My children are 14, 13, 10, 5, 2, and 7 months old. Clearly not all of them are online just yet, but for those who are, I work too hard to monitor them. It’s an impossible task for any parent. Even when they are in the room with me, it is hard to focus 100% on what they are doing while completing my own duties. I rely on instinct and behavior observation more-so than being over their shoulder. This isn’t full-proof.
I think one of the moms in SmartFeed’s Kickstarter video, Ruthie, had a great point:
“Once they see certain images, we can’t take those back”
How true is this? I remember the first time my oldest teenager stumbled upon graphic material that a friend of his shared with him. I was mortified and hurt that my child was so exposed. I didn’t know how to undo what had been done. We went the route of the extreme – No devices or internet use whatsoever until we could sort things out. It was hard. We know there is good material out there, but is the good worth the bad?
SmartFeed suggests that there is more to moderating your children online than just being a filter for the bad. They want you to know that the internet is full of good too! You can now use SmartFeed to harness the good things you want your children to see; because we want our children to learn from the internet too (there is so much to learn out there!).
While media can’t be blamed for all of society’s ills, the hyper-violence and hyper-sexuality found in many of the most popular games, apps and movies kids consume most definitely impacts the way they see the world. We want to change what they’re seeing – and help positively shape their worldview and their character.
Rather than taking away devices or “filtering out the bad stuff,” now you can deliver the good stuff– across all content formats and device types, with preferences set by child, media and device. SmartFeed fetches all content matching your personal settings and delivers it to you in a trusted, easy-to-use family packet.
Children are consuming an average of nine hours of digital media a day! That is nine hours of opportunity for your child to learn music, English, a foreign language, History – SO MUCH! SmartFeed is going to help you with “filtering out bad” and “driving more good” content & technology into your lives.
With SmartFeed, parents can easily curate Apps, Netflix Shows, YouTube videos, Movies, Online Games and Books, completely aligned with their family values.
SmartFeed 1.0 will include:
- One family portal for parents to curate, load and rate all kids’ media
- Access to the broadest global database of kids’ digital media with aggregated ratings and reviews from trusted industry leaders.
- An ability for parents to configure their own media settings for each child by: Demographics, Values, Interests, Curriculum
- Options for parents to connect and share content favorites and family media management tips as well as trending content based on all families with similar family settings and media priorities
Future releases will include:
- Direct content delivery to devices and subscriptions
- Content and device usage management and monitoring
- Parent toolkit to block, promote and manage your kids’ ongoing digital media usage
- SmartFeed member discounts on trending content SmartFeed 1.0 includes recommendations across all digital media types.
Right now SmartFeed is on Kickstarter and they are making great strides. You can help reach their goal while purchasing your subscription with BIG savings. Subscription fees will start at $14.99/month – but can be secured today for as low as $4.99/month with your reward pledges on Kickstarter. Almost 200 backers have taken advantage of early pricing opportunities and saw the need for such a great program in their lives. If the campaign fails to meet their goal, that is 200 families who will not be enriching and protecting their family with SmartFeed.
Visit SmartFeed on Kickstarter HERE
Follow SmartFeed on Facebook and Twitter.
Media today is increasingly pervasive and plays a major role in shaping kids. We created SmartFeed to offer parents better control over what their kids watch, play and share – to go beyond just filtering out the bad media content to instead driving the inspiring, positive and engaging content.