him by his mother claiming he is 19. AS if any person with eyeballs can't tell the picture is of a 9yr old child. initially it claimed he lived in a city about an hour away, now it has his actual hometown. Mostly his mother posts him cute little messages-they live in the same house? say hello in the hallway for crying out loud! Anyway...he does not access it here.

FSD13 has begged for one, but with all the boy trouble she has already, I'm glad FDH and BM won't allow her. DS9 won't have one til he's 14, at least if I have any say-so about it. Hell, I didn't have one until I was 27. LOL!

I don't remember exactly, so I had to ask DD. she says she was 13-14 or something around that. that sounds about right. 8th or 9th grade. I never checked what she did on those sites. she was told about security and such. I trusted she would not hook up with old men or something. Now she is using facebook and livejournal. I myself do not have accounts on any of these type of sites. just don't find it interesting.

I guess
I'm odd man out.I wont allow my children to have one...until they are 18, then of course they can do what they want.But even my SD 21 doesnt WANT to have one because she understands the dangers.
I'm very strict with the computer and how it gets used.Too many caution stories (most recently that poor girl who killed herself because her friend and mother created a fake account pretending to be a boy her age and told her the world would be better without her!)

iloveexercise,

I am with you. I recently saw something on Dateline or 20/20 about teenage girl who was taken from her house and killed in a storage unit several hours later. (Think she was raped but, cant remember). Her dad was I think it was a Sheriff or Deputy or something like that. His daughter never knew it was an older man and he found out where she lived and killed her. Its very easy to find out alot of things about someone on the internet. We KNOW that is one of the many stories of people getting hurt online. Just think of all the ones we never hear about.

Finedreams-not sure how old your daughter is now but pls reconsider taking a peek if she is still younger. She may not hook up with the wrong people but who is to say that the wrong people will not knock the door down and kill her.

happy, my daughter will be 21 in 2 weeks. I have very little control over what she does on a daily basis because she is away to college (she is home now for Christmas break). yes I worry about her daily not because of the Internet but because she lives in a very busy city and commutes very far to school and work. it is nothing i can do though. at some point you got to let them go. yes like you said wrong people can knock the door out and kill her (as they can knock anyone's door down including mine). what do you want me to do about it? besides reminding her to be careful out there, there is very little i can do.

what are these sites? are they just for communication with people or can you post things like journals, trip photos??? i used icq for awile and really enjoyed communicating with people from all over the world. finally i quit because i got to many nasty messages. i talk to one guy that was really smooth. very intelligent, educated and i enjoyed his messages for about 3 weeks then he got to what he really wanted. he was the kind of guy we warn our children about.i am not vulnerable to guys like that but young people would be especially if they were having trouble at home.

Finedreams, I do not want you to do anything about it. If you look at what I said I did say if she was still young.

stargazzer,that's about the gist of it.I joined my space a while ago.I enjoyed it because of the music and meeting people who shared similar interests.However,after a while,I started getting creep after creep harrassing me.Now,believe me,I can handle myself too,but the thought of someone young and inexprienced may not be able too.

I'am totally appauled by some of the young girls on there who have sexy pictures too.It is just attracting these creeps right to them.I shudder at the thought.

My SS has a myspace since he was 7 yrs old it is not set to private. It has pictures of him and says what town he lives in. When he came to live with us I cancelled the account. Of course as soon as he is back at his moms he has it back again. He has people of all ages as his friends that his mom doesn't even know. His page also says what school he goes to. I think this is just crazy and dangerous. My 2 kids do not and will not have a myspace page till they are older.