AllThingsD » kids

Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's an iPad

Peter Kafka — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 14:36:20 +0000

You love your kids, but they are loud or hyper or bored or simply need more attention than you can provide at this particular second. And that’s why you have an iPad.

You can file this under “not news to anyone who has kids,” but it’s fun to see in print. Nielsen reports that 55 percent of tablet owners with kids say they use the gadgets to “entertain” (read: pacify) the brood while traveling. And 41 percent do the same when out at restaurants, etc.

If you expand the sample set to include people with smartphones, and/or people who are honest about their parenting, both of those numbers will hit 100 percent.

Viral Video: Jimmy Fallon Loses to a Lady (The First One)

Kara Swisher — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 08:45:15 +0000

Here is a deeply silly video of NBC late-night show host Jimmy Fallon and First Lady Michelle Obama competing in a potato-sack race.

You read that right. Also a push-up battle, a hula-hoop hip-off and a tug-of-war in the White House, all part of Obama’s “Let’s Move” exercise initiatives aimed at improving children’s health.

It’s got a goofy charm, and the kids will love it (mine did):

Up Close With the Next Generation of Tablet Users

Ina Fried — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 14:00:59 +0000

I spent some time this past weekend exploring the future of tablets.

I wasn’t looking at the next generation of devices, but rather the next generation of people who will be using those devices. Like many youngsters, my 6-year-old cousin and almost-3-year-old cousin need no introduction to touchscreen devices.

My cousins have long enjoyed playing with my iPad, as well as their dad’s iPod touch. This year, they added two more devices to their lives: For Christmas, their dad got an iPad that they occasionally let him use. And the older of the two girls also got a kid-oriented tablet — the LeapPad Explorer, by LeapFrog.

The LeapPad is proving quite popular. It plays matching games, assembles scrapbooks and takes pictures and videos.

And while it took the kids no time at all, their parents spent about nine hours trying to get the thing to properly sync with one of their computers so they could download games.

For those uninitiated with LeapFrog, it’s an educational-technology company that creates all kinds of fun tech geared exclusively for kids. The LeapPad is this year’s hot toy, riding the coattails of the iPad’s popularity. Past Leap devices have overlaid educational gaming on top of other popular tech shapes. Indeed, sitting unused in a corner of the house was the Leapster Explorer — a device that plays many of the same titles as the LeapPad, but is shaped more like a Nintendo Game Boy. The company has also made devices that offer a kid’s take on a laptop and grocery store price scanner, among other digital products.

Of course, the iPad itself boasts plenty of educational content, and was also an instant hit with the girls, who enjoyed tapping on its virtual piano and playing a game called Temple Run.

What struck me is the place that both devices had in my cousins’ lives. They used the LeapPad on their own and together, and shared the iPad — at least on occasion — with their dad.

More importantly, it reinforces the fact that the next generation of computer buyers is already having their minds shaped. And their expectations are high. Everything should be a touchscreen and instantly responsive. Devices should also be versatile and capable of quickly learning new tricks. And, by default, Apple is the gold standard.

Most Likely iPad Buyer Is a Male, Pet-Owning Gamer (Who May Be a Scientist)

Ina Fried — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 20:22:16 +0000

While the iPad is clearly a hit among lots of demographics, from non-reading toddlers to senior citizens, there are still certain sets of people that are more likely to go out and buy one of the Apple tablets. The folks at marketing firm BlueKai have compiled some of that data into a handy infographic.

Among the three characteristics most tied to iPad purchasing are being male, a pet-owner and into video games. Close behind are scientists, travelers (both international and domestic) and, bizarrely, organic food proponents. Perhaps the latter, though, is tied to having the kind of disposable income necessary to purchase a device that, while undeniably fun and useful, likely doesn’t replace any other device.

Of course, as previously mentioned, the tablet’s popularity extends even to female liberal arts majors who don’t care whether their food is processed. Indeed, a recent survey by Nielsen shows that the iPad is tops on the holiday wish lists for kids of all genders and food preferences.

