People piss and moan about "social media" for such stupid reasons. It's like the babyboomers who think our generation is lazy, when in reality you fucked up everything for us. To start, I love my Facebook. Everyone I know who whines about it uses it stupidly. Of course you're going to dislike Facebook if you have 7000 "friends" you barely know! I have 85. The general number of people one can keep track of is predicted to be about 100. These people are friends and family I genuinely care about. I can chat with them, use the calender to make events to meet up with them, see what they're up to - the whole "facebook is for people to talk about their daily mundane lives" thing is a weak argument used by unhappy people. If anything, FB has made me more social, letting me get to know people better both in the real world, and the virtual one - which, in reality, aren't that separate from one another. Same goes for Twitter. If you think it's "to update people on what you're eating for breakfast," you're using it that wrong. Twitter lets me keep tabs on my favorite musicians, and I've made close online friends through it as well, like my pen pal that lives in Rotherham, in South Yorkshire. Granted, I didn't use it as much, but it was very helpful while traveling. In the end, it's not the tool that sucks, it's you. Surprise surprise. I've already written about this before.
Seems to make sense. As a parent, I've got a responsibility to keep my children's online experiences in check and also a responsibility to make sure they are choosing positive social interactions. I can't watch them everywhere, but it's gotta start at home first.