A lot of unusually thoughtful points about parenting in our collective, global social media environment are made in this recent New York Times article: “Cyberparenting and the Risk of T.M.I.” Pamela Paul writes that, for this generation of teens, it’s not Big Brother so much as Big Mother and/or Big Father. “Yes, we know contemporary parents are hyper-involved in their children’s lives,” she reports (though I’m not sure that’s common knowledge yet), “but the term ‘helicopter parent,’ with its menacing tones of parental omniscience, has nothing on the intimate reach of the cyberparent. A helicopter hovers above, at a safe distance, with lots of insulating air between. Cyber-parents, on the other hand, are squished right up next to their offspring.”

The post TMI: Parents and Social Media appeared first on Inversoft.

Where does a community manager go to learn new trends and gain expert industry insight to keep up with this crazy, progressive digital world? Online Community Unconference is an event, (not a conference) where community managers take the reins. A place for the new and seasoned  community manager to get their feet wet, truly engage with like minds, and share their experiences. You will meet professionals from all aspects of the industry like managers, producers, developers, executives, tool providers and investors to discuss the solutions and strategies others have used to nurture and develop their online communities. There is no one better to offer advice than those on the front-lines continuously honing, practicing and implementing new strategies for their own online communities.

In 2007, Online Community Unconference opened its doors and invited social solution providers, designers, community trend setters and many others to come together to share their expertise. Thanks to these influential minds and industry support, Unconference is back again and in full force. “People have been trying to figure out the format for loose connections among the ‘community sector’ for some time, and we are getting to where that makes some logical sense to take action” (Gail Williams).

There are just too many questions and not enough time to get what you want out of a conference. Does that sound familiar? Be a part of the tribe, and contribute to the community. Unconference adopts the Open Space format. All those attending will have the chance to offer topics for discussion. Virtual worlds and online communities are free flowing, so why not implement a free flowing community guided agenda? And you get a take-away – all content from the sessions will be collected and compiled in a book of proceedings prior to your departure.

Inversoft is excited and proud to be a sponsor of the Online Community Unconference. We look forward to listening and learning what the community managers foresee for the future, so we can use these insights to make CleanSpeak an even more effective tool community managers can use to create and maintain healthy, engaging online communities.  We’re just happy to be a part of the tribe.

“A tribe is a group of people connected to one another, connected to a leader, and connected to an idea. For millions of years, human beings have been part of one tribe or another. A group needs only two things to be a tribe: a shared interest and a way to communicate.”

- Seth Godin

 Register here!

Follow the conversation at #OCTribe

For more details and resources:

What to expect at the Online Community Unconference

San Francisco Online Community Meetup Group

Book of Proceedings – Online Community Unconference 2009

Online Community: 3 Types of User Communication

The post Online Community Unconference 2013 appeared first on Inversoft.

I keep seeing research evidence that “what goes around, comes around” online too. We think of it as common sense in the face-to-face world, but it’s becoming pretty evident online too. There’s safety in respect for self and others wherever it’s shown, including in digital spaces. Here are three examples in the research, starting with a recently released study:

Positive Begets Positive Online Too

The latest is a study released by Michigan State University researchers who found that “positive online comments can help blunt cyberbullying.” The question that led the press release was: “Want to stop cyberbullying on Facebook? Try using … Facebook.” But certainly not just in Facebook; that’s just where the research was done. If you want positive behaviors from others, be positive. We kind of knew that, right? I’m not being sarcastic in any way, just noting what we’re seeing more and more in the research: that online reflects offline, and there’s an ethic of reciprocity that works in all spaces. The social norms and common sense we humans have been developing for thousands of years apply in this new “space” into which human relations spill over and play out too. “We’ve established with our research that anti-cyberbullying messages that are framed in a negative way are not getting kids’ attention,” said one of the MSU researchers, Asst. Prof. Anna McAlister. This is good advice for the online safety field too.

