The German baby taken from his parents after they put him up for sale on eBay for a euro--apparently as a joke--is back home, according to the Associated Press.
"The child has been returned to his parents," prosecutor Johannes Kreuzpointer told the AP on Thursday.
The parents had told the authorities the posting had been a joke. Prosecutors eventually agreed and dropped their investigation into child trafficking, the news service reported.
The original ad that ran May 24 stated: "Offering my nearly new baby for sale, as it has gotten too loud. It is a male baby, nearly 28 inches long and can be used either in a baby carrier or a stroller." The parents, both in their early 20s and residents of Unterallgau, were not identified. The bid price, 1 euro, is equivalent to about $1.57.
Otto Gaschler, deputy chief of youth services in Unterallgau, told the AP that the posting was "like a game for them. They never thought that this stupid joke could have such an effect."
Gaschler said he didn't know how exactly how long the infant was away from home but said it was for several days. "The parents always had contact to their son," he noted. A social worker is checking on the family, he told the AP.
Google's terms of service, while ignored by the vast majority of users, contain a pretty shocking clause: Under 18's are not permitted to use any of Google's Web properties. That's right, kids--no search, YouTube, Gmail, news, or images.
Under 18s wishing to watch YouTube videos of skateboarding dogs, or perform research for a school project will have to go elsewhere--Ask.com or Microsoft's Live.com search, perhaps. The message from Mountain View seems clear: We don't want your (underage) business.
Google's terms of service, thick with legalese, state that:
"You may not use ... Google's products, software, services and web sites ... and may not accept the Terms if ... you are not of legal age to form a binding contract with Google.
The problem with this, of course, is that all 50 states in the United States require that someone be at least 18 years old to form a binding contract. As for what happens when a person under 18 attempts to agree to a click-through contract, the jury is still out on that one.
When contacted about the matter, a Google spokesperson initially told me that "users need to be at least 13 years old to use Gmail."
However, when I pointed out that the language in the company's terms of service contradicted her statement, she clarified her remarks, stating that: "We require users to be able to form a legally binding contract in order to use our services. The actual age required to form a legally binding contract may differ based on jurisdiction."
When I asked what the company would do if it found out that someone under 18 were using search, or Gmail, the spokesperson told me:
"We're not in a position to verify the age or legal status of any user, given the tremendous number of users accessing Google services. That said, when we become aware of a user who is violating our Terms of Service, including not being of proper age to accept the Terms of Service, we take appropriate action, which could include the termination of the user's Google Account."
After first seeing Google's no-kids policy in the company's terms of service, any rational person would assume that it's just standard legalese that all companies are required to include. However, it turns out that Google's dot-com competition is far more kid friendly.
Facebook's terms of service state:
"This Site is intended solely for users who are thirteen years of age or older, and users of the Site under 18 who are currently in high school or college."
"By using the MySpace Services, you represent and warrant that ... you are 14 years of age or older."
As for Microsoft's Live.com search engine and Ask.com, their terms of service don't mention age at all.
To this outside observer, it seems a little bit strange that 13+ year-olds can use social-networking sites like Facebook and MySpace, where many users post their gender, sexuality, religion, and a large number of potentially embarrassing photos. Yet, those same teenagers are forbidden from conducting a Web search. Surely things should be the other way around.
Conflicting messages
Google is currently running a Doodle 4 Google contest, in which K-12 students take a shot at designing a Google company logo. The winner will receive $10,000 and their art will appear on Google's home page for a day.
When viewed in light of the "no kids here" policy in the terms of service, Google's school outreach seems rather strange. Ironically, the winner of the contest will be forbidden from viewing his or her artwork on the main Google page, unless a parent types in the URL for them.
This is hardly Joe Camel territory, but it is still very strange. Why has the company gone out of its way to write up a terms of service that bans kids, yet at the same time, is engaged in kid-friendly promotions? Why does the site include anti-kid legalese that none of its competitors has opted to include?
The answer, for now, will remain unknown. Google's PR people toe the company line, and its lawyers, well, remain lawyers.
Parents on the lookout for carefree, unintimidating ways to urge the sprout of their young kids' creativity ought to take a look at Ten Amazing Fruits. As the product name suggests, Ten Amazing Fruits stars a sampling of botanical characters, including the frequently miscast tomato (hurrah!) These are not, however, your garden-variety fruits. Each outsize organic possesses arms, feet, and a blank face upon which children can attach, Mr. Potato Head-style, a variety of digital features and appendages. A posh voice recites object names when the cursor mouses by, but a quick trip to the options can put an end to it.
Hidden in the branches of the app's help manual are instructions on playing the loosely defined game, and an accompanying story written cheerfully in passable English translation. The goal? Help the fruit escape certain death-by-digestion by dragging and dropping on eyes, ears, and noses so they can find their way out of the fruit bowl. Yawn. Without the app's interaction, it's much more satisfying to dream up new stories for each character, and save the fertile faces to the computer as BMP or proprietary FRD files, or print them out to adorn the fridge.
While light-hearted fun, Ten Amazing Fruits is no study in sophistication. Woefully short on graphic finesse, additional backgrounds and accouterments, and space to type new stories, the app nevertheless offers a whimsical and wonderfully silly way for young kids to personify produce.
And at the very least, an early lesson on the tomato's true horticultural alliance. My dapper three-eyed Mr. Tomato, vested in black hat and bow tie, would surely agree.