Apple actually swept the top three spots on that list, with the iPod touch and the iPhone being the next most popular wishes among the 6-to-12-year-old set. As a point of reference, the iPad and iPod touch also topped last year’s survey, so it appears not all kids are getting their first pick of presents. It would seem some are being told they had better get an iJob first.

Former Blue Nile Execs Raise $43 Million to Nurture Their New Baby, Zulily

Tricia Duryee — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 04:00:38 +0000

Zulily has closed a third round of venture capital, totaling $43 million, just 18 months after launching a site aimed at mothers looking for bargains on clothing and accessories for babies and kids.

The Seattle-based company was co-founded by two Blue Nile execs, Darrell Cavens, former SVP of marketing and technology, and Mark Vadon, the chairman and founder of the online destination for engagement rings.

Vadon started Blue Nile in 1999 after getting engaged; he and Cavens came up with the idea for Zulily after becoming dads.

“The amount of packaging that was arriving at our house led me to believe that there was an opportunity in kids’ retail that didn’t already exist,” said Cavens, Zulily’s CEO and father of a five-year-old girl and a three-and-a-half-year-old boy.

Zulily emails its subscribers daily offers on clothing and accessories, with discounts from 50 to 90 percent. The sale lasts for roughly 72 hours or until the inventory runs out.

A ton of money has been pouring into the flash sales concept over the past year.

Gilt Groupe and Ideeli, both of which focus on women’s and men’s fashions, recently raised $138 million and $40 million, respectively. One Kings Lane, which is focused on home decor, closed a round totaling $23 million.

Since launching the site in January 2010, the company has grown from four employees to 240 employees. It has moved office space four times and has four million members.

The large round of capital will give Zulily the resources it needs to move even faster.

Cavens, who was tight-lipped when it came to sharing too many of the company’s financials, has the lofty goal of building the next big brand in children’s retail, a $60 billion business driven by the birth of four-and-a-half million babies in the U.S. every year.

What Cavens wasn’t willing to say about the company’s growth plans, however, was hinted at during a tour of the company’s new headquarters in the industrial district south of downtown Seattle.

Zulily is renting 90,000 square feet on three floors of the four-story building, but occupies only about half of that space today. The office staff includes buyers, editorial writers and photographers. As you can see from a video tour, boxes and racks of kids’ clothing are everywhere, in what Cavens calls “structured chaos” — which comes with publishing a brand-new site every day. (See the full tour in the video below.)

[ See post to watch video ]

The expansive space is filled with employees steaming wrinkles out of miniature tuxes and prepping tutus for child models that will arrive later in the afternoon. But it does not include the company’s actual merchandise, which is stored at a distribution center in Kentucky. At that facility, Zulily employs hundreds more people.

Cavens compares running the site to putting out a newspaper every day. Like clockwork, the team publishes its email at 6 am, seven days a week, offering an average of 600 styles or pieces of clothing — representing 2,200 SKUs, or stock-keeping units — in different sizes and color combinations.

“For some retailers, that’s a whole season of clothing,” he said.

The $43 million round of funding was raised by Meritech Capital Partners, which is one of the largest institutional investors in Facebook and has registered 20 exits in the past 20 months, including four IPOs.

Zulily’s latest round brings the total funds raised to date to $53.6 million. Other investors include Howard Schultz’s Maveron and August Capital.

“The core value proposition is really strong,” said Craig Sherman, managing director of Meritech Capital Partners. “It’s great fashion for kids at reasonable prices. I don’t think that’s been done before. … For a next-gen e-commerce company, this is the ultimate dream team. We’ve followed the company since inception 18 to 20 months ago, and they have continually and consistently accomplished more and grew faster than they predicted.”

