The Money Mustache Community
Learning, Sharing, and Teaching => Mini Money Mustaches => Topic started by: ThreeCarbsNoGrains on June 10, 2019, 05:06:15 PM
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We are expecting our first (yay!) and this is a topic DH and I continue to discuss. He rarely uses social media; I use it and only connect with relatives and close friends. We know that in the future we will have issues with his parents sharing baby photos to their 500+ and 5000 (yes, you read that right) FB “friends.” How do we address this? We don’t want to set boundaries across the board (“no one post photos of our child without our permission”) but we do not want photos shared with hundreds of complete strangers. Any advice?
We anticipate his mom having a problem with this because in the past she will friend my friends and relatives she doesn’t know in order to see their baby photos. It really creeped out my SIL. DH had a talk with her, “Mom, have you ever met ThreeCarb’s brother’s wife? No? Ok well then it doesn’t make sense to friend her on FB.” She got upset.
I am annoyed that we even are thinking about this but we are concerned about safety and privacy. I’m interested in what other parents have done. Feedback appreciated!
I do not want to be unnecessarily a stick in the mud but, at the same time, once you put things out there you can’t take them back.
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There is a website in which you can give access to certain users via email address. Then you can make a list of relatives/friends that can see it. I forget the name of right now, but it sounds like a much better alternative to Facebook.
Also, I believe you can buy a digital picture frame and remotely add pictures to it, so the person(s) on the other end can have pictures coming in.
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Our daughter was a nanny for an uber-rich family. There was actually a team of six nannies. They all had to sign agreements not to post photos of the kids anywhere. Too bad that's unlikely to work in your situation. Probably not worth the stress of making it an issue.
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Isn't this as simple as restricting who can view the photo on Facebook? Make family lists, share selectively. Photos that can be viewed only by a certain list will not appear to people not granted access.
Granted, a family member can still screenshot and share that, but perhaps that's unlikely for your MIL. Also, don't give FB permission to identify you by face. Of course by putting yourself and your kids on there, your face is in their database, but at least that's a step you can shield your kids from in terms of associating name to face.
I don't see why she wouldn't understand that you're "afraid of identity theft" (insert other scary thing, like kidnapping) for your kids. For me a far greater concern is people posting their precise location, or exterior house shots so people see where they and their kids live. If I have a favorite place to hike, drink coffee or work, best believe I do not declare that on the internet.
I have never named my kids on social media. Just figure they didn't need that dossier. Now that they're older they do use social accounts with their real names (Snapchat, Instagram) for interacting with friends, but I still don't name them on mine. They use pseudonyms on YouTube.
Electronic Frontier Foundation has excellent guidelines for online privacy here: https://www.eff.org/issues/privacy
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We have a group text conversation with our parents that we send pictures to. Other than a few larger family pictures and profile pictures with the newborn, there are nearly no pictures of our kiddo on Facebook. A few that extended family take but none from us.
We have a shared private Google album with immediate family, too. The advantage there is that it's more curated and likely to be relevant in 20 years than "let me scroll through 20 years of Facebook posts."
You have boundary problems that are well beyond the question you are asking here, though. If your mother in law is actively stalking/creeping people on Facebook that seems like a convo that needs to happen. Because regardless of what you decide on this, it seems she thinks it is her right to do whatever she wants with respect to privacy on social media.
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I know a couple who say, and enforce, zero pics of the kids on the internet. Period. No ifs, ands, or buts. That rule applies to the grandparents, and there is a grandmother who didn't like the rule. Shared a pic on her facepage page despite knowing the rule.
Said grandmother hasn't received any pictures in any form in the 5 years since that incident. There was various other bad behavior that didn't help, but at this point, phones and cameras are confiscated when that grandma sees the kid. (some of that bad behavior involved safety issues, so she's probably lucky to be allowed to see the kid)
Point being - your kid, your rules, and everyone else can lump it.
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I know a couple who say, and enforce, zero pics of the kids on the internet. Period. No ifs, ands, or buts. That rule applies to the grandparents, and there is a grandmother who didn't like the rule. Shared a pic on her facepage page despite knowing the rule.
Said grandmother hasn't received any pictures in any form in the 5 years since that incident. There was various other bad behavior that didn't help, but at this point, phones and cameras are confiscated when that grandma sees the kid. (some of that bad behavior involved safety issues, so she's probably lucky to be allowed to see the kid)
Point being - your kid, your rules, and everyone else can lump it.
Not a parent, but this is probably the road I'd go down. Pictures of kids on people's social media accounts make me very uncomfortable. I don't post much on social media myself (like, a post every two years or so), but even what I post about myself is pretty curated. If I wouldn't be comfortable with my boss, my mom, the police, the president, and Mr. Rogers seeing something, it doesn't go out there with my name attached to it.
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This is also something I've been seriously thinking about but part of it for me comes down to not wanting my SIL plastering photos of my kid on social media. I'm thinking of instituting a blanket ban or maybe a "parents only" ban but I have to discuss this with my husband.
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I post pictures of my kids on Facebook about once a month, but I'm careful not to post anything that would potentially embarrass them when they get older - they're always fully clothed, for example. I haven't really had issues with relatives sharing photos (my MIL shares photos I post on Facebook all the time, but since my sharing settings are set to "friends", that doesn't increase the number of people who can see them, which I don't think she realizes).
If you don't want your parents/ILs to share photos on Facebook, I don't think there's anyway around talking to her about it. To smooth over any hurt feelings, maybe give her a small physical photo album that she could use to share photos with her (actual) friends?
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My friends use Tinybeans, I think it might be the site Archipelago is talking about.
They also are very strict with friends/relatives and enforce a no photos of kids on social media rule. One infraction, blocked.
Our son was born before social media was big, but we asked for no photos online and had no problem asking people to take them down. At that time it was met with hurt feelings because 'what harm could it do nobody is looking', now I think it's the same hurt feelings for the opposite reason 'photos are everywhere'.
I think now I would definitely ask for no social media photos due to facial recognition and targeted ads. Kids have enough commercialism in their face without my tech personalising it for them before they can type. Tinybeans does not use facial recognition so I'd consider that for sharing with friends/family. Mostly though I'm pretty private and shut down my facebook when too many relatives got in my business, haha.
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Thank you everyone for the feedback! This has been so helpful to confirm this is a perfectly rational concern.
I think we need to set ground rules and make those clear and then that will require an additional difficult conversation with anyone who pushes back.. I know DH is totally on board and is willing to have those conversations as well. I think I really just needed a sanity check.
I really like the idea of the digital photo frame! My concerns about the photo sharing site is the password will be shared and I’ll have no way of knowing.
I definitely do have my FB settings already set to friends only so it wouldn’t be possible to share my photos but it would be possible to save/screenshot and repost.
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This is definitely a legitimate concern!
I don't want any photos of our future child circulating on social media, either, especially not to thousands of strangers. I'm concerned about privacy, creating a public image of the kid that they might not like, and creeps.
You would be totally within your rights to ask that no one post pictures to social media, at all. I think more and more parents are becoming aware of the issues with it and are moving in this direction. I've heard of people posting only photos of their kids that show just the back of their heads, or photos taken from so far away that you can't make the kids' faces out. And never tagging locations or including recognizable landmarks.
In our case, we will probably print and mail a selection of photos to the grandparents. But in our case, it's an easier shift, because almost no one in the family is into social media anymore.
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Good on you for thinking about this before baby arrives. It will come up within the first hour before you even settle into the recovery room so it's best to have a plan.
We have a strict no sharing pictures on any social media without our permission, except for a private Facebook group which DH and I manage. We invite people we want to include, plus members can suggest people to add. Sometimes I add them (my mom's long-lost cousin) and sometimes I don't (our elderly family friend's mah jongg gals). Members can post pictures on that page freely without our permission. I would still maintain authority to take down a picture if someone posted something embarrassing or inappropriate (which has not happened so far).
And, yes, this will come with some uncomfortable conversations. I've had to confront a best friend from college who put a picture of my son on her wedding website. I hope your MIL is understanding and respects your boundaries.
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My friends use Tinybeans, I think it might be the site Archipelago is talking about.
They also are very strict with friends/relatives and enforce a no photos of kids on social media rule. One infraction, blocked.
Our son was born before social media was big, but we asked for no photos online and had no problem asking people to take them down. At that time it was met with hurt feelings because 'what harm could it do nobody is looking', now I think it's the same hurt feelings for the opposite reason 'photos are everywhere'.