The Offline Context of Online Behaviors

 A study recently published in the journal Psychology of Violence by researchers at the University of New Hampshire cites the overlap found between online and offline social aggression, saying that “research suggests that online behavior is often an extension of, or is similar to, social behavior in the face-to-face world.” So what we’re seeing is, what happens online, both positive and negative, is often a reflection of offline experiences and relationships – and negative behaviors in either “place” can be reactions to actions or comments in the other. Any investigation into what we see in a social network site probably shouldn’t stop there. The online “evidence” could be the latest development in a long chain of reaction. There is so much more in this study, “Online Harassment in Context: Trends From Three Youth Internet Safety Surveys (2000, 2005, 2010).” It certainly adds clarity and confirms that school – not so much a Web site or app – is the real context of any social aggression or victimization online among young people.

Early Evidence

An early bit of evidence in this social media era that we reap what we sow was the finding in a 2007 article in Archives of Pediatrics that aggressive behavior online can significantly increase online victimization. “Aggressive behavior” had a broad range of definitions back then: “making rude or nasty comments or frequently embarrassing others, meeting people in multiple ways, and talking about sex online with unknown people.” That was a milestone for me as an observer of the online-safety space for nearly a decade at that time. It was suddenly clear to me then what was confirmed later in a Harvard School of Education study on digital ethics: that each participant is a stakeholder in his or her own wellbeing online, as well as the wellbeing of his or her peers and of their community. Youth are stakeholders, potential change agents, not passive potential victims, as they were so often represented to be (see this, posted 9/10). It was the first clear sign to me that citizenship – respectful, literate, competent participation, online and offline – is key not only to safety but also success for both the community and its participants.

The post Cyberbullying: Reflections of the Real World appeared first on Inversoft.

Extension Response from Commission Letter

Due to the “proliferation” of the digital market, including mobile devices, online social environments, virtual worlds and children’s accessibility to these mediums the Commission noted the COPPA rule was on a “accelerated schedule.” 1.

Final amendments have been announced and Commission issues the statement of basis and purpose (SBP) and responds to analysis of public comments of obligated parties. Making note of costs and burdens of compliance as well as Commissions decision on the effective date of July 1, 2013 (Consistent with original rule and time frame of November 3, 1999 and its effective date on April 21, 2000). 2.

Commission responds it has provided sufficient guidance in regard to obligation of amended rule and responsible parties and its effective date is adequate.

Concerns Addressed by the Commission Letter

 Actual Knowledge

Commission narrows proposed standard and provides guidance.

“Knowledge, by its very nature, is a highly fact-specific inquiry. The Commission believes that the actual knowledge standard it is adopting will likely be met in most cases when: (1) A child-directed content provider (who will be strictly liable for any collection) directly communicates the child-directed nature of its content to the other online service; or (2) a representative of the online service recognizes the child-directed nature of the content.” 3.

 Liability

Commission makes note of “the potential burden” child directed sites and its third parties undertake to appease COPPA rule.

“It cannot be the responsibility of parents to try to pierce the complex infrastructure of entities that may be collecting their children’s personal information through any one site. . .the primary-content site or service is in the best position to know which plug-ins it integrates into its site.” 4.

Commission responds it will not provide “safe harbor” from liability, but will consider the degree of due diligence provided by the obligated parties.

 Definition of Persistent Identifier (Personal Information)

Commission makes exception to “persistent identifier” and allows collection of data for support and internal operations.

“That persistent identifiers are also used for a host of functions that have little or nothing to do with contacting a specific individual, and that these uses are fundamental to the smooth functioning of the Internet, the quality of the site or service, and the individual user’s experience.” 5.

 Commission responds that all interested parties can request approval of additional functions related to “support for internal operations.”

In closing, the Commission states the lack of concrete facts invalidates the request for extension.

For more information on COPPA Compliance & Child Online Safety follow us on Twitter @Inversoft

1.  2011 Notice of Proposed Rulemaking available at http://ftc.gov/os 2011/09/110915coppa.pdf 

2.  See http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2012/12/coppa.shtm (Dec. 19, 2012 press release announcing adoption of final amendments to the COPPA Rule). 

