Safer Internet Day

Today marks the 10^th Anniversary of Safer Internet Day run by the Insafe network and celebrated in over 90 countries worldwide.

This year looks set to be exciting with the UK’s Safer Internet Centre planning to reveal the results of their ‘Have Your Say’ survey which asked over 24,000 children and young people to vote on what their top ten online rights and responsibilities are.  There is also a live radio program broadcast from 9am to 9pm that young people can tune in to listen to advice, information and discussion. It’s just the tip of the iceberg and companies, schools and families across the UK will be thinking about online safety and what makes a good digital citizen today.

This year’s theme is ‘Connect with Respect’, a message that resonates here at Tempero where we have been removing messages from those with very little desire to do just that, for all of the ten years since the first Safer Internet Day. In that time we have worked with chat rooms, online communities, social networking sites and text-to-screen TV projects for young people.  Over all of the different forms of media, and across projects designed to inspire, engage or simply provide a space for young people to communicate in, there have always been messages that have the potential to upset or offend.

I’m really excited about the theme this year as I think it’s a message that young people are ready to get behind.  In my experience most young people are excellent digital citizens, happy to communicate and share ideas with each other. Offensive posts often result from a testing of the boundaries of humour and a search for an identity. There are always exceptions of course, with some few young people who delight in trolling when the impact of the few can be felt by many. It’s why good moderation can mean the difference between a friendly, enjoyable space like CBBC and a space like YouTube where many young people report feeling threatened or bullied.

I have often seen posts from young people about how angry and bewildered they feel that adults allow un-moderated spaces to be such a free for all.

To quote one contribution -  “Why doesn’t that stupid YouTube manager guy stop them?” 

Although young people don’t always understand the nature and structure of the companies behind some of the world’s biggest online spaces, they expect protection there and feel let down that ‘adults’ aren’t providing it.

I’ll be thinking about that on Safer Internet Day and about how, alongside the important messages of education and inspiration for young people, protection also matters and is appreciated by the members of the communities that provide it. I’ll leave the last word to a member of the recently closed Tate Movie Project community who took time out from posting on the day the site closed to say a thank you to our moderation team who helped to make it a fun and safe place to visit.

“Mods: You have worked night and day, non stop, for TWO YEARS! And i expect moderating our messages isn’t the funnest thing to do! If you we’rent as nice as you are, we wouldn’t have had anything on this site! thank you so much xx”

Tom is Tempero’s Community Manager focussing on projects involving children, young people and charities such as ChildLine, the NSPCC, Macmillan Cancer Support and CBBC. When he’s not working, he can usually be found walking in the Chilterns or continuing his fruitless quest to take Gillingham FC to European glory on Football Manager.