I think now I would definitely ask for no social media photos due to facial recognition and targeted ads. Kids have enough commercialism in their face without my tech personalising it for them before they can type. Tinybeans does not use facial recognition so I'd consider that for sharing with friends/family. Mostly though I'm pretty private and shut down my facebook when too many relatives got in my business, haha.
Yes, I think that was the site!
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I post pictures of my kids on Facebook about once a month, but I'm careful not to post anything that would potentially embarrass them when they get older - they're always fully clothed, for example. I haven't really had issues with relatives sharing photos (my MIL shares photos I post on Facebook all the time, but since my sharing settings are set to "friends", that doesn't increase the number of people who can see them, which I don't think she realizes).
I do something similar. I do post the occasional photo on Facebook because I do want my friends (and I"m only 'friends' with folks I actually know) to see them. Nothing that would inhibit a run for office in the future. We have a family only shared album that gets much more content.
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We don't post pictures on social media and have told all the family that we don't want the kids on there either. My siblings and nieces/nephews have been respectful. I only once had to tell my niece to take photos down and her mom agreed with me that you must always ask the parents before posting.
My kids are 9 and 6. I do troll the public library social media account and have them take photos down if my kids are at all identifiable. If I can tell it is my kid because I know his clothes and the shape of the back of his head, it can be left up but nothing that would show a face.
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We decided before he was born that we didn't want him to have a huge Internet presence until he was old enough to decide what he did or didn't want online. A big part of that was that my parents have no concept of what is appropriate to post online. My mother once not only posted that I was going to be out of the country, but that the dates that I'd be gone. She might have well put a sign in the front yard that said "Rob me." Despite sending all the grandparents an email prior to birth about this, my father still posted his entire name and birthdate the night he was born. He took it down quickly when I called him out on it and they've been pretty good since then.
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This is definitely going to be an issue with my mother. I swear she spends 80% of her day on facebook and it has already been an issue with things my husband and I want to keep private/don’t want shared with the whole world. Our facebooks only have friends we actually know and relatives and my mom has thousands of “friends” most of which she has never met in real life. Every time we share an announcement on facebook (engagement photos, wedding photos, baby announcement, etc) we set it so only our friends can see it, but then she calls me and begs me to change the settings to private so when she shares it her friends can see it. It makes my husband mad and so far we have said ok, and then a few days later switched it back so it’s only up there a short time. When it comes to the baby we will NOT change it to public for her and I know it is going to end with her in tears. I can already hear her “but it’s MY GRANDBABY and I should be able to share photos of MY GRANDBABY.”
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The boundaries for our kids, until they reached the age of consent, was "NO."
No, you may not take a photo of my kid and put it on the internet. No, I will not sign a release form giving you (schools and summer camps) permission to put my kid's photo up anywhere. No, I once ripped a photographer from the local paper a fresh one for trying to take a photo of my kids (then, quite small) in their admittedly adorable halloween costumes without asking my permission first. No, no, no.
Fortunately, we barely preceded the era of everyone being on Facebook, but the answer is still NO.
Seriously, there are so many ways for this to go south. Think of it as a way to set some boundaries with the grandparents and have the opportunity to think through consequences ahead of time. Can't avoid taking pictures of the grandkids and posting them? No more visits for you. If the grandparents are not alert to the dangers of overexposure on the internet, this is a chance for them to get educated. If you really want to freak them out, look into pedophiles on the internet!
Your house, your baby/kids, your rules.
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Inspired by this post I had the conversation with my husband this weekend. We finally came to the agreement that only we would be able to post things on social media and we'd ask everybody else not to. This will let us limit the potential audience. He's on board, but I'm guessing it's going to start being a fight once the baby is actually here.
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I have a cousin who has a strict rule about this. She’ll only privately share photos if you agree not to post publicly, if you do, she’ll never share again. We all respect her decision. I’ve got a SIL who posts everything in the world about her baby. It’s annoying. You quickly realize that so many people use those baby pictures to get attention for themselves without thinking of the implications. I kinda like Mindy Kaling’s way of posting but not showing her kid’s face. I also think I’d do the shared family album but no public pics cause I think the kids should decide when they are older how much they want the face recognition technologies to have a hold of them.
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Absent special safety concerns, I don't get the whole don't put the kid on the internet thing. I've worked with actual sex offenders. They are not getting their jollies by looking at your fully clothed child on FB. Sadly, they have much better resources. The biggest threat to your kid is your creepy uncle, cousin, camp counselor, priest or babysitter. Stranger danger is actually not really that big of a thing. I'm shocked at Jeninco's post below. If you are out in public with your kids, people can take their picture. There is no expectation of privacy.
I can't remember the girl's name now but remember the girl who was kidnapped and her parents murdered? The person that did it drove by her at the bus stop. He didn't find her online. Your kids face way greater risks on a daily basis.
The world communicates online now. I quit Facebook for 10 years and only rejoined last year. People legit forgot to invite me to things when I wasn't on FB. I have a way better social life now that I'm back on. I agree that you can set ground rules for family and friends but I just don't understand the upset if grandma posts a picture of the baby eating cake, even if 1,000 people see it. Really, the worst that is likely to happen is you make a few people smile.
Edit to add one caveat: there is also the chance a really awesome photo could go viral and your kid becomes a meme.
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Inspired by this post I had the conversation with my husband this weekend. We finally came to the agreement that only we would be able to post things on social media and we'd ask everybody else not to. This will let us limit the potential audience. He's on board, but I'm guessing it's going to start being a fight once the baby is actually here.
I think if you have a problem with people sharing photos of you or your family on social media, you really have to not share photos of you or your family on social media. That's truly the only way to be sure no one shares anything.
Social media is "social". It is set up to promote sharing of photos. If you want to keep photos of your child out of the public eye, but want to share photos with family members far away, it would be better to snail mail them actual photographs or even better, put the photos in a yearly album. It is a strong reminder to relatives that you don't want digital photos of your child shared with anyone but the people to whom you sent the photos.
As a side note, my own parents absolutely dote on their grandkids, but after having 8 of them, they are not terribly interested in reposting yet another picture of a grandkid blowing out candles on a cake. They will repost something like a team photo of a grandkid winning a major competition -- academic or sports -- as that is deemed newsworthy enough to interest their friends. But everyone in their circle has grandkids, and no one is particularly interested in seeing generic milestones of someone else's grandkids I don't think.
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The boundaries for our kids, until they reached the age of consent, was "NO."
No, you may not take a photo of my kid and put it on the internet. No, I will not sign a release form giving you (schools and summer camps) permission to put my kid's photo up anywhere. No, I once ripped a photographer from the local paper a fresh one for trying to take a photo of my kids (then, quite small) in their admittedly adorable halloween costumes without asking my permission first. No, no, no.
What was the age of consent?
I'm curious how you'd feel about photos of, say, your kids' School Robotics Team Championship win? Usually the team is photographed with their trophy and the photo and a little blurb is posted on school social media...but could be shared from their widely. Would that be something you are comfortable with or would you request your child not be part of that photo at, say, grade 5 (10 years old) or grade 8 (13 years old?) Or are you saying wait until age 18 ?
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The boundaries for our kids, until they reached the age of consent, was "NO."
No, you may not take a photo of my kid and put it on the internet. No, I will not sign a release form giving you (schools and summer camps) permission to put my kid's photo up anywhere. No, I once ripped a photographer from the local paper a fresh one for trying to take a photo of my kids (then, quite small) in their admittedly adorable halloween costumes without asking my permission first. No, no, no.
What was the age of consent?
I'm curious how you'd feel about photos of, say, your kids' School Robotics Team Championship win? Usually the team is photographed with their trophy and the photo and a little blurb is posted on school social media...but could be shared from their widely. Would that be something you are comfortable with or would you request your child not be part of that photo at, say, grade 5 (10 years old) or grade 8 (13 years old?) Or are you saying wait until age 18 ?
Great question!
My kid did a robotics thing at grade 5, and my inclination was "no". By grade 8, I'd play it situation-by-situation: a possible solution was the photo can't have a name associated with it, so "the XX school robotics team poses with their monster-crusher creation."
When the kids play varsity high school sports, it's a little tricksier to limit, so I guess that's about when we gave in, at least somewhat. Again, this is made easier because none of the immediate family Facebooks, or twits, or Instagrams (actually, the older kid now Instagrams, under not-his-real-name).