3.  See also Complying with COPPA: Frequently Asked Questions, available at http://business.ftc.gov/documents/Complying-with-COPPA-Frequently-Asked-Questions, FAQ

4.  See also Complying with COPPA: Frequently Asked Questions, available at http://business.ftc.gov/documents/Complying-with-COPPA-Frequently-Asked-Questions, FAQ

5.  http://www.columbia.edu/~mr2651/ecommerce3/2nd/statutes/16CFR312.pdf 

Other:

FTC Letter of Refusal

Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule – Final Rule

Original Request for Extension Document (Includes List of Trade Organizations)

7 Ways to be More COPPA Compliant

The post FTC Refuses COPPA Extension Request appeared first on Inversoft.

First, let’s give a quick overview of cyber bullying.  Cyber bullying is similar to “regular” bullying, but is done through electronic means (e.g., cell phone, computer, tablet).  There are many avenues for cyber bullying: social media sites, text messages, forums, and chat rooms are among them.  According to the US Department of Health and Human Services Cyberbullying Research Center, a stunning 52% of students reported being cyber bullied.  It may be difficult for adults to relate to cyber bullying as the sheer speed and scale is much greater than bullying that we grew up with.  No longer is bullying just done face-to-face.  Being able to disparage someone online provides not only anonymity, but also, an extremely wide audience.

So, how can we address this problem?  For this article we will focus on online communities specifically.  As many parents know, teens and children spend a significant amount of time communicating with other kids in online forums like chat.  Based on a recent study by Netmums, almost 75% of parents believe their children spend only an hour a day online.  Children reported an average of two hours per day.  With children spending so much time online how can site owners establish safe communities?

1. Publish Your Policy

The first step in preventing online bullying is for the site owner to have a strict, no tolerance written policy in place on your site.  All sites have a list of policies that users are expected to adhere to.  The consequences for violating the bullying portion of the policy should be severe – immediate suspension of the bully’s account.

2. Leverage Technology

The site owner should utilize a filter in place to prevent certain types of language from being used in chat rooms.  Inversoft’s CleanSpeak™ platform has a stringent “blacklist” of words associated with bullying (e.g., fat or hate).  An intelligent real-time filter allows a moderator to add words and phrases to make sure it is kept up to date with current slang used by kids and teens.

If a user types one of the blacklisted words or phrases into chat, the filter immediately takes action by blocking content or tagging the message for moderator review.  There are multiple options that a site owner can utilize when configuring the filter – block the message entirely, replace the word(s) in question with ***, employ the bozo filter technique or let the message go through if the word is considered mild.  When a message is bozo filtered it will only be shown to the author.  No one else in the community will see the content.  In any case, the text is logged and the moderation team is informed.

3. Take Consistent Action

Once informed, moderators can take appropriate action.  Based on the severity of the words used in chat, moderators can ban the offending party and disable their account; issue a warning (possibly with a short account suspension, like 30 minutes); or, in the most mild of cases, do nothing.  Through a conversation or Threaded View feature, CleanSpeak gives moderators the ability to review multiple messages from before and after the text that was flagged.  This provides moderators some context of the conversation and allows them to take the most appropriate action.  The moderation policy should be clearly documented to ensure consistency.

To be on the safe side, the account of the person being bullied can also be suspended.  This is done to prevent additional messages from reaching the user and causing further damage or embarrassment.   The user name of either the bully and/or victim can also be blacklisted so other members of the community cannot continue any additional discussion.

4. Actively Manage the Community

An active community manager can be a great resource to promote positive behavior and discourage harmful acts like bullying on your site.  Posting relevant articles on your site regarding bullying can be beneficial to parents looking for a way to communicate with their children regarding the dangers of cyber bullying.  Also, rewarding positive behavior within your community can provide a strong offset to any negative comments.

Tiffany Richison, User Engagement & Community Manager at Everloop, provides an example: “As a community manager, I like to empower kids to report others if a post makes them feel uncomfortable in any way. There are times, however, that rather than reporting one another for bullying behaviors, community members choose to speak-up against comments they feel are offensive or mean. If done in a respectful manner, this breeds a supportive network, positive energy, and provides an open, accepting forum for a bully to take responsibility. Online communities for kids and tweens should allow them to learn and grow from mistakes, as well as encourage socially appropriate interactions such as this.”

