There is a new social networking program being launched online, this new program is none other than Google+. Read more...

This story was originally published on L.A. Youth. 

Distractions are all around us—Facebook, YouTube, texting, TV. It’s sometimes so overwhelming that it can be hard to focus on homework. So we challenged these teens to do their homework without distractions for three days. They were allowed to take breaks to do things like check their Facebook, go on YouTube, talk to their friends or watch TV, but they couldn’t do those things while doing their homework.

By Moviz Dar 18, Hawthorne HS

I usually come home after school and eat, sleep for one to three hours and then watch videos on YouTube. I promise myself that I’ll start my homework the next hour but it never happens. I do my homework from 9 p.m. until midnight. I knew that starting my homework at 9 was bad because I wasn’t getting all my work done.

On the first day of the challenge, I deactivated my Facebook account and put my phone on silent. My brain was telling me every second that I had to log onto Facebook and reply to text messages I assumed I had. But I was able to resist. I finished my economics homework in half an hour. I usually take two hours. And I finished all of my homework one hour earlier than normal and got eight hours of sleep. Even though I got homework done faster, I felt like I was stuck in a cage and being forced to do it.

As gestures of affection, young people are sharing passwords to their email and Facebook accounts with their friends and significant others, according to the New York Times. Seems like risky business, especially when you ask parents. But to many teens, it’s sweet.

The Times cites a Pew Research study that says 30 percent of online teenagers have shared a password with a friend. Girls are more likely than boys to share passwords, and 14 - 17 year-olds are more likely than younger teens to share passwords. Also according to Pew, 33 percent of teens who use social networks have shared a password, compared to 19 percent of online teens who do not use social networking sites.

The Times quotes Rosalind Wiseman, author of Queen Bees and Wannabes--a book with advice for parents of teenage girls--who says that sharing passwords is a forbidden act, just like sex. 

Sharing passwords, she noted, feels forbidden because it is generally discouraged by adults and involves vulnerability. And there is pressure in many teenage relationships to share passwords, just as there is to have sex.

Just like sex, there are major risks involved in sharing a password. If the relationship sours, personal information could be used against someone or leaked to parents or the teenager's community. But taking that risk is the ultimate sign of trust for many teenagers, according to the Times.

Facebook’s new suicide response feature relies on friends to recognize self-destructive posts and comments and to sound the alarm.

By clicking on a “report” button next to a concerning post, the friend is prompted to answer a series of questions about the post. If “harmful behavior” is identified, Facebook’s user safety team reviews it, and forwards it to Lifeline, a medical alert service, according to NPR. Then Facebook sends the person in distress an email with Lifeline’s contact information and a link to begin a confidential chat session.

NPR reports, "The Lifeline currently responds to dozens of users on Facebook each day. Crisis center workers will be available 24 hours a day to respond to users selecting the chat option."

The article also cites three cases in recent years where Facebook users have posted their final words on social networking sites, including the widely publicized case of Tyler Clementi, who jumped off the George Washington bridge in September 2010. Read more...

What goes around, comes around, seems to be one of the takeaways from the results of “Crossing the Line (2011),” a study done by the American Association of University Women about sexual harassment in school, in May and June of 2011. 

Notably, a third of those students who reported being harassed, also admitted to being harassers. And almost all of the students who reported being harassers, experienced some form of sexual harassment themselves.

Out of the 48 percent of students surveyed who said they had been sexually harassed, 87 percent of them said the harassment had a negative effect on them. Half of those students did nothing in response to the harassment.

Different kinds of sexual harassment were identified in the survey, verbal harassment being the most common. One third of students reported being harassed on Facebook or online, and those students were also likely to be harassed in person.

The study surveyed almost 2,000 students between 7th and 12th grades.

For more details on the study results, view the entire report here.

Also check out a personal commentary about sexual harassment from Mikki Robinson.

Today, Occupy Colleges called for a nationwide student protest, in solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street movement. Participants from 90 colleges have pledged to attend the protest.

Natalia Abrams, 31, is one of the founding facilitators of Occupy Colleges. She’s a graduate of UCLA, and has been in close contact with the larger Occupy LA movement. “We’re about getting the word out on college campuses. As students, we don’t have the capability to go out and camp with our sisters and brothers, so we’re organizing one day events,” she said.