Admittedly, we're enormously conservative (some might say paranoid) about our presence on the internet, and see no reason to put the kids' photos out there with their names attached. And the more articles I read about data mining, and face recognition (MrInCO works in a face-recognition-adjacent space, so we're not completely lay readers) the less comfortable I am parading it all out there. I figure I can at least protect the kids for some amount of time.
I'm aware that I'm holding down one end of the spectrum for y'all.
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Absent special safety concerns, I don't get the whole don't put the kid on the internet thing. I've worked with actual sex offenders. They are not getting their jollies by looking at your fully clothed child on FB. Sadly, they have much better resources. The biggest threat to your kid is your creepy uncle, cousin, camp counselor, priest or babysitter. Stranger danger is actually not really that big of a thing. I'm shocked at Jeninco's post below. If you are out in public with your kids, people can take their picture. There is no expectation of privacy.
I can't remember the girl's name now but remember the girl who was kidnapped and her parents murdered? The person that did it drove by her at the bus stop. He didn't find her online. Your kids face way greater risks on a daily basis.
The world communicates online now. I quit Facebook for 10 years and only rejoined last year. People legit forgot to invite me to things when I wasn't on FB. I have a way better social life now that I'm back on. I agree that you can set ground rules for family and friends but I just don't understand the upset if grandma posts a picture of the baby eating cake, even if 1,000 people see it. Really, the worst that is likely to happen is you make a few people smile.
Edit to add one caveat: there is also the chance a really awesome photo could go viral and your kid becomes a meme.
My concerns have less to do with sex offenders and more to do with giving him the right to decide what does and doesn't end up online. He had classmates last year in Kindergarten that have had had every single milestone documented on Facebook from the first ultrasound to the last day of school. I just ask myself "would I have really wanted my parents to share that I'd finally used the potty?" and the answer is "Hell no."
Also, I have some vague concerns about social engineering and identity theft. I mentioned before that my father posted the night my son was born his full name and that he was born. That gave his 1500 friends, some that he has never actually met, my son's full name, birthdate, and mother's maiden name. Holy PII, Batman.
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Inspired by this post I had the conversation with my husband this weekend. We finally came to the agreement that only we would be able to post things on social media and we'd ask everybody else not to. This will let us limit the potential audience. He's on board, but I'm guessing it's going to start being a fight once the baby is actually here.
I think if you have a problem with people sharing photos of you or your family on social media, you really have to not share photos of you or your family on social media. That's truly the only way to be sure no one shares anything.
Social media is "social". It is set up to promote sharing of photos. If you want to keep photos of your child out of the public eye, but want to share photos with family members far away, it would be better to snail mail them actual photographs or even better, put the photos in a yearly album. It is a strong reminder to relatives that you don't want digital photos of your child shared with anyone but the people to whom you sent the photos.
As a side note, my own parents absolutely dote on their grandkids, but after having 8 of them, they are not terribly interested in reposting yet another picture of a grandkid blowing out candles on a cake. They will repost something like a team photo of a grandkid winning a major competition -- academic or sports -- as that is deemed newsworthy enough to interest their friends. But everyone in their circle has grandkids, and no one is particularly interested in seeing generic milestones of someone else's grandkids I don't think.
I agree. My in-laws are the type though who will find the need to post everything, SIL especially. I'd much rather them only have the option to share what we post rather than my SIL posting a million selfies with my kid to show what a great aunt she is. We can post and limit the audience with the post settings. It also lets us limit the content of the pictures more easily so that the kid doesn't end up having every milestone documented online.
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You might think you can limit the sharing using privacy settings in Facebook, but it only takes someone skilled enough to do a screen shot to be able to repost at will.
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You might think you can limit the sharing using privacy settings in Facebook, but it only takes someone skilled enough to do a screen shot to be able to repost at will.
Yeah, I would consider restricting sharing settings on Facebook to be akin to leaving the keys in the ignition with a sign saying "do not steal." Zero effort to mitigate.
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You might think you can limit the sharing using privacy settings in Facebook, but it only takes someone skilled enough to do a screen shot to be able to repost at will.
Yeah, I would consider restricting sharing settings on Facebook to be akin to leaving the keys in the ignition with a sign saying "do not steal." Zero effort to mitigate.
Fair. But at the very least this rule prevents them from posting their own pictures. We may revise the plan once the child arrives.
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So your plan is to tell relatives it’s OK to take pictures of your children, but please don’t post them anywhere online or text them to anybody?
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So your plan is to tell relatives it’s OK to take pictures of your children, but please don’t post them anywhere online or text them to anybody?
That's what we did except that we don't mind the texting so much. Basically we told them that if I found out they posted a picture online it would be the last picture they were allowed to take until his college graduation.
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Absent special safety concerns, I don't get the whole don't put the kid on the internet thing. I've worked with actual sex offenders. They are not getting their jollies by looking at your fully clothed child on FB. Sadly, they have much better resources. The biggest threat to your kid is your creepy uncle, cousin, camp counselor, priest or babysitter. Stranger danger is actually not really that big of a thing. I'm shocked at Jeninco's post below. If you are out in public with your kids, people can take their picture. There is no expectation of privacy.
I can't remember the girl's name now but remember the girl who was kidnapped and her parents murdered? The person that did it drove by her at the bus stop. He didn't find her online. Your kids face way greater risks on a daily basis.
The world communicates online now. I quit Facebook for 10 years and only rejoined last year. People legit forgot to invite me to things when I wasn't on FB. I have a way better social life now that I'm back on. I agree that you can set ground rules for family and friends but I just don't understand the upset if grandma posts a picture of the baby eating cake, even if 1,000 people see it. Really, the worst that is likely to happen is you make a few people smile.
Edit to add one caveat: there is also the chance a really awesome photo could go viral and your kid becomes a meme.
I understand that for someone like me who has a very, very small social circle online, the chances of someone creepy getting a picture of my child is very low. However, I think the reason why I don't want to share any pictures of my kid online is because I want them to choose what they put out to the public. I would hate it if my childhood was plastered all over the internet, even if it's nothing to be embarrassed about. I would imagine many kids growing up today will feel the same way in a few years.
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I don't want to share any pictures of my kid online is because I want them to choose what they put out to the public.
Same. The pedophilia concept wasn't in the top 100 reasons we didn't post pics online.
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So your plan is to tell relatives it’s OK to take pictures of your children, but please don’t post them anywhere online or text them to anybody?
That's what we did except that we don't mind the texting so much. Basically we told them that if I found out they posted a picture online it would be the last picture they were allowed to take until his college graduation.
Yup, that's the plan, we'll see how it goes.
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Our relatives all live far enough away that they are very rarely getting a chance to take photos of our kid themselves, which I think makes enforcing any kind of policy much easier. They also aren't *that* into social media and I would say overall the grandparents are somewhat distrustful of sharing too much online.
I have told my parents it's fine to share pictures via email or by pulling out their phone and showing a picture to someone in person, but that I would prefer they not post photos directly to social media, as I can't control what kind of privacy settings they have or how many photos they choose to post. They have been very good about following this rule. When our son was born they did ask me what level of sharing we were okay with and I think they did genuinely believe we would refuse to share photos with them if they didn't respect our wishes (and, well...we might have). If we had grandparents who were more likely to overshare and lived nearby I think I would definitely look into a photo-sharing app that would limit sharing outside of the app, and maybe also adopt a more general "no smart phones around the baby" rule to limit the number of photos being taken by anyone other than us.
Overall while I do post some photos of our son online I definitely limit the number and try to be cognizant about how he might feel about XYZ photo when he's older. I have also personally had problems with an online stalker in the past so I try to avoid posting photos that would give away too much about our regular routine, things with street signs, park names, etc., clearly spelled out in the background, and so on.
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I don't want to share any pictures of my kid online is because I want them to choose what they put out to the public.
Same. The pedophilia concept wasn't in the top 100 reasons we didn't post pics online.
Could you share what some of your concerns are then?
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This is definitely going to be an issue with my mother. I swear she spends 80% of her day on facebook and it has already been an issue with things my husband and I want to keep private/don’t want shared with the whole world. Our facebooks only have friends we actually know and relatives and my mom has thousands of “friends” most of which she has never met in real life. Every time we share an announcement on facebook (engagement photos, wedding photos, baby announcement, etc) we set it so only our friends can see it, but then she calls me and begs me to change the settings to private so when she shares it her friends can see it. It makes my husband mad and so far we have said ok, and then a few days later switched it back so it’s only up there a short time. When it comes to the baby we will NOT change it to public for her and I know it is going to end with her in tears. I can already hear her “but it’s MY GRANDBABY and I should be able to share photos of MY GRANDBABY.”