One option for a site owner to consider is whether to inform the parents of the child being bullied.  There is no “one-size-fits-all” answer to this question.  At times it may be warranted, other times it may not.  Typically the site owner should NOT try to counsel the child being bullied, nor should you engage in further discussion with the bully.  In any case, there should be an escalation path for more serious cases (e.g., moderators can inform the community manager of any repeat offenders).

Completely eliminating cyber bullying is, unfortunately, not a realistic goal.  Hopefully the guidelines we’ve discussed here can help site owners provide a safe forum for kids and teens to interact online.

Further Reading:

Cyber / Bullying Statistics

Our Children in The Digital Age

Online Bullies: Parenting in Real-Time

The post 4 Steps to Prevent Online Bullying appeared first on Inversoft.

Protect Your Community Culture

Online communities commonly develop their own sub-culture enhanced by new and creative vocabulary specific to that culture. Had you heard of the terms uber, leet, or ftw prior to the rise of virtual worlds? This phenomenon should be embraced and supported by site owners as it strengthens the community by enhancing the online experience and increasing user engagement. However, new fun ways to communicate within a community also opens doors for new methods of harassment and bullying. So while it is important to allow community evolvement and creativity, you must also protect your members. A powerful tool for doing so is having the ability to update your profanity filter in real-time, which provides the following benefits:

1. Respond to user reports of abuse immediately. By instantly addressing problems, you will instill ownership and empowerment within the community, promote a respectful environment for your members, and offer them an environment where they can feel safe.
2. Stop inappropriate language in its tracks to prevent abuse, with the option to revert any changes made to your filter later. If players start using a normally acceptable word or phrase in a negative connotation such as “truck you”, add truck to your black list immediately so your community understands it’s not appropriate. To prevent false-positives, you can later remove “truck” from your blacklist.
3. Deter community members from attempting to harass others. Once word spreads that inappropriate language will be dealt with swiftly and the offender penalized, bullies will quickly learn that their efforts to harass others are futile.

Eliminate False-Positives

Let’s face it, no profanity filter is perfect, especially considering that every online community is unique. Many games, in particular, have creative names for content that can generate profanity filter matches. You can prevent your community from getting frustrated by false-positives when you have the ability to adjust your profanity filter in real-time as they are discovered.

Consider the following scenario: You release a new set of features that contains new content and unbeknownst to you, one of the content names creates a false-positive from an entry on your black list. Players try to chat about one of your cool new features but get blocked by the profanity filter! If your profanity filter requires you to take down the entire application to be adjusted, this would impact your business negatively, both by creating unnecessary expenses and tainting the user experience. If the problem isn’t addressed quickly, you will create discontentment in your community and potentially lose users. A better solution is having the ability to adjust your profanity list in real-time so that changes take effect immediately without incurring downtime of the application, resulting in effective filtering while preserving the best user experience.

Dynamically Track Key Conversations

Managing your profanity list in real-time also provides less-obvious value by allowing you to dynamically track user conversations. At Inversoft, we refer to this as graylisting. In the example described above, you may be curious what players are saying about the new features you just released. To find out, add keywords and phrases about the new features to your filtering lists so that when used, the conversations get queued for review (but the messages do not get blocked). You will gain extremely valuable insight on your community’s likes and dislikes so that you can adjust your content and future releases accordingly.

The ability to customize profanity filtering lists in real-time isn’t merely a benefit, rather a requirement for successful community management. By addressing the points discussed above, real time list management allows you to trust in your filter and build the online environment that you desire for your users.  There are many technical challenges to consider when developing such a solution, but it can be done. Contact us to learn how Inversoft’s CleanSpeak filtering platform can help you tackle those challenges!

Further Reading:

Multilingual Filtering: 5 Ways to Prevent False Positives 

Crashing Servers: A Stable Profanity Filter Solution

Types of Online Filters for Online Safety

The post Profanity Filter Best Practices: Customize in Real-Time appeared first on Inversoft.