Microsoft is apparently on a bi-generational education campaign.
This weekend at the national conference of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) in San Francisco, the software giant hosted an exhibit designed to educate pediatricians on answering parents' questions about children's online safety. More than 750 doctors took Microsoft's 10-question quiz about kids and the Internet to receive a free copy of Vista, according to Adrienne Hall, the company's senior director of Trustworthy Computing.
"Physicians are getting a lot of questions from parents about Net safety, and through this (exercise), their awareness goes up," Hall said.
Of course, the effort also helped Microsoft promote the parental controls embedded in its Vista operating system, which was released earlier this year. About 18 months ago, the company teamed with the AAP to develop an age-related guide to Internet usage for kids, which is linked to its Vista parental controls.
(Credit:
Microsoft)
On the other end of the spectrum, Microsoft said Monday that it has partnered with the city of Miami to provide free computer training in senior centers throughout the city. Through the public-private partnership, called eSeniors, the organizations will offer technology training to interested parties on recycled PCs at the centers.
And in partnership with Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft has put together a package of senior-friendly technology--things like a printer, PC notebook, and preinstalled software such as memory-enhancing games--that the company will sell to seniors.
"Miami is providing a model for other cities to follow by making it easy for seniors to get the tools and training they need to gain full membership in today's digital lifestyle," Microsoft spokesman Rob Sinclair said in a statement.
WASHINGTON--Tired of their antipiracy messages being ignored by the teen- and college-age set, the entertainment industry is attempting to indoctrinate far younger disciples.
Representatives from the Entertainment Software Association, the video game industry's trade group, and the Canadian Recording Industry Association shed some light on their strategies at an antipiracy summit hosted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce here.
Screenshot of the video game industry's copyright curriculum Web site
"In the 15- to 24-year-old (range), reaching that demographic with morality-based messages is an impossible proposition...which is why we have really focused our efforts on elementary school children," said Ric Hirsch, the ESA's senior vice president of intellectual property enforcement. "At those ages, children are open to receiving messages, guidelines, rules of the road, if you will, with respect to intellectual property."
The ESA has gone so far as to develop a copyright education curriculum geared toward the kindergarten through fifth-grade set. Since 2005, the organization has been trying to find ways to get teachers to incorporate its tenets into their everyday lessons, although Hirsch did not say how successful that effort has been. The components, which include charts, teachers guides, lesson plans and a wall poster imploring students to "Join the © Team," are also now available online.
The reason for targeting youth at that age is that they're at an "inflection point" where they're just learning how to use computers and the Internet, and the classroom seems a perfect opportunity for delivering copyright education, Hirsch said. The ESA devised its own curriculum after finding "very little out there in the form of institutional education addressing this issue," he said.
The video game industry isn't alone in trying to infiltrate classrooms with its antipiracy messages, although it appears to be targeting younger kids than some of its counterparts. The Recording Industry Association of America offers a similar set of curriculum ideas, but none of them appears to target students younger than third grade. The Motion Picture Association of America last year released a "Respect Copyrights" curriculum (PDF) tailored to merit-badge-seeking Boy Scouts in the Los Angeles area.
Some fair-use advocates have argued the copyright-dependent industries send contradictory messages through such materials. They've criticized, for example, an RIAA video intended for college students that they argue gives mixed messages about when it's legal to copy music for personal listening or to share with friends.
The Canadian record industry group, for its part, would like to work with provincial governments to help schools develop their own copyright-minded curriculums "so it's organic...it's not something they're tacking on," said Graham Henderson, the group's president.
Youthful voices may be able to help to influence parents who themselves don't set such a great example on the copyright-protection front, much in the same way some kids have been able to pressure adults to stop harmful habits like smoking, he suggested.
Parents--and mothers in particular--do represent an important audience to educate, though, Henderson added. That means planting messages in places that may seem less-than-traditional, such as women's interest or general parenting magazines, he said.
I don't know about you, but I have to wonder what's next: exposing babies still in the womb to antipiracy audio messages, a la the so-called Mozart effect?
Two important, if somewhat cliche, online public service videos warn teenagers about the dangers of putting photos and personal information online. My question is why it took so long for someone to come up with an educational effort to help kids understand the privacy implications of sharing their images and lives with the world online, something many of them do every day?
The videos can be viewed on the Google Blogoscoped blog. Sponsored by the Ad Council, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and Project Safe Childhood in the U.S. Department of Justice, they are part of a Think Before You Post ad campaign.
In the first ad, a blond, innocent-looking teenager in a pink blouse and jeans is leaving her school with friends and keeps getting comments from men she doesn't know--attention that quickly turns from flattering to scary. A football coach says, "Love the new tattoo, Sarah." A creepy movie theater ticket taker asks her: "Hey Sarah, what color underwear today?" And a tattooed busboy wants to know when she's going to "post something new."
In the second ad, another girl, this one brunette but also wearing a pink shirt (the color of innocence and chastity apparently) pins a sexy photo of herself on the school bulletin board. Throughout the day boys yank it down, only to have another copy reappear to the sound of a mouse click. After copies get passed around in class, the girl regrets her action and tries to take the photo down. But a new one just keeps reappearing, like an after-school special about the Internet but with a Twilight Zone flavor. "Once you post your image online you can' take it back. Anyone can see it, family, friends, anyone," a narrator says as the school janitor snatches a copy of the photo.
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