This, exactly! My concern lies with my in-laws because of the incredible amount of time they spend on social media. I truly do think my MIL spends most of her day on social media and is frequently upset about perceived offenses (frequently she shares something totally fake and someone points out it is fake and this is upsetting for some reason). There have already been incidents of posting photos of a child before adoption/custody issues were finalized, etc. The “MY grandchild” sentiment has already been expressed several times after she shared her daughter’s good news with us before her daughter had a chance.
This led to a larger discussion DH and I were having about some members of the older generation who seem addicted to social media. It’s surprising to me since they didn’t grow up with it; I guess I assumed people in their 60s would be immune to getting hooked on it but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Has anyone else noticed this? We have a number of older relatives who check in for every meal, tell every medical procedure detail and every family update. It’s really refreshing to be around those who don’t use it at all.
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Absent special safety concerns, I don't get the whole don't put the kid on the internet thing. I've worked with actual sex offenders. They are not getting their jollies by looking at your fully clothed child on FB. Sadly, they have much better resources. The biggest threat to your kid is your creepy uncle, cousin, camp counselor, priest or babysitter. Stranger danger is actually not really that big of a thing. I'm shocked at Jeninco's post below. If you are out in public with your kids, people can take their picture. There is no expectation of privacy.
I can't remember the girl's name now but remember the girl who was kidnapped and her parents murdered? The person that did it drove by her at the bus stop. He didn't find her online. Your kids face way greater risks on a daily basis.
The world communicates online now. I quit Facebook for 10 years and only rejoined last year. People legit forgot to invite me to things when I wasn't on FB. I have a way better social life now that I'm back on. I agree that you can set ground rules for family and friends but I just don't understand the upset if grandma posts a picture of the baby eating cake, even if 1,000 people see it. Really, the worst that is likely to happen is you make a few people smile.
Edit to add one caveat: there is also the chance a really awesome photo could go viral and your kid becomes a meme.
For me, safety is a concern but perhaps any safety violation would be unlikely to happen. I’m more concerned about what I know for a fact will happen, which is my child’s photo will be shared to hundreds of strangers who will comment with their opinions and I just don’t see any reason they need to have access to photos of my child.
As an example, this has happened to me when my MIL was very into sharing photos of us as a couple on social media years ago and lots of people would comment about our appearances, usually kind, but it just made me so uncomfortable. I just don’t need validation from complete strangers.
As you mentioned, the viral meme is a possibility as well as the cases where someone steals a photo and creates one of those awful “THIS CHILD HAS CANCER 1 SHARE = 1 PRAYER”. I have read about photos of children being stolen for those.
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Inspired by this post I had the conversation with my husband this weekend. We finally came to the agreement that only we would be able to post things on social media and we'd ask everybody else not to. This will let us limit the potential audience. He's on board, but I'm guessing it's going to start being a fight once the baby is actually here.
I think if you have a problem with people sharing photos of you or your family on social media, you really have to not share photos of you or your family on social media. That's truly the only way to be sure no one shares anything.
Social media is "social". It is set up to promote sharing of photos. If you want to keep photos of your child out of the public eye, but want to share photos with family members far away, it would be better to snail mail them actual photographs or even better, put the photos in a yearly album. It is a strong reminder to relatives that you don't want digital photos of your child shared with anyone but the people to whom you sent the photos.
—SNIP—
You make an excellent point. This may be the best way to handle!
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Oh, another thing we're planning to do is give the grandparents one of those cloud enabled digital picture frames where we can just drop new photos of the baby in from our phones. Hopefully that'll help satisfy the picture itch without them being able to put them online.
Like I said earlier, my main concern in SIL, so she's who I'll be watching for.
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This is definitely going to be an issue with my mother. I swear she spends 80% of her day on facebook and it has already been an issue with things my husband and I want to keep private/don’t want shared with the whole world. Our facebooks only have friends we actually know and relatives and my mom has thousands of “friends” most of which she has never met in real life. Every time we share an announcement on facebook (engagement photos, wedding photos, baby announcement, etc) we set it so only our friends can see it, but then she calls me and begs me to change the settings to private so when she shares it her friends can see it. It makes my husband mad and so far we have said ok, and then a few days later switched it back so it’s only up there a short time. When it comes to the baby we will NOT change it to public for her and I know it is going to end with her in tears. I can already hear her “but it’s MY GRANDBABY and I should be able to share photos of MY GRANDBABY.”
This, exactly! My concern lies with my in-laws because of the incredible amount of time they spend on social media. I truly do think my MIL spends most of her day on social media and is frequently upset about perceived offenses (frequently she shares something totally fake and someone points out it is fake and this is upsetting for some reason). There have already been incidents of posting photos of a child before adoption/custody issues were finalized, etc. The “MY grandchild” sentiment has already been expressed several times after she shared her daughter’s good news with us before her daughter had a chance.
This led to a larger discussion DH and I were having about some members of the older generation who seem addicted to social media. It’s surprising to me since they didn’t grow up with it; I guess I assumed people in their 60s would be immune to getting hooked on it but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Has anyone else noticed this? We have a number of older relatives who check in for every meal, tell every medical procedure detail and every family update. It’s really refreshing to be around those who don’t use it at all.
The older generation being addicted makes perfect sense to me. It's a dopamine hit. Every time someone comments or likes something you share, it gives you a feel-good rush. It's validation. They might not be working anymore. They are bored. Their friends and family are scattered geographically. They can post a grand-baby picture and get all their buddies to say "awww how cute, you are so lucky!" and it makes them feel better about their lives.
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Consider the average age of casino-dwellers who are pulling the lever on slot machines all day long. Then consider that the social media industry used casino consultants to design their "infinite slot machine" scrolling interface. Makes perfect sense.
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This is definitely going to be an issue with my mother. I swear she spends 80% of her day on facebook and it has already been an issue with things my husband and I want to keep private/don’t want shared with the whole world. Our facebooks only have friends we actually know and relatives and my mom has thousands of “friends” most of which she has never met in real life. Every time we share an announcement on facebook (engagement photos, wedding photos, baby announcement, etc) we set it so only our friends can see it, but then she calls me and begs me to change the settings to private so when she shares it her friends can see it. It makes my husband mad and so far we have said ok, and then a few days later switched it back so it’s only up there a short time. When it comes to the baby we will NOT change it to public for her and I know it is going to end with her in tears. I can already hear her “but it’s MY GRANDBABY and I should be able to share photos of MY GRANDBABY.”
This, exactly! My concern lies with my in-laws because of the incredible amount of time they spend on social media. I truly do think my MIL spends most of her day on social media and is frequently upset about perceived offenses (frequently she shares something totally fake and someone points out it is fake and this is upsetting for some reason). There have already been incidents of posting photos of a child before adoption/custody issues were finalized, etc. The “MY grandchild” sentiment has already been expressed several times after she shared her daughter’s good news with us before her daughter had a chance.
This led to a larger discussion DH and I were having about some members of the older generation who seem addicted to social media. It’s surprising to me since they didn’t grow up with it; I guess I assumed people in their 60s would be immune to getting hooked on it but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Has anyone else noticed this? We have a number of older relatives who check in for every meal, tell every medical procedure detail and every family update. It’s really refreshing to be around those who don’t use it at all.
The older generation being addicted makes perfect sense to me. It's a dopamine hit. Every time someone comments or likes something you share, it gives you a feel-good rush. It's validation. They might not be working anymore. They are bored. Their friends and family are scattered geographically. They can post a grand-baby picture and get all their buddies to say "awww how cute, you are so lucky!" and it makes them feel better about their lives.
WOW you really nailed it. Because the older folks I know who don’t use social media (or use it sparingly) are busy working, volunteering, traveling, babysitting, or doing something else they enjoy. My older relatives who travel the most actually post on social media the least.
Incidentally, this overall discussion has led to me taking a good long look at myself and my relationship with social media. I had always assumed I (we) would announce my pregnancy on social media (to my few social media connections) and recently realized there is no value in that (for me personally). We’ll personally tell people close to us and people who aren’t close can find out through the grapevine (or not at all, who cares). Surely I was just after the dopamine hit myself! Good opportunity for some self reflection.
