Monthly archive November, 2006

Breaking news about the growth of MXit. Why thy chose 2.3 million to do a press release I do not understand, 2 million or 3 million would be a good way to go. The important thing to note in this press release is the break-down of the age groups. That 12-18 year category being the most vulnerable.

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SMSWeb, a company that specialises in providing free SMS messaging to schools, has joined the Online Safety Action Campaign today.Their services allow schools to be in more direct and immediate contact with their parents, and also allows the schools to save costs in terms of telephone, printing and administration costs. The service is currently in use in more than 150 schools across the country, and growing all the time.

They will be promoting the Parents Guide to MXit to all the schools they are dealing with because the often get requests from schools about how to handle MXit.

SMSWeb also provide schools with a number of fundraising opportunities through commission shares on the sale of airtime and short term insurance services.

This is how they describe their Porn Blocking Service:

Pornblocker – we were approached last year by a number of schools as to the problem of cellphone pornography in schools. We have managed to secure agreements with the majority of adult content providers and have set up a premium-rated service whereby parents can request their children’s numbers to go onto a blocklist at these providers. Numbers are blocked for a full year, and cost parents R25. We donate proceeds from this service to a charity, and promote it into our network of schools as a value-added service, as we do not make any money from it, but feel we have an obligation to our schools to be providing such a service.

In October a client of mine contacted me about a news story on TV about the Film and Publications board (FSB)’s quest to find and appoint cyber inspectors. This is nothing new to me because I know in 2002, the Electronic Communications and Transaction Act was passed into law, which made provision for so-called Cyber Inspectors.

The purpose of these Cyber Inspectors broadly speaking is to identify suspicious websites based on set criteria, and also investigate reports of unsavoury content on websites; for example websites that promote, sell or advocate child pornography.

It took me a while to track down the organisation because my client could not remember the exact name. Well I eventually found this article which talks about it. So I emailed them through their website to offer my services. This was about 10 days ago and no response!

Today I did another interview about the Parents Guide to MXit on RSG, the biggest Afrikaans radio station in South Africa. And afterwards I decided to call the Film and Publications Board. No response! No voicemail and I’m at a loss. How can this organisation expect us to take them seriously if you cannot even make contact with them.

So I’m asking anyone out there that knows how to engage the FSB to help me reach them. I need to know the name of a person who works for them. And an introduction would make it easier to speed up the process of engaging with them to help set-up these cyber inspectors, conduct training with them to help speed up the understanding of the global and local issues regarding mobile and Internet issues.

I do not agree that MXit can be blamed for exam results. Something I have not made clear is that MXit is the medium. Just like a car cannot be blamed for road accidents, its the drivers and more specifically the negligence of the drivers. Either they are drunk, careless or its a genuine accident where someone else bumps into them.

Now in the case of MXit, you have teenagers some innocent, some not so innocent, abusing the system. Hiding from the real world and like in the movie The Matrix, embracing this virtual world where they can let go of any responsibilities. An anonymous environment allows for people to take on different persona’s and more so drop any sense of social etiquette or social courtesy.

When children’s exam results are impacted by an activity like chatting on MXit, drastic action should be taken by parents with co-operation from teachers. School Governing Bodies should pass a policy decision to ban cellphones during school hours. That’s the first step to setting some well needed boundaries for children. It may infringe on the Bill of Human Rights in the South African Constitution. Even if it does, there is a case to be made to encourage well defined boundaries for children. They are not mature enough to understand the consequences of their actions. So parents please engage immediately with the Principals of your children’s schools and the School Governing Bodies and implement some kind of policy to reduce children’s dependence, or reliance on their cellphones.

Other health outlets should be encouraged like sports, music, drama or some traditional form of extra mural activities which can at least for a few hours per day or per week occupy the child’s mind completely. Think about it…if they are playing soccer they cannot be chatting on their cellphones. And besides the exercise is good for them.

Read the original article in Die Burger here.