Social Web Spans Generations on Newly Launched Ohanarama

Liz Gannes — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 21:59:29 +0000

Kids and social networking are a touchy combination. But it’s not always creepy for kids to interact online with adults. Ohanarama, a social gaming site that launched today, joins family members virtually to play together.

Ohanarama, which is backed with $1.5 million from investors including Softbank Capital and Contour Venture Partners, offers brightly colored quizzes as well as simple single and multiplayer games on its site and through a Facebook app. The idea is to connect families that are separated by physical distance. Parents can create small networks including children age five to 12, their grandparents and others to play together with a common leaderboard.

Of course, like any social gaming service worth its salt, Ohanarama actively encourages users to spam each other so they can play together. But at least this time it’s all in the family.

Nickelodeon Launching A Virtual World Next Month For Kids To Monkey Around In

Tricia Duryee — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 15:00:14 +0000

Nickelodeon, the TV network targeting kids, is launching a virtual world called Monkey Quest that will be unveiled next month at the Kids’ Choice Awards.

On April 2, the free online game will be unveiled, marking the culmination of two and a half years of development. It represents a significant undertaking for the network.

Kyra Reppen, SVP and general manager of Nickelodeon’s Virtual Worlds Group, who was showing off the game at GDC last week, declined to quantify the investment, but said it will be heavily promoted, much like a new TV show.

Monkey Quest is comparable to other so-called massively multiplayer games, such as the insanely popular World of Warcraft, which has roughly 12 million subscribers.

Except for that it is cute and cuddly, and something even parents can approve of.

“What we did was take the big adult games and adapt them for kids, which is something you don’t see very often,” Reppen said.

That doesn’t mean they cut any corners.

While it runs in a PC’s browser, it has the quality look and feel of a console game, thanks to a development platform company called Unity, which has been the basis for a lot of other high-quality games.

Monkey Quest takes place in the World of Ook. It spans a vast territory that encompasses five different tribes, which are connected by a network of highways. Initially, there will be 50 levels for players to achieve, but new content will be added daily.

Even after the game launches, the Nickelodeon team will be busy adding missions, characters and other tribes–indefinitely.

In the game, each player creates an avatar monkey that can be customized. Even without a lot of work, the monkeys are very animated and have kid-friendly attributes, like the ability to burp, or take a nap if they aren’t being very active.

Challenges include fighting monsters, or venturing into volcanoes, where they may meet Maurice the Gorilla, a friendly giant that enjoys roasting marshmallows. Players never fight one another, and even when shooting monsters, they use silly guns like the Kernal Blaster, which is an ear of corn. The monkeys are also rewarded with bananas for completing tasks.

The game is targeting 8 to 12 year olds, and keeps things safe by limiting what can be said. Players are never allowed to know each other’s real names, and some phrases are filtered out of text-based conversations automatically. Nickelodeon monitors conversations around the clock, and parents can even choose to limit chats to a handful of canned phrases, like “do you want to trade x for y.”

Still, they find that doesn’t keep kids from interacting with one another.

While the game is in beta, they are noticing that a lot of the players are learning how to interact with one another through gestures. For instance if a monkey squats down and puts his hands above his heads, it implies that it is offering to give another monkey a boost up to a higher ledge. If you give someone a boost, it’s only proper etiquette to reciprocate.

Like many social games today, the game is free, and users never have to pay if they don’t want to.

But there’s two premium offers to entice kids. Subscriptions will cost $9.95 a month, or users can choose to pay as they go, by buying Nick Cash. Parents can enter their credit card online, or they can buy game cards in 40,000 retail locations through a partnership with InComm. Players who pay have access to additional content, including premium missions and items for your avatar.

The idea for Monkey Quest is an evolution from Nickelodeon’s roots in the gaming space, starting with Neopets, which Viacom purchased almost six years ago.

Neopets, which launched 11 years ago, allowed kids to take care of virtual pets, by buying them food, toys and clothes. Similarly, users had to purchase virtual currency to play.

