Ways Kids Think Adults 🤥 (Lie)
#NEWSLETTER | Two yrs ago TikTok was a #ScaryNationalSecurityRisk, today Biden is all #TikTokGoals. Read @ this head scratcher & other ways China scored during Sunday's Super Bowl (we 👀 you Temu)
Top Stories We’re Talking About This Week
WAIT, didn’t the federal government ban TikTok from federal devices (and contractor devices too)? Well, yes they did. But despite the “No TikTok on Government Devices Act” passing in 2022, the Biden campaign decided to open an account for POTUS and promote it Super Bowl Sunday. It’s exactly the kind of thing that makes parenting hard, isn’t it? And when you consider that even the FBI warned of the platform’s risk, adults would also be forgiven for wondering if our electeds are prone to crying wolf.
Speaking of China…what the Temu happened to our brains on Sunday? 🤯 Forget TikTok how did a company we never heard of only our kids have heard of find itself with multiple prime Super Bowl ad spots? The app owned by Chinese company Pinduoduo, has, in fact, an estimated marketing budget of $1 billion. For comparison, Coca Cola spent about $650 million on its US advertising in 2023. Not surprising news to families who were told by their kids on Sunday: “oh yeah everyone loves Temu” and thereby proving another Chinese brand has its sights set on our youth.
More than 200 companies have joined the White House consortium on AI safety. The White House announced last week that it convened "AI stakeholders to help advance the development and deployment of safe, trustworthy AI." So far, so good. Wait…Pfizer is on the list? 🤔 Well, yes it is worth taking a good at those invited. We should also keep track of the details, such as whose definition of “safe” or “trustworthy” the group is working toward.
It takes a village to advocate for good sense. My father-in-law sent me a wonderfully compelling and clear thought-piece on data privacy last week. And the fact that it came via a small industry publication in the UK seemed fitting… because the issue of data privacy is universal and we all should be speaking up. It’s worth a read.
This Week’s Tips & Tricks
(Each week I’ll share ways to engage and educate kids, protect our data, and embrace the opportunity of new technology. Have an idea? Let me know!)
✅ Turn off app tracking. Did you know that when you (or your kids) are in a store that you happened to have an account for the company can store any in-person video or audio associate it with your account? ❌ Don’t make it easy! Keep the account, no problem. But turn off tracking a few different ways (do all) — on your phone via preferences, via the specific apps account preferences, and turn off Bluetooth too.
✅ Sign up for a family password manager. Did you know that even if you’ve been on board with randomizing your passwords (letters, characters, numbers) hackers have been able to decode those eight characters or less. Yikes. A password manager (I now use 1Password) allows you to set one master (that you can print and store physically) and generate super long random ones for every site you visit. Check out haveibeenpwned to check any email address you have to see if its been part of a hack (doesn’t necessarily mean your password has been stolen, but does mean you should change it now).
❌ Don’t jump in on those social media “me 20 years ago” unless you understand what is being done with the images. I know, it seems super fun and, yes, I’m going to burst that bubble, but you are being used. How? Well, when you share contrasting images of yourself such as “me now” “me as a kid” or “me in college” … etc… you are helping companies refine image AI. Computer “vision” technology needs millions of images to “learn” and understanding age progression is a key aspect to any good computer vision tool. So you are doing companies a favor in the name of fun.
You have your homework! Have a thought? I would love to hear from you…