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I don't want to share any pictures of my kid online is because I want them to choose what they put out to the public.
Same. The pedophilia concept wasn't in the top 100 reasons we didn't post pics online.
Could you share what some of your concerns are then?
Fear of pedophilia/kidnapping by a stranger was statistically not something we worried about - it's a terrible, awful thing for anyone to ever go through but the numbers show over and over that kids are more at risk from a neighbor or relative. Sadly this has been true among my adult friends who have gone through PTSD therapy for childhood sexual trauma.
I'd say our number one reason was the same as mindy's - we wanted our kid to make that choice for himself, not us making that choice before he was even able to say yes or no.
At the time we thought the concept of sharing any personal crap on a public forum was really odd (my son's dad has never had a social media account, and my son still isn't on any as a profile but uses FB messenger) but the culture around social media has obviously changed dramatically since then. My son's dad is a professional photographer and he was pretty adamant about consent for using photos in publicly published spaces, and the concept of being old enough to consent in general was a big factor to a lot of our parenting decisions when it came to things that would affect our kid long-term. For example we wouldn't have pierced our child's ears when babies, even though for other families that is expected and absolutely not a big deal. As the internet changed we became more aware of the potential for images being used for identity theft, especially once bigger sites started using facial recognition (around the time our kid hit his teen years). That's something as an adult I can be aware of and proceed as I wish, but for our kiddo we opted to not post about him in places that could end up public. We made similar (conservative) choices around other parts of life that will follow our kid digitally forever, so I admit we're weirdos :)
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This is definitely going to be an issue with my mother. I swear she spends 80% of her day on facebook and it has already been an issue with things my husband and I want to keep private/don’t want shared with the whole world. Our facebooks only have friends we actually know and relatives and my mom has thousands of “friends” most of which she has never met in real life. Every time we share an announcement on facebook (engagement photos, wedding photos, baby announcement, etc) we set it so only our friends can see it, but then she calls me and begs me to change the settings to private so when she shares it her friends can see it. It makes my husband mad and so far we have said ok, and then a few days later switched it back so it’s only up there a short time. When it comes to the baby we will NOT change it to public for her and I know it is going to end with her in tears. I can already hear her “but it’s MY GRANDBABY and I should be able to share photos of MY GRANDBABY.”
This, exactly! My concern lies with my in-laws because of the incredible amount of time they spend on social media. I truly do think my MIL spends most of her day on social media and is frequently upset about perceived offenses (frequently she shares something totally fake and someone points out it is fake and this is upsetting for some reason). There have already been incidents of posting photos of a child before adoption/custody issues were finalized, etc. The “MY grandchild” sentiment has already been expressed several times after she shared her daughter’s good news with us before her daughter had a chance.
This led to a larger discussion DH and I were having about some members of the older generation who seem addicted to social media. It’s surprising to me since they didn’t grow up with it; I guess I assumed people in their 60s would be immune to getting hooked on it but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Has anyone else noticed this? We have a number of older relatives who check in for every meal, tell every medical procedure detail and every family update. It’s really refreshing to be around those who don’t use it at all.
The older generation being addicted makes perfect sense to me. It's a dopamine hit. Every time someone comments or likes something you share, it gives you a feel-good rush. It's validation. They might not be working anymore. They are bored. Their friends and family are scattered geographically. They can post a grand-baby picture and get all their buddies to say "awww how cute, you are so lucky!" and it makes them feel better about their lives.
WOW you really nailed it. Because the older folks I know who don’t use social media (or use it sparingly) are busy working, volunteering, traveling, babysitting, or doing something else they enjoy. My older relatives who travel the most actually post on social media the least.
Incidentally, this overall discussion has led to me taking a good long look at myself and my relationship with social media. I had always assumed I (we) would announce my pregnancy on social media (to my few social media connections) and recently realized there is no value in that (for me personally). We’ll personally tell people close to us and people who aren’t close can find out through the grapevine (or not at all, who cares). Surely I was just after the dopamine hit myself! Good opportunity for some self reflection.
The dopamine hit isn't always a bad thing if you are doing it consciously. I wouldn't deny yourself the joy of sharing your pregnancy. Personally, I just like to be more conscious of why I'm doing things and try not to let my social media use get out of control again. I just shared a story about something funny my dog did. I shared it in part to make other people smile and laugh at his antic and in part to see the fun responses (dopamine hits) I'll get. I know I did it more for me than for them. I'll take the small pleasures in life where I can get them but it's a dangerous thing when you don't realize you're doing it.
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We don't want any photos online and our extended families have respected it. We've been upfront since our children were born and when we had one issue, it was handled quickly and without drama.
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We don't put pictures of our kid's face on social media. If we're paying someone for a service (such as a preschool), we ask them not to post pictures of her either. For friends and family, we just let them do what they want. Most notice that we're careful about it and therefore ask about posting, some do occasionally post without asking. My friends who live out of town joke that they've never seen her face! ;)
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I know a couple who say, and enforce, zero pics of the kids on the internet. Period. No ifs, ands, or buts. That rule applies to the grandparents, and there is a grandmother who didn't like the rule. Shared a pic on her facepage page despite knowing the rule.
Said grandmother hasn't received any pictures in any form in the 5 years since that incident. There was various other bad behavior that didn't help, but at this point, phones and cameras are confiscated when that grandma sees the kid. (some of that bad behavior involved safety issues, so she's probably lucky to be allowed to see the kid)
Point being - your kid, your rules, and everyone else can lump it.
This mentality irks me. You have a right to photograph things and people in public.
Second, this "threat" is so overblown. Sure, don't post embarrassing stuff that will come back and haunt. However, normal photos pose no threat. If someone wanted to find children, they'd just drive by a school when it lets out. Nearly all of this stalking and kidnapping is by people you know already, not random strangers a thousand miles away on the internet. They aren't going to steal your toddler's identity with their picture (why would someone want a child's ID anyway?). Photos of the exterior of your house are already up on google maps as well.
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I don't want to share any pictures of my kid online is because I want them to choose what they put out to the public.
Same. The pedophilia concept wasn't in the top 100 reasons we didn't post pics online.
Could you share what some of your concerns are then?
Fear of pedophilia/kidnapping by a stranger was statistically not something we worried about - it's a terrible, awful thing for anyone to ever go through but the numbers show over and over that kids are more at risk from a neighbor or relative. Sadly this has been true among my adult friends who have gone through PTSD therapy for childhood sexual trauma.
I'd say our number one reason was the same as mindy's - we wanted our kid to make that choice for himself, not us making that choice before he was even able to say yes or no.
At the time we thought the concept of sharing any personal crap on a public forum was really odd (my son's dad has never had a social media account, and my son still isn't on any as a profile but uses FB messenger) but the culture around social media has obviously changed dramatically since then. My son's dad is a professional photographer and he was pretty adamant about consent for using photos in publicly published spaces, and the concept of being old enough to consent in general was a big factor to a lot of our parenting decisions when it came to things that would affect our kid long-term. For example we wouldn't have pierced our child's ears when babies, even though for other families that is expected and absolutely not a big deal. As the internet changed we became more aware of the potential for images being used for identity theft, especially once bigger sites started using facial recognition (around the time our kid hit his teen years). That's something as an adult I can be aware of and proceed as I wish, but for our kiddo we opted to not post about him in places that could end up public. We made similar (conservative) choices around other parts of life that will follow our kid digitally forever, so I admit we're weirdos :)
We're weirdos, too! But I would much rather have our kids laughing at us as adults over how strict we were with sharing them online versus them being mad at us for things we can never unshare.
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I know a couple who say, and enforce, zero pics of the kids on the internet. Period. No ifs, ands, or buts. That rule applies to the grandparents, and there is a grandmother who didn't like the rule. Shared a pic on her facepage page despite knowing the rule.
Said grandmother hasn't received any pictures in any form in the 5 years since that incident. There was various other bad behavior that didn't help, but at this point, phones and cameras are confiscated when that grandma sees the kid. (some of that bad behavior involved safety issues, so she's probably lucky to be allowed to see the kid)
Point being - your kid, your rules, and everyone else can lump it.
This mentality irks me. You have a right to photograph things and people in public.
Second, this "threat" is so overblown. Sure, don't post embarrassing stuff that will come back and haunt. However, normal photos pose no threat. If someone wanted to find children, they'd just drive by a school when it lets out. Nearly all of this stalking and kidnapping is by people you know already, not random strangers a thousand miles away on the internet. They aren't going to steal your toddler's identity with their picture (why would someone want a child's ID anyway?). Photos of the exterior of your house are already up on google maps as well.