Nordstrom Acquires Flash Sales Site HauteLook for Up to $270 Million

Tricia Duryee — Thu, 17 Feb 2011 22:11:23 +0000

Nordstrom has agreed to acquire four-year-old HauteLook, marking the department store’s first foray into online private sales.

Nordstrom will acquire the company for $180 million in stock. However, the transaction size could jump to as much as $270 million over time if the company meets certain performance goals and vesting requirements for the existing management team.

At that price, the transaction gives a lot of weight to a burgeoning new area of e-commerce, fueled by private/flash sales and other group-buying trends.

Los Angeles-based HauteLook offers discounts of 50 to 75 percent off home, beauty, travel and local services for women, men and kids. In the last two years, HauteLook says it has conducted 2,500 private sales events for 1,000 high-profile brands.

Seattle-based Nordstrom said HauteLook will operate as an independent, wholly owned subsidiary, to be managed by its current leadership. The HauteLook brand and Web site will remain separate from Nordstrom, and there are plenty of incentives to keep the management team in place.

While Nordstrom is primarily a physical department store, it has a fairly sizable online presence and recently has spent time integrating its online and store presence, so customers can see what inventory is online and what’s available in the store.

The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2011 and is subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory and HauteLook shareholder approval.

Study Finds More Young Kids Can Work a Smartphone Than Tie Their Shoes

Ina Fried — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 18:05:51 +0000

Mobilized loves studies, especially ones that validate our skills and make us feel better about our shortcomings.

That’s why this new one from AVG is especially close to our heart. As part of the company’s Digital Diaries research on children and technology, the security firm polled a couple of thousand mothers with kids from 2 years old to 5 years old in the U.S., Europe, Japan, Australia and New Zealand.

Among the findings was that more of the young kids could play with a smartphone app (19 percent) than could tie their shoes (9 percent). See, Mom, I’m not alone! Of course, Mobilized is no longer a kid and is still bad at shoe-tying.

Tech skills are outpacing life skills in other areas as well. For example, more of the kids can open a Web browser than swim on their own, and more can play computer games than ride a bike.

My favorite part, though, is the quote from AVG CEO J.R. Smith.

“Technology has changed what it means to be a parent raising children today-–these children are growing up in an environment that would be unrecognizable to their parents,” Smith said. “As our research shows, parents need to start educating kids about navigating the online world safely at an earlier age than they might otherwise have thought.”

I would have gone with “Holy crap! We need to get our kids outside more and make sure they can do more than play Angry Birds.” But that’s me.

Don't Read This While Driving: T-Mobile Launches Safe Driving App

Ina Fried — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 16:10:59 +0000

If technology created the problem of texting and driving, it is only natural that we look to technology to solve the problem.

After all, we can’t just put our cellphones out of reach and just not answer the things for five freaking minutes. No, we can’t. Trust me. I’ve been to L.A.

In any case, there is a cottage industry developing for products that help those who want to stop texting and yammering on their phones, but need some help.

In the latest such move, T-Mobile plans to start offering a program for Android phones called DriveSmart Plus that allows subscribers who opt-in to have their phones automatically tell when the user is driving and put the phone into a driving mode that disables most texting and calling features. Calls can be set to go straight to voicemail, and a text message can be sent to people who are calling or texting to let them know that the recipient is driving.

Of course, all of this requires users to opt-in, so it will only help those who recognize that they have a problem and actually want to do something about it. And there are ways to override it, which is useful if there is an emergency or the cellphone user is a passenger in a moving car.

But, hey, it is a start. T-Mobile will offer DriveSmart Plus initially only for one phone–the LG Optimus T–but said it plans to expand the service soon. DriveSmart Basic, a free version of the app, is available for free on some T-Mobile phones, although that app requires users to tell the app when they are driving. DriveSmart Plus, the new premium program, will cost $4.99 per month and covers all lines on a subscriber’s account.