“Because of our mounting student loan debt, and lack of opportunities after graduation, that makes us the 99 percent,” she added. Abrams said that Occupy LA is in full support of Occupy Colleges. “We’ve been going there on the weekends. We suggest college students go out and help out at their local occupations. It’s about solidarity. Yes, student loans are a big issue, but we don’t want to stray from the message of Occupy Wall Street,” she said.

The event today was formerly called a walk out, but the Occupy Colleges group changed the wording. “We don’t want to be seen as being subversive to schools,” said Abrams.

The following originally aired on KQED-FM.

By: Bianca Brooks

When I joined Tumblr, a photo blogging website; I was in awe of all the “beautiful” people. I too wanted to be “internet famous”, to be appreciated for my beauty. I honestly believed with nice clothes, a cool camera, and a little luck, that thousands of Internet users would love me too.

It was an escape that let me be the person I felt I could never be in real life. My own faults and insecurities were hidden behind a computer screen. The praise I never got from my family and peers created the need for compliments, “likes”, and “reblogs”.

The problem was not that I enjoyed the attention, but mistaking this praise for validation of my beauty and intelligence, instead of taking it at face value for what it really was: The Internet.
But how could I resist slipping into a world where it’s so easy to “add” who loves you and “delete” who doesn’t? Photoshop and Picnik gave me that whiter smile I could never get with my nonexistent dental coverage. I said I was born in Hollywood instead of Orange County to sound more glamorous.

Robyn Gee, Turnstyle News

With election season on a roll, it’s time to look at strategy -- and President Obama’s Facebook page has over 22 million “likes.” The Atlantic reports that Facebook hired five GOP strategists to join their outreach team in an effort to amplify their Republican presence, and not seem so disconnected to the Democratic party.

As of now, Republican candidates aren’t quite keeping up. Mitt Romney’s page has one million likes, and Michelle Bachman’s page doesn’t have a picture.

Obama attracted a lot of young voters for the 2008 election with his social media savvy. Studies have shown that college students who are politically vocal on Facebook are likely to be involved in other forms of political activity, and in general, the Pew Research Center writes that Facebook users are generally more politically engaged than most people. But Facebook is not just young people any more.

According to a study by the Pew Research Center called, “Social Networking and Our Lives,” over half of Facebook’s users are over the age of 35. We have seen Facebook take an active role in journalism with the creation of Facebook for Journalists; now Facebook is owning its role in politics by reaching out to these GOP strategists to help their party “get in the game.”

There is this new law being proposed called California SB 242, which lets parents access their child’s Facebook account and remove any information that they think is inappropriate if their child is under the age of 18.

 Instead of letting parents snoop in their teens accounts doesn’t that question their parenting skills?

Opinion: I think this law is uncalled for because it’s an invasion of privacy for parents to be able to see their teens Facebook account without permission. Some parents think if they delete their kid’s Facebook account, their teen will stop posting inappropriate things. Wrong! Teens have other ways to communicate with other people. Teens can make a new face book, they can interact with people on cell phones with camera phones, and nowadays, cell phones can do most of the things Facebook do. Kids also can lie about their age on Facebook so their parents can’t access.

 To me it shows parents don’t see their kids as trustworthy enough.

Parents should be able to trust their teen to have a Facebook. Without trusting them, they’ll be more likely to sneak around. If your kid is out of control, you are probably doing something wrong as a parent.

In my case there was some drama on my Facebook and my aunt told me to delete my face book but what she didn’t know is that if you deactivate your face book you can reactivate. This is a way to show the government that their law is going to be a waste of time because teens will find a way to get on Facebook. A parent should should know how to raise their children without the government telling them how.

I know teens today are crazy, but be a parent by having discussions with your kids instead of being harsh and taking away Facebook. Teens should have rights too!

Max Dougherty's new social networking service Envoy- to be released in the near future- bridges a digital divide that was previously ignored... the one between this life and the next.

Envoy essentially allows the living to connect with their loved ones who have passed away. Envoy starts with the deceased person's Facebook account and analyzes every status update, comment, photo, and chat in the person's digital history. Envoy uses this information to create new updates, posts, and status feeds in the person's style of language. Basically - you can pretend that your loved one is NOT in fact deceased.

This demo video leaves me asking the question... why??

Keep an eye out for WEIRD media demos at 3:30 and 4:24 that show how you can have voice chats with the deceased and incorporate them into your every day life.