Tell that to the parents whose kids' home videos have been circulating among pedophiles on YouTube: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/28/technology/youtube-pedophile-comments.html
For me, though, it's not just about the creeps and weirdos. It's about preserving a digital clean slate and allowing a child to create their own public image once they are old enough. There are people out there who post pictures of their kids' potty training and whatnot, seemingly not even thinking about whether or not their child will want those kinds of images out in circulation. And you never know what is going to embarrass someone 10 or 20 years in the future.
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Tell that to the parents whose kids' home videos have been circulating among pedophiles on YouTube: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/28/technology/youtube-pedophile-comments.html
For me, though, it's not just about the creeps and weirdos. It's about preserving a digital clean slate and allowing a child to create their own public image once they are old enough. There are people out there who post pictures of their kids' potty training and whatnot, seemingly not even thinking about whether or not their child will want those kinds of images out in circulation. And you never know what is going to embarrass someone 10 or 20 years in the future.
1. Lots of sick people out there, as long as I never see them or interact it doesn't affect me. Kind of how people stick head in sand on geopolitics/Trump. Just ignore it.
2. Already mentioned not posting embarrassing stuff like potty training. Those are reserved for dragging out in front of Prom dates. Oh wait, that's been going on for 60+ years, long before Facebook.
3. Your child I doubt will care to develop a digital slate of their child years. Hence, they won't care if there are baby pictures on their parents page. What about all the people I hang out with that get caught in pictures with me? Am I forbidden to post those photos too? The world is different, our expectations of privacy are changing, especially for kids. You are not entirely anonymous, faceless name with no background. I don't see that as a bad thing.
4. Websites change in 10+ years. What was commonly used then isn't now and vice versa. The most popular photo sites among kids now didn't exist 10 years ago. A lot depends on Facebook even being a significant thing 15+ years down the road.
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I know a couple who say, and enforce, zero pics of the kids on the internet. Period. No ifs, ands, or buts. That rule applies to the grandparents, and there is a grandmother who didn't like the rule. Shared a pic on her facepage page despite knowing the rule.
Said grandmother hasn't received any pictures in any form in the 5 years since that incident. There was various other bad behavior that didn't help, but at this point, phones and cameras are confiscated when that grandma sees the kid. (some of that bad behavior involved safety issues, so she's probably lucky to be allowed to see the kid)
Point being - your kid, your rules, and everyone else can lump it.
This mentality irks me. You have a right to photograph things and people in public.
Second, this "threat" is so overblown. Sure, don't post embarrassing stuff that will come back and haunt. However, normal photos pose no threat. If someone wanted to find children, they'd just drive by a school when it lets out. Nearly all of this stalking and kidnapping is by people you know already, not random strangers a thousand miles away on the internet. They aren't going to steal your toddler's identity with their picture (why would someone want a child's ID anyway?). Photos of the exterior of your house are already up on google maps as well.
In our case, neither one of my parents has shown good judgement when it comes to what is and isn't appropriate to post and has a ton of "friends" that they've never actually met so it's just easier to say "don't post anything" than it is to have to explain why this post is okay, but that one isn't. My mother still doesn't understand why I got so upset that she posted that I was going to be out of the country and listed the days I'd be gone.
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Tell that to the parents whose kids' home videos have been circulating among pedophiles on YouTube: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/28/technology/youtube-pedophile-comments.html
For me, though, it's not just about the creeps and weirdos. It's about preserving a digital clean slate and allowing a child to create their own public image once they are old enough. There are people out there who post pictures of their kids' potty training and whatnot, seemingly not even thinking about whether or not their child will want those kinds of images out in circulation. And you never know what is going to embarrass someone 10 or 20 years in the future.
1. Lots of sick people out there, as long as I never see them or interact it doesn't affect me. Kind of how people stick head in sand on geopolitics/Trump. Just ignore it.
2. Already mentioned not posting embarrassing stuff like potty training. Those are reserved for dragging out in front of Prom dates. Oh wait, that's been going on for 60+ years, long before Facebook.
3. Your child I doubt will care to develop a digital slate of their child years. Hence, they won't care if there are baby pictures on their parents page. What about all the people I hang out with that get caught in pictures with me? Am I forbidden to post those photos too? The world is different, our expectations of privacy are changing, especially for kids. You are not entirely anonymous, faceless name with no background. I don't see that as a bad thing.
4. Websites change in 10+ years. What was commonly used then isn't now and vice versa. The most popular photo sites among kids now didn't exist 10 years ago. A lot depends on Facebook even being a significant thing 15+ years down the road.
You have a very optimistic view that bad actors can be ignored, the kids won't mind, it will all fade into oblivion anyway, etc. etc. I would rather be safe than sorry!
I don't use Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or anything like that myself, as social media has become so pernicious in so many ways. I wouldn't want to inflict it on my child before they are even old enough to decide about it for themselves.
Fortunately our family is respectful of this and doesn't insist on trampling our privacy so they can harvest a few likes.
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We post pictures of our toddler for major milestones (birthday, vacation, etc.). We try to keep it limited to one post of several photos. Always fully clothed, nothing kid would find embarrassing when they get older, etc. We don't tell embarrassing stories about our kid on social media, etc. We probably also share additional photos every ~1-2 months or so on average. We don't flat out tell people "don't" - but we don't exactly encourage other friends/family from taking their own pictures and posting them. We haven't had to request a picture be taken down yet, but we absolutely will if needed.
We have a private "shared Apple Cloud" album (or whatever it's called) and my wife and I have added our siblings and their spouses (so basically the kids' aunts and uncles) as well as our parents (the kids' grandparents) so that we can more regularly share photos of the kid and so that the grandparents have an outlet to share photos they take if they just absolutely need to share photos or videos with us. Then if we don't like those photos...we just delete them from the album a few weeks later and grandparents never notice. This provides an album that grandparents can scroll through to show their friends in person that is curated and limited and private, etc. And, frankly, higher quality than facebook albums anyways. Also allows an outlet for us to share more personal moments (still the kid is always dressed, etc.) but maybe stuff we wouldn't "quite" want on Facebook or we feel would put us into the "omg why do you only post pictures of your kids" territory.
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I haven't read the whole thread so I'm only going to respond to the OP.
We have a policy where our kids' names and faces are not allowed on FB. Or, since this needed clarifying with my MIL, on FB messenger. (This is really the only social media that they use, so it was the biggest concern.) Their names were put up precisely once, to announce their birth so that family and friends would know the name, and other than that we use an initial. We enforce this rule rather strictly, both for friends and family.
Our reason is actually because we don't trust the big tech companies. My husband, father, and a bunch of our friends work in security. Don't, absolutely don't, ever trust a tech company with your data. They have all kinds of tech that they don't publish to mine your data, including your photos and the content of those photos. It's creepy. They don't need to be mining my kids' data from birth. There are far too many security concerns. I've actually started doing this more for myself as well, keeping my full face off FB more and more. They can have pics of our dog and scenery.
To circulate pics, we've set up an email chain. I know, I know, also problems with email getting ahold of photos! But this was the best solution we could come up with to allow 90-year-old great grandparents in another state to receive family updates and photos as well as younger family and friends, many of whom are far away. It's totally imperfect, but it's honestly better than letting FB see everything your kids do.
We were mildly concerned that people would put embarrassing stuff about our kids, but not really concerned about pedos and other creeps. We, for our age and friend group, don't post all that often and we keep our friends list down to people we actually know and trust. That's about the best we can do.
I also know that plenty of people have a hard time seeing a huge flood of other people's kids, and some have expressed their gratitude that we post about things other than our kids. It can be painful for someone going through infertility or a pregnancy loss, and it can be annoying for people who just don't want to see your kids all the time. For those reasons alone I consider it polite to not flood social media with your kids.
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Good luck holding that social media sharing boundary firm. To me it has more to do with respect and impulse control than anything else. If your extended family doesn't have decent respect for others' wishes and impulse control, then it will be a long battle. The first step in the battle is to not share lots of photos of your family via social media yourself.
Even in elementary school, kids get basic training in internet posting and personal data sharing (that some of them promptly ignore, admittedly.) Grandparents never got this basic training. Lots of older people overshare.