DriveSmart Plus is from a venture-backed start-up called Location Labs. T-Mobile is also launching another Location Labs-developed service, dubbed FamilyWhere, for tracking children or family members via their cellphones. It’s apparently useful for monitoring an elderly family member or keeping tabs on school-age kids (or perhaps tracking that cheating spouse, if they are foolish enough to opt-in to the service).

Viral Video: "Kids React to Viral Videos"

Kara Swisher — Mon, 15 Nov 2010 14:11:24 +0000

Here is a new monthly series from the Fine Brothers called “Kids React to Viral Videos.”

And that about says it all.

Now, leave Britney alone!

Enjoy:

Keep Tabs on Kids' Social Lives

Katherine Boehret — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 21:54:08 +0000

It’s often said that kids need their parents to be parents, not friends. With the launch of its new social-networking tool, SafeSocial, AOL Inc. lets parents practice this adage in a literal way by monitoring their kids’ Facebook activity without becoming one of their “friends” in the social network. (It also works with other sites like Twitter and MySpace.)

Through a partnership with SocialShield Inc., AOL SafeSocial uses technology that constantly scans sites where kids are social networking to identify and report any language that might be inappropriate (think of cursing, drugs and bullying) or even dangerous (suicidal words or phrases). It detects if kids have other accounts on sites that parents might not know about, and displays photos in which kids are “tagged,” or identified as being in the photo, as well as a list of most recently added friends.

[ See post to watch video ]

SafeSocial costs $10 monthly and can be tried free for 30 days. I tested it by monitoring two people’s Facebook, Twitter and MySpace accounts, access of which was provided by AOL (AOL). I focused mostly on monitoring a 13-year-old’s Facebook account and grew to appreciate the concise way the monitoring site presents information. I easily toggled through recent photos, friends and activity without needing to know anything about how social networking works.

SafeSocial keeps all of the monitoring in one place on a password-protected website that can be accessed with any browser and set up with any email account. The site will email parents if severe alerts are triggered, like if violent or suicide-related keywords are detected. And once a week, parents receive digestible email summaries of their kid’s activities.

The site did return some false positives, like a flagged Facebook comment in which one kid used the phrase “hang out” because “hang” could refer to suicide. But an AOL representative said the site is designed not to filter alerts because the company would rather it err on the side of catching something than not. SafeSocial lacks the ability to show videos in which kids are tagged; comments that a child makes on another child’s page; or instant-messaging conversations. The representative told me that the ability for a parent to see their child’s comments on other kids’ pages may work within a couple weeks, and the other features are in the works for future updates.

AOL SafeSocial identifies any language that might be inappropriate, in this case, using the word ‘bust’ generated an alert because there are instances where it may be drug-related.

Other monitoring products, like CyberPatrol, can overwhelm parents by sending them too many write-ups and too much detailed information about kids’ online activities, much of which are confusing to parents. Still others, including PC Tattletale Internet Monitoring Software and key-logging software programs, record everything a child does on the computer, presenting parents with a lot of content to sort through.

SafeSocial works only when parents invite their kids and the kids accept the invitation; in the case of Facebook, Facebook Connect is used to link a kid’s account to SafeSocial. This way monitoring is done without the stigma of the parent actually “friending” the kid. There’s nothing in SafeSocial that lets parents hit a button to stop a child from doing something (the site encourages parents to discuss with the child why the activity isn’t allowed). Shortcuts let parents email alert items to other people, like when a spouse sees a questionable photo and wants to run it by the other. (Both parents can check the same account at the same time using the same log-in.)

The site’s technology is intelligent enough to tell if one particular friend seems like an outlier, for example, a 55-year-old man who doesn’t have any common friends with a 15-year-old girl on Facebook. SafeSocial determines if that person is a member of sites it considers more geared toward adults, like Match.com or LinkedIn, and tells parents as much without specifically saying the name of the site.

