As we all might know in order to sign up for a Facebook account you must be at least 13 years of age. Well Mark Zuckerberg has announced he believes this limit must be lifted in order to “educate” youngsters about the Internet. According to statistics there are millions of preteens on Facebook already, whether they lied about their age or asked their parents or tutors for permission.
However Mark hasn’t forgotten that there is an actual act (COPPA) that obliges all web pages and services to deny access to all users that are under 13 years of age. That is why he spoke at a summit held in California and stated that there should be no age limit at all because kids should be educated about the Internet in their early years. He stated that the Internet should be made safer for the youngsters.
Perhaps it’s a bit difficult to see how Facebook would contribute to the actual education of the young kids in the US and the world yet Mark says it’s a tool with a powerful potential for education purposes. He stated that they haven’t been able to start developing the tools that the youngsters would be using because of the restrictions.
Mark has also reassured that Facebook will take all the precautions necessary to make sure that young kids will be safe on the net. He reminded the people that just a few months ago Facebook had announced that they were implementing innovative tools and resources that were going to make reporting a lot easier. This was done in order to prevent any cyber-bullying on Facebook.
Statistics also showed that about 7 and a half million users on Facebook are currently under the age limit and about 66 percent of that is younger than 10 years of age. Yet these statistics don’t scare Mark, as a matter of fact he’s encouraged to keep pushing the lift of the age limit.
His defense on the subject was that education was becoming more social along with other fields and that it was important for kids to start learning from other kids. Even though learning happens in school where kids interact with other kids, Mark insisted on the importance of Facebook to achieve such goal.
He made emphasis on the fact that he started coding when he was really young and that other kids should have access to the same opportunities. Even though he ended up dropping out of Harvard and never finishing his studies, he managed to become a billionaire based on his persistence.
Mark is known for setting his own challengers every year; at the summit he spoke a bit about his own personal life including his long time girlfriend.
There was no response from the FTC or the government yet on allowing the change to the 1998 act.
I 100% agree that there should no longer be an age limit as there are already many children under age on facebook. There is no point in lifting the limit to 14 or anything because facebook will become unpopuar and all the children who are 13 who are allowed will continue using it. I personally think that there ought to be a warning so that when you create an account it tells you why it is bad for younger children and the parents can then decide from the information wether they will allow there child to have it. I hope that the age limit is removed.
Thank you.