Allie's Blog

Recently a friend of Allie’s came over to play. It wasn’t long into the visit when they announced they were bored. That’s when I said if they wanted to make a movie I’d tape them. Later Allie’s friend’s Mom came over to pick her up and was told, “Allie’s Daddy made a video of us!"

I’m sure she was completely freaked.

She probably was further freaked when after she viewed the raw footage I asked if it would be okay if we posted an edited version of the video on Allie’s blog.

The next day the Mom said something to Deb about a friend of theirs who is a Sherriff’s Deputy. The Deputy told them that no eight year-old should have any sort of presence on the Internet.

Deb and I are not naïve about the dangers of the Internet. We’ve read the statistics and we’ve heard the horror stories. And while I hesitate to compare Allie’s Web page to a newspaper story or some other media exposure that would probably reveal the town she lives in and the school she attends I still am predisposed to view the Internet as presenting a greater threat.

Our girls have never had unsupervised access to the Web. As far as Allie’s blog goes I filter all comments and watch her page stats carefully to see if she is receiving undue attention from anyone I don’t know. But here’s the thing; I allowed Allie to have a blog so that she can create, brag, complain, praise, share and do anything she’d like. That said a great deal of what she’s going to want to share is going to feature her friends.

Our level of comfort with Allie’s blog has no bearing whatsoever on other parents' feelings or attitudes. Speaking for myself, I do want some modicum of control over where Allie’s name is mentioned and/or her image displayed. If someone is posting images of my kid on the Internet, I’d want to be able to make sure I knew everything there is to know about who, what and how those images will be used. This is why Allie’s blog has become by invitation only.

If you want to see what Allie is up to, drop me an email at gbgone@aol.com. You may need to have a Blogger log-in or a gmail address. I know many of you already have those but if you want to view the blog you’ll have to let me know so I can add your email address to the “approved” list. Jeannette, I know Allie really likes to read your comments so please write soon and I’m taking care of the Grandmas.

You should know Allie posts about once a month and with summer almost here I’m pretty sure this frequency will diminish. But if you like to read about hairdos, playdates and eye boogers Allie’s blog might be worth jumping through a few security hoops.