Of course, kids will be kids, and technology can’t do it all. If kids type acronyms or phrases to get around the detection technology, parents may not be notified. And if a kid creates an account on a social-networking site without using an email the parent knows, SafeSocial won’t be able to detect it. But the site scans status updates and comments against a list of hundreds of keywords, which is constantly updated.

Though AOL SafeSocial isn’t perfect, it’s an easy-to-use middle ground between banning social networking from a child’s life and watching over his or her shoulder at all times—without the embarrassment factor that kids associate with becoming “friends” with parents. More important, the site could be used to get a teen talking about what exactly they’re doing online.

Write to Katherine Boehret at mossbergsolution@wsj.com

BoomTown Will See You in September

Kara Swisher — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 16:00:28 +0000

Starting today and through next week, BoomTown is headed south down California’s lovely Highway 1 for as much of a vacation as I can possibly take.

Which is to say, just a week off from posting (if one does pop up, forgive me, but it was probably already baked).

In other words: iLike twins, Wenda, Owen, play nice! Yahoos, please hold onto your internal memos. And I hope Apple’s iTablet is not delivered from on high this week while I relax beachside (it won’t be).

This summer has been unusually news-laden for the digital sector–the Yahoo (YHOO) deal with Microsoft (MSFT); all the machinations at News Corp.’s (NWS) MySpace, Facebook and Time Warner (TWX) online unit AOL; various and sundry Google (GOOG) battles; some tasty Amazon (AMZN) follies; Palm (PALM) Pre-ambulations; and, of course, more Apple (AAPL) hijinks than you can count.

Oh yeah, and whatever Twitter fill-in-the-blank-you-like.

But I digress, and will now return to my annual scheduled programming–a blog-free week with some really interactive time with the kids and family in Santa Monica.

This week is a particularly good time to take time–a big birthday celebration for my Twitter-bashing mother and also a 10th wedding anniversary (an inexplicable event, except to say–given it is me we’re talking about–that I obviously married a saint).

For all that and more, see you in September. (Actually, August 31, but who’s counting?)

And, until then, here is a cool video of someone playing a 45 of that great song by the Happenings on an old turntable:

A DonorsChoose High School Musical: A Very Awkward Dance for the Kids!

Kara Swisher — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 14:38:59 +0000

It’s been just a week, and BoomTown is rocking out in the DonorsChoose.org’s Blogger Challenge 2008!

It started a week ago, with us featuring a video from my hell-froze-over dinner with Yahoo (YHOO) CEO Jerry Yang, who ably endured a meal with me in support of the kids who benefit from the unique charity.

DonorsChoose.org is a charity that funds classroom projects in high-need public schools, using the Web to match teacher project requests with donors.

Last year, BoomTown did pretty well, raising $12,199 from 52 donors and impacting 1,940 students.

This year, just a week in, we are already at $3,617, from nine donors and impacting 348 students. That puts BoomTown in the No. 2 spot behind our archrival VC Fred Wilson (he is at $5,877).

That’s great, but I have a long list of technology requests in high-need public schools, so we need to get cracking.

You can click here to reach the giving page or use the widget on the lower right side of the ATD homepage or the left side of the main BoomTown page.

To get you inspired, the fine folks at JibJab sent me this deeply embarrassing video of me and Yang (well, our heads, actually) dropped into a promotional video for “High School Musical 3: Senior Year,” which opens Oct. 24.

It’s painful to watch (most especially, Yang in a dress as Gabrielle), but it’s for the kids!

Also, there is no telling what low level of pandering–next week, for example, I plan on press-ganging my kids to help out–I am capable of to raise the money.

Here’s the video as proof:

Try JibJab Sendables® eCards today!

KidZui's Parent Plan Lets Children Explore in Safe Corner of Web

Walter S. Mossberg — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 00:01:00 +0000

The Internet presents a real dilemma for parents with younger children. On the one hand, it’s filled with fun and wholesome sites for kids, and lots of educational material. On the other, it teems with inappropriate content and potentially dangerous means of communicating with strangers.

