I believe that (most) technology is neutral; it’s how people use it that makes it good or bad. It is curious that humans pay more attention to the relatively few predators than to the far larger problem of bullying, which is growing in our culture, not just online. Look at some of the most popular reality TV shows for examples.

Link courtesy of Stephen Downes – http://www.downes.ca/cgi-bin/page.cgi?post=39533,
From BlogSafety.com – http://www.blogsafety.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1100000263&tstart=0

Cyberbullies

Now let’s look at a very different number deserving of parental attention: peer harassment, or cyberbullying. Compare the figure of 100 adult-to-minor predation cases in 2005 to 6.9 million “cases” of teen-to-teen cyberbullying. The latter number comes from a 2006 study by criminology Profs. J.W. Patchin and S. Hinduja which found that 33.4% of US teens have been victimized by cyberbullying (see “Bullies Move Beyond the Schoolyard”). According to Jupiter Research, there were 20.6 million US teens online by the end of last year. One third (33.4%) of 20.6 million suggests 6.9 million incidents of cyberbullying. These are the best figures we have on the noncriminal, peer-to-peer side of the social Web’s risk spectrum, but are actually much better numbers (based on sound research methodology) than the 100 cases of sexual predation compiled from news media stories. The CACRC researchers tell me they’re starting work on a study that will update and vastly improve on that 100-cases figure, but it won’t be publicly available for over a year.

I find it interesting too, that I’ve never seen the positives of social networking highlighted before either:

[And consider one more notable number on the positive side of social networking: MySpace is the source of more than 100,000 visitors a year to the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline’s Web site. It’s the hotline’s single biggest source of referrals… .]

So the web is neither good nor evil; it is simply a communication channel for humans.

Alja Sulčič describes the impact of web 2.0 on her daily activities, and suggests some questions arising from the changes the read/write web is bringing.

I’m really amazed at what big part Web 2.0 plays in my life (and I in its life). In just a few years it has entered our lives from different doors and it’s growing stronger and more powerful days by day. And for this reason I agree with what Michael Wesch pointed out in his video – we really need to rethink a lot of things. Among these things I think that rethinking ourselves is one of the key points. We are being linked in previously unthinkable ways and our lives are being changed. What kind of changes is that bringing us? Are the changes improving our lives or crippling the social aspect of our analogue real lives as some fear?

The answers to these questions are many – and there should be. For me the most important changes are the feeling of connectedness, the feeling of responsibility, the need to share and the trust systems that the users of Web 2.0 are building among each other (just take for example Wikipedia). These are the changes I find most valuable and that I hope I (and others) will be able to keep and use not just for a better and more useful Web 2.0, but also to build a better future – together, by connecting are ideas and constructing new worlds.

If you want to understand more about how web 2.0 is affecting people, both young and old, I recommend the whole post – http://ialja.blogspot.com/2007/02/living-web-20.html – and the comments.

Image – “Open Clip Art Library/Clip Art.” Open Clip Art Library. 24 Feb. 2007 .