Even if you don't share photos and names on social media, identity theft on kids is indeed a thing and all of the credit reporting agencies have mechanisms for coping with it now. Please don't ask me how I know (lucky me!) I expect it will get worse before it gets better as databases are being built about the next generation.
Also, there have been some very highly publicized cases of violent crimes where victims were picked specifically from information on social media . . . and very specific information posted about their family was used as leverage against the victims in those crimes. Why would anyone think handing out all this information to the public is a good idea?
I killed my facebook account years ago and never looked back. It has been GREAT!
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I didn't do any of the standard social media sites when my kids were young enough for this to be a concern, but I have a friend with a rule that is probably what I would have done -- the types of pictures one would see in a small town newspaper were allowed, but nothing else.
This meant stuff like the team championship photo or the face painting in action shot at the farmer's market could be posted, but not the private birthday party photos or the silly baby sleeping shots. She developed this rule because A) it allowed family to share some stuff that once upon a time would have been shared via mailed newspaper clippings, and B) some youth activities require a photo release in order to participate.
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Hmmm...a lot of very strict parents. I am very laidback with social media. I post fairly regularly on FB and use it as a medium of communication with my friends and family, particularly for announcements etc. I like it that it is an easy way for others to stay updated on our lives. In addition, I use it to preserve my own family memories and post most significant life moments and vacations too. It motivates me to take some photos, otherwise I am horribly lazy. Pre-FB we have very few photos of the kids or ourselves.
In addition, I used to run a business out of my home which required me to trumpet my home address and phone number far and wide. Since that cat is out of the bag, there has never seemed to be any point to me to try to put it back in.
All this to say - I do respect your right as parents to control photos of your kids on social media. I did use to post pics of my niece but then my SIL came to me one day and asked me very kindly and politely to avoid posting pics of my niece. She didn't threaten me with removing access. She just explained nicely and I was happy to comply. I did forget once but then went back and removed the picture after. She didn't give me a hard time or yell at me for an honest mistake. She still sends me tons of pics and videos of my niece, who I adore.
Another family member also had the same request and it was very simply enforced, again with no nastiness. When we took pics, they'd just say cheerfully, "remember - no pics on social media". It was all done in a cheerful, loving way.
In another case, a different family member didn't like me posting a particular set of photos. She messaged me privately, telling me she thought it was awful and that I should stop. I had no issues removing the photo and kindly let her know that. But I found the way she asked me very condescending, abrupt, and made me feel like she immediately assumed the worst about me and my intentions. And to be perfectly honest, many of the above posts have the same tone.
I'd suggest keeping it kind and loving with your oversharing family members. Ask nicely, remind them in a loving way regularly, and don't go all "I can't believe you would disrespect me like that" on them. Yes, u might need to get extra firm with some ppl. But no need to pull out the big guns in the very beginning.
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I don’t know anyone who doesn’t post pics of their kids on social media (myself included). I just can’t imagine any of these photos being embarrassing at an older age, when just about all kids have them out there. I suspect that the real embarrassing stuff is what they will post themselves as teenagers. In fact, I kinda think my kid will look at the years of him on social media and see how deeply loved he was (not that he would need that to feel loved). I think it would be awesome to look at the social media my mom would have posted of me as a child if it was around then—to see parenting, and me, through her eyes. I also would just feel sad to deprive my parents and in-laws of the fun and joy of sharing (not a huge factor, as they have other sources of joy thankfully). Last pro-sharing point: aren’t these photos we take all on a cloud and easily discoverable by anyone interested in doing so anyway (if not now, in the near future?)
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I don’t know anyone who doesn’t post pics of their kids on social media (myself included). I just can’t imagine any of these photos being embarrassing at an older age, when just about all kids have them out there. I suspect that the real embarrassing stuff is what they will post themselves as teenagers. In fact, I kinda think my kid will look at the years of him on social media and see how deeply loved he was (not that he would need that to feel loved). I think it would be awesome to look at the social media my mom would have posted of me as a child if it was around then—to see parenting, and me, through her eyes. I also would just feel sad to deprive my parents and in-laws of the fun and joy of sharing (not a huge factor, as they have other sources of joy thankfully). Last pro-sharing point: aren’t these photos we take all on a cloud and easily discoverable by anyone interested in doing so anyway (if not now, in the near future?)
I would have loved to see posts from my mother of my growing up years. As it is, we have a handful of photos in albums with no context and that's really it.
I know my DD18 in particular loves to read my FB posts to see my take on whatever we just did. Actually, so does DH.
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I actually have no idea what people are sharing of my kids. We used to use Facebook, but after the 2016 election, we signed off and didn't look back.
The specific story was that after the results were in, we posted "We are totally buying the first timeshare on Camp David. Does anyone want to split the maintenance?"
Worse than someone berating us, no one said anything, and then we received a phone call from my wife's grandfather asking if we were doing something with the timeshare. My wife said 'it's a joke grandpa. You know, because he's a hotelier.' She was then lectured on how he's her president now, blah blah blah.
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I don’t know anyone who doesn’t post pics of their kids on social media (myself included). I just can’t imagine any of these photos being embarrassing at an older age, when just about all kids have them out there. I suspect that the real embarrassing stuff is what they will post themselves as teenagers. In fact, I kinda think my kid will look at the years of him on social media and see how deeply loved he was (not that he would need that to feel loved). I think it would be awesome to look at the social media my mom would have posted of me as a child if it was around then—to see parenting, and me, through her eyes. I also would just feel sad to deprive my parents and in-laws of the fun and joy of sharing (not a huge factor, as they have other sources of joy thankfully). Last pro-sharing point: aren’t these photos we take all on a cloud and easily discoverable by anyone interested in doing so anyway (if not now, in the near future?)
I know people who share many photos of kids ages 2-7 that I think *most* normal teenagers and adults would find embarrassing to be on social media. I share plenty of photos of my kid and I generally agree with one of the above posters who has the "newspaper clipping" rule such that they'd only share something you'd find regarding larger moments....however I know quite a few people who share highly embarrassing, gross, and/or bathtub (nude) photos or even photos of their 2-7 year old swimming without swim trunks...…maybe I just know more rednecks than you.
Sure iCloud (or similar setup) could get hacked, but there's still a big difference between storing photos on your personal cloud that's supposed to be somewhat secured where some employees of a tech company might have some access (that should be monitored/restricted/etc.) versus available to public at large, to kids' friends when they're older, able to be screenshotted by virtually anyone, etc.
I think some decisions are also a function of how your facebook is set up. If you have 1,200 facebook friends for whatever reason (maybe work related because you're in sales), you might be more restrictive about what types of private photos you'll post since SIGNIFICANTLY more people will instantly see it than if you have ~150 friends that are half family and half close friends.
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Parent of two teenagers, 16 and 14. Social media didn't blow up until they were 7 and 5ish. We never posted much and have all but eliminated social media from our lives. Too much downside. The older I get (49) the more private I want to be. The folks running social media are downright evil. I no longer post on social media other than on some private groups I'm in for work and kids activities reasons.
Bottom line: 90 percent of social media is people bragging or bitching. We have plenty to brag about our kids, but don't feel the need to do so. And if relatives want to see how they're doing, come visit. Or invite us to see you.
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I don't know about you guys, but my kid is adorable. I post with abandon.
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Personally, my wife and I share about 1-2 pictures a month of our five month old, maybe. We told all friends and family members about our desire not so share pictures of him on social media, and all have respected. We actually print photos and mail them to grandparents, and they love it.
As to why, I have several reasons:
1. Put me in the camp of letting the child decide what they want to be their public persona. I know friends who have posted literally thousands of pictures of their kids. For me personally, if my parents did that and shared it with the world, I would have been irate about it.
2. I have no need for useless digital social affirmation. I have not shared on Facebook since probably 2011 and share *maybe* 3-4 times a year on Instagram, and these are almost always a congratulations to someone else or not about me. I just don't see the need to post about my son digitally.
3. Most importantly, I think my son is entitled to what someone else called a "digital clean slate" (or as much of one as possible). Even after I underwent an extensive process to clean my digital footprint, if you Google my own name, a bunch of photos of me from Facebook and Instagram pop up. Ninety percent of them are fine, ten percent of them are less than desirable. Meanwhile, if you Google my son's name...nothing. I think he's entitled to that.
We save all of our pictures on both a 256GB external harddrive and a Google Cloud account. The memories will always be there for him. If he wants to post pictures from his childhood when he's older, good on him.