There are tools for dealing with the problem, most commonly, filtering software that attempts to bar sexual, violent and other objectionable material. But these can frustrate kids and parents, by either blocking too many things or not blocking enough.

Avatars help guide users

Some other approaches, such as the parental controls built right into the latest Windows (MSFT) and Macintosh (AAPL) operating systems, offer parents more control by allowing them to specify what Web sites a child can access. But that requires close and constant involvement by the parent as the child seeks access to more Web sites.

This week marks the launch of a parental-control service with a somewhat different approach. It’s called KidZui, and it aims to offer kids a safe subset of the Internet where they can roam freely without triggering parental worry. KidZui, for children ages 3 to 12, hopes to emphasize the positive, rather than the negative.

The service, from a San Diego company of the same name, claims to encompass 500,000 safe sites, photos and videos, ranging from pop culture to science, comics and games to history. You can watch the latest “American Idol” contestant, learn about dinosaurs, delve into history or visit popular kids’ sites, such as Webkinz and Club Penguin.

The sites, photos and videos included in KidZui are approved by a team of about 200 parents and teachers across the country, and are ranked by age, so that a site that might be right for an 11-year-old isn’t served up to a 4-year-old.

While a child can establish a list of friends in KidZui, and can share content with them, there is no instant-messaging or email function.

KidZui isn’t free, and it can’t be accessed via a regular Web browser. Instead, you must download a special KidZui browser, from kidzui.com, that runs on either Windows or Macintosh computers. I tested it on both platforms, and it downloaded quickly and installed smoothly.

The service nominally costs $99.95 a year, or $9.95 a month, but there is a 30-day free trial and an introductory rate of $49.95 a year, or $4.95 a month. It has no ads, other than those already present on Web sites kids visit.

A key selling point of the service is that busy parents can simply set up KidZui and trust that their kids will be safe online. To that end, the program can be optionally configured, so that a child can’t escape from it to use the computer’s standard browser, for example. A parent can set KidZui to launch when the computer starts up, in full-screen mode. In this mode, KidZui automatically disables or hides the common keystrokes, icons, commands and techniques that allow users to switch to, or to start up, other programs.

In addition, when KidZui is running in this locked-down mode, the child can be barred from quitting KidZui without a parent’s password. In my tests over the past week, I found some loopholes in this lockdown system, but the company plugged each leak I turned up. I can’t swear that a clever kid won’t be able to escape from KidZui, but the program blocks most obvious exits.

Inside the software, the company has tried to create a fun, lighthearted world. Each child is represented by a “Zui,” a cartoon-like character that can be customized with hair, clothing and other features. There are lots of sound effects, and kids can rate content with illustrated tags ranging from “best” and “cool” to “boring” or “gross.”

When a child types in a term like “ocean” KidZui offers a list of related terms as well, to guide further exploration. If a child types in a search term or a Web address that has been banned from the KidZui universe, a message appears saying “This page isn’t available on KidZui, but your parents can add it for you.” This applies not only to terms typed into KidZui’s own search bar, but also to terms a child enters at sites like Wikipedia or in the search boxes embedded in other sites. The main pages of Google and Yahoo can’t be summoned.

If a search or Web address is new to KidZui, a different message appears promising that it will be reviewed.

I did find some holes in this system. For instance, I was able to get to The Wall Street Journal’s Web site and do an internal search on “Spitzer,” which turned up a story on the former New York governor’s sex scandal.

Parents can get detailed reports about the KidZui activities of each of their children and can tweak the content they can see by adding specific types of material, such as “athletic violence,” and approving or blocking specific Web sites.

For parents who want to allow limited Web use by their young children without constantly micromanaging their online activities, KidZui may be worth a try, but don’t expect it to be perfect.

Email me at mossberg@wsj.com. Find all my columns and videos online, free, at the new All Things Digital Web site, http://walt.allthingsd.com.

You Have Weapons In Your Computer To Monitor Your Kids

Walter S. Mossberg — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 00:01:00 +0000

One of the most vexing problems in home computing is finding a way for parents to govern their children’s use of computers and the Internet. The goal is to keep their kids safe from the creepier content and people on the Internet, and from spending too much time on the computer.

Of course, in many families, these problems are solved with good parenting skills, and establishing trust and limits. But even strong parents could use some technological help.

For years, add-on programs have attempted to give parents some control over what children can do on the computer. Some of these have been OK, but many have had weaknesses that were exploited by kids, who are typically technically savvier than adults.

Many parents, however, don’t realize that the latest versions of the two main computer-operating systems, Microsoft‘s Windows Vista and Apple‘s Mac OS X Tiger, have parental controls built right in.

On both platforms, you can control even which programs a child can run. This is key, because it prevents kids from running alternative Web browsers or other programs that may not be susceptible to parental controls. Both also allow you to specify which Web sites a child can visit, another crucial feature.

[ See post to watch video ]

These built-in controls are free of charge and fairly easy to use. Even better, because they are designed by the same companies that built the operating system and aren’t bolted on afterward, they can impose limits in ways that kids may find harder to evade.

I have been testing these built-in parental controls. While they aren’t perfect, I can recommend them as powerful tools to help parents get a handle on their children’s computing and online activities.

On both Windows and Mac, the trick is to make sure the computer used by a child has multiple accounts, or logins. One, for a parent, should be set up as an “administrator” account, the type that grants its user powers to change various settings, including the power to establish parental controls on other accounts. This administrator account should be protected by a password — and this password should never be shared with the child. If the child knows it, he or she can log in as the administrator and weaken or remove the controls.

In addition, you should set up a standard, or more limited, account for each child who uses the machine. People logged in via these accounts can’t change many settings on the computer and can’t override the controls.

Once logged in to your administrator account, you can apply different limits to each child’s account. In Windows Vista, you can find the parental-controls settings in the Control Panel, under the heading User Accounts and Family Safety. You must be using the Home Basic, Home Premium, or Ultimate versions of Vista to apply these boundaries. They aren’t available in the Business or Enterprise versions.

On the Mac, in Tiger, you can find parental controls in the System Preferences program, by clicking on the Accounts icon. You select the standard account you want to control and then click the tab labeled Parental Controls.

In addition to restricting which Web sites kids can visit and which programs they can run, Vista, but not the Mac, includes an extensive system of controls on games. On the other hand, the Mac allows you to block a child from using a printer or burning CDs.

The Mac system, but not Vista, allows you to specify exactly with whom a child can exchange emails or instant messages — as long as the child is using Apple’s own built-in Mail email program and iChat instant-messaging program. To ensure compliance, you would have to limit the child to using only these programs and not competitors or Web sites that perform these functions.

In Vista, you may be able to set up similar limitations within the individual email or instant-messaging program, but it’s easier on the Mac. If a nonapproved person attempts to send your child an email, the Mac system can even forward the email to you.

On the other hand, Vista, but not the Mac, allows you to set time limits for a child’s use of the computer. Another strong Vista feature absent on the Mac is a detailed report on the child’s activities that can be emailed to the parent — though the report doesn’t include email and instant-messaging activities. Vista also can filter out Web pages based on content categories, such as sex or drugs.

Apple is planning to add a time-limit feature, Web-content filtering and a new activity-logging feature in its forthcoming Leopard operating system, due in October.

Determined kids wanting to view pornography or contact strangers could probably find ways to evade both systems. It’s awfully hard to shut down access to everything of which you disapprove without also blocking access to valuable content and functions. But the logging and reporting features should at least make evasions detectable after the fact.

So, if you want to put some technological muscle behind your parenting, don’t overlook the parental-control features hiding in your own PC.

Email me at mossberg@wsj.com. Find all my columns and videos online free at the new All Things Digital Web site, http://walt.allthingsd.com.