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We keep it very simple: No photos of our kids shared by us or others (botth <10y old). Also i have no interest in pretending that every day is a happy day and all is perfect all around at any time.
It helps that neither me nor my GF uses Facebook, Instagram or anything similar apart from the bare minimum of keeping up to date with some of the leiseure activity stuff where info is posted on FB.
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Relevant to this conversation:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/07/opinion/parents-social-media.html
The U.S. law meant to protect kids online (COPPA) “places parents in control over what information is collected from their young children online.” But innocent posts from parents can carry unintended consequences. Studies estimate that by 2030, 'sharenting' will play a role in two-thirds of identity fraud cases facing the young generation. Parents also risk unwittingly exposing their children to data broker profiling, hacking, facial recognition tracking, pedophilia and other threats to privacy and security.
The accompanying video features kids and teenagers having conversations with their parents, trying to convince them not to share so many photos of them online without permission.
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Relevant to this conversation:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/07/opinion/parents-social-media.html
The U.S. law meant to protect kids online (COPPA) “places parents in control over what information is collected from their young children online.” But innocent posts from parents can carry unintended consequences. Studies estimate that by 2030, 'sharenting' will play a role in two-thirds of identity fraud cases facing the young generation. Parents also risk unwittingly exposing their children to data broker profiling, hacking, facial recognition tracking, pedophilia and other threats to privacy and security.
The accompanying video features kids and teenagers having conversations with their parents, trying to convince them not to share so many photos of them online without permission.
I saw that article and video, and the one part that stuck out was the mom who said something like, "If I don't post it on Insta, did it even happen?" I try to give people the benefit of the doubt, and I imagined that she could have a Private Instagram account that only close family can access, and maybe that family is far away and she cannot physically share life with them on a regular basis...but even so, it was hard not to cringe at that line. Maybe she was joking? I dunno.
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Personally I'm solidly in the "nothing online until the child is old enough to ask for it to be posted and understand the consequences" camp. For those of you who don't understand why, I want you to think about all of those pictures of celebrities as kids that you see. Let's say your kid grows up to be a celebrity. You really don't think your parents 4,743rd friend won't sell the picture of your kid to a gossip rag for a few hundred bucks? (What would you do if you had a picture of Donald Trump as a crying baby?) Or let's say your kid wants to be a politician. You don't think the opposition will find and share the pictures of your (now adult) kid as a crying baby front and center on their email lists to get their base to donate money against your kid? What if your kid is getting bullied at school and the bully keeps finding old pictures of them as a baby that they share to embarrass your kid?
Every one of these things has happened already. Non-pedophiles do some terrible things with these pictures too. It isn't your decision to make, it's your kids'.
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What is striking me about the no-kid pic camp in this thread is the concern over embarrassment at baby/kid photos. I am less prone to embarrassment than others, but I truly don't understand how a kid picture of just about any variety (with exception of a private part) can be embarrassing. What is embarrassing about a picture of a baby crying? I don't get it. What, exactly, is it that people are embarrassed about? Having braces and looking a bit goofy? Isn't that all of us? Is that actually embarrassing? I suppose teenagers could be embarrassed by kid pics, but even that strikes me as not that likely in this day and age (and I was an easily embarrassed, socially anxious, acne-ridden teenager). And so now I'm not sure if I'm the one that is weird or if you all are :). (Probably all of us since we are on this site). And speaking of possibly unrepresentative samples, I do think the NYT is notorious for finding a trend among a select group of people and acting as though it represents a broader trend. I'd be curious to see some actual data on portion of parents that post kid pics (I think most of us would agree that it is the vast, vast majority. I'd conservatively estimate 95%, based on my fairly socioeconomically diverse set of friends and family), and the portion of people of various ages who would prefer there not be kid pics of them on the internet.
I do have some sympathy for the idea of wanting a clean digital slate for your kid, but this just seems like a quaint idea of a bygone era to me (just not really possible).
And as @jpdx mentions, it just seems unfair to keep all my kids cuteness to myself :)
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What is striking me about the no-kid pic camp in this thread is the concern over embarrassment at baby/kid photos. I am less prone to embarrassment than others, but I truly don't understand how a kid picture of just about any variety (with exception of a private part) can be embarrassing. What is embarrassing about a picture of a baby crying? I don't get it. What, exactly, is it that people are embarrassed about? Having braces and looking a bit goofy? Isn't that all of us? Is that actually embarrassing? I suppose teenagers could be embarrassed by kid pics, but even that strikes me as not that likely in this day and age (and I was an easily embarrassed, socially anxious, acne-ridden teenager). And so now I'm not sure if I'm the one that is weird or if you all are :). (Probably all of us since we are on this site). And speaking of possibly unrepresentative samples, I do think the NYT is notorious for finding a trend among a select group of people and acting as though it represents a broader trend. I'd be curious to see some actual data on portion of parents that post kid pics (I think most of us would agree that it is the vast, vast majority. I'd conservatively estimate 95%, based on my fairly socioeconomically diverse set of friends and family), and the portion of people of various ages who would prefer there not be kid pics of them on the internet.
I do have some sympathy for the idea of wanting a clean digital slate for your kid, but this just seems like a quaint idea of a bygone era to me (just not really possible).
And as @jpdx mentions, it just seems unfair to keep all my kids cuteness to myself :)
I can see that you don't find embarrassment to be a big deal, for you, now. But you seem to remember a time when it was a bigger deal. The thing is that, as parents, we can't always predict what will be a big deal for our kids solely based on our own experiences. Plus, privacy.
Anyhow, I'm in the "it's not my life, it's my kid's life" camp, for the most part. I am free to share my own images, if I wish, with the greater world. And my child will be free to share his or her own images. Now, I don't hunt down every single photo that has ever been posted of my kids by friends, because I have other things to do, but many of my own friends know that I prefer not to post my kids' pics, so they respect that and leave my kids out of photos posted online usually.
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To quote a guy I know:
"Man, I'm glad I was young and stupid before smartphones were invented"
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What is striking me about the no-kid pic camp in this thread is the concern over embarrassment at baby/kid photos. I am less prone to embarrassment than others, but I truly don't understand how a kid picture of just about any variety (with exception of a private part) can be embarrassing. What is embarrassing about a picture of a baby crying? I don't get it. What, exactly, is it that people are embarrassed about? Having braces and looking a bit goofy? Isn't that all of us? Is that actually embarrassing? I suppose teenagers could be embarrassed by kid pics, but even that strikes me as not that likely in this day and age (and I was an easily embarrassed, socially anxious, acne-ridden teenager). And so now I'm not sure if I'm the one that is weird or if you all are :). (Probably all of us since we are on this site). And speaking of possibly unrepresentative samples, I do think the NYT is notorious for finding a trend among a select group of people and acting as though it represents a broader trend. I'd be curious to see some actual data on portion of parents that post kid pics (I think most of us would agree that it is the vast, vast majority. I'd conservatively estimate 95%, based on my fairly socioeconomically diverse set of friends and family), and the portion of people of various ages who would prefer there not be kid pics of them on the internet.
I do have some sympathy for the idea of wanting a clean digital slate for your kid, but this just seems like a quaint idea of a bygone era to me (just not really possible).
And as @jpdx mentions, it just seems unfair to keep all my kids cuteness to myself :)
Your opinion is perfectly fine, and it's okay to agree or disagree. It's not like one of us is right and one of us is wrong. It's a matter of preferences.
I'm going to guess the first sentence I bolded from your post weighs more heavily on your opinion thank you probably think. Personally, I am very prone to embarrassment, and that was especially true when I was younger. I was very shy, did not like school picture day, etc.
To the second part, it almost seems as if you feel social media is obligatory. Like, OF COURSE everyone has Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and Snapchat, and OF COURSE your kid is going to have a bunch of pictures online.
My wife and I deleted our social media earlier this year (sans Snapchat, but we created new handles just for direct family) and don't miss it at all. For now, we are five months in with our son, and there are currently zero posts of him online. Everyone knows our preferences and respects our position.
Eventually, school photos and team pictures and the like will come online from other parents. That was already public to a degree with anyone who would care (everyone gets a yearbook), so it's a wash.
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we are def outliers - don't really have social media, OK, have some accounts, only check what's up with friends once a months see what's up - so we asked everyone just don't post it. So far so good, grandparents is not very tech savvy - no accounts- so that helps, and friends all busy with their own lives so nobody really take much kids pictures when we get together. LOL