Communities are no longer restricted by walls or boundaries. People from all over the world can congregate and share their thoughts and opinions from the click of a button. A site owner has an inherent responsibility to protect users and prevent unwanted content. The chat filter is your first line of defense, but when multiple languages find their way in to the community, it can get confused and create false positives. Filtering multiple languages at the same time can quickly turn your leading advocates in to antagonists.

1. Word Collision

Word collisions occur when filtering multiple languages from a central black list. A word in English does not necessarily mean the same thing in German or Spanish. Filtering words and phrases in multiple languages within one community will create false positives. As an example, the word pupil (the center of the eye) is harmless. When an “a” is placed at the end, “pupila,” it becomes derogatory. The sequence of letters placed within a word can mean something harmless in one language and be profane in another. Be aware of the users in your online community and refine your filter based on the languages most commonly seen.

2. Phonetics & Signs

The perception of how words sound when letters are placed together, and the signs (symbols) some languages use to represent those sounds can become an issue for your chat filter. Depending on the community, it is important to be aware of the language most commonly used, and refine the filter around the locale so as not to create false positives. Signs and literary language like those used in the Russian alphabet (кириллица), can also confuse the filter and create issues. Creating restraints and adding variations can help to alleviate any unwanted actions the filter may take against characters/signs.

3. Spanglish (Mixed Language)

Spanglish occurs when someone uses a mixture of English and Spanish within a sentence. An example is when someone uses the word “pinches”, as in “I don’t like it when she pinches me.” A harmless use of the word. A variation in Spanglish may be “You pinches hombres, get a job.” A not so kind way of letting people know you don’t care too much for them. Inversoft’s CleanSpeak combats this issue with the flexibility of adding variations and filtering phrases in multiple languages (locale).

4. Language Detection

The easiest way to prevent unwanted content when multiple languages are involved is to implement a language detection filter. Restricting the use of other languages in a specified community can prevent the issues of false positives from the very start. Make sure to let your users know that the online community they are entering is restricted. When users try to use a different language, signs or symbols, you can provide a pop-up reminding them of the community guidelines.

5. Language Rules

Chat filters come in all shapes and sizes. Some solutions offer extensive blacklists that are very difficult to maintain. Where they make up in numbers is where they lack in language rules. Understanding the root of a word, its inflections, conjugations, phonetics and even variants or characters (leet speak) are just a few of many attributes that need to be considered when looking for the right chat filtering solution. A naive filter will always need attention and must be constantly updated by someone who understands parts of speech and all the related variations. CleanSpeak makes it easy for the site owner by simplifying filter maintenance through automation.

There are many things to consider when providing an online community to engage your users. The more aware you are of the potential pitfalls and the tools available to manage them, the better prepared you will be to create a flourishing community.

Further Reading:

Profanity Filtering 101: Embedding

Profanity Filtering 101: Separators

Profanity Filtering 101: Repeat Characters

Profanity Filtering 101: The Grawlix

Types of Profanity Filters for Online Safety

Crashing Servers: A Stable Filtering Solution

The post Multilingual Filtering: 5 Ways to Prevent False Positives appeared first on Inversoft.

Public Areas

Many online communities have a public area where all members can interact.  This environment is much like the lobby in a building where people can congregate to share news, meet up for an activity, ask questions and develop a sense of community with other members.   In a game environment, players might meet in the lobby to trade goods or discuss game strategies and tactics, or plan to enter the game together.

Since the lobby is the community segment where the most participants congregate at any one time, it is the perfect place for those with nefarious intent to target and approach other community members.  Spammers can blast the public area with offers and promotions.  Online Predators can identify potential victims and groom them with small talk then invite them into private chat to continue their overtures unobserved.  Trolls can badger other players.

Community moderators must observe the public area and take action against bad actors to preserve the mood of the community.  Fortunately, filtering and moderation software like CleanSpeak can help minimize the workload and alert moderators to questionable content.  The community moderator uses this tool to view alerts and make decisions based on current and historical user information.

Groups

The use of groups in the community enables people with shared interests or friendships to communicate amongst themselves in a smaller landscape.  Some conduct may be more tolerated within a group than it would be in the public area since members have to be invited and must opt in.  Spammers and trolls are typically prevented from joining in or are quickly removed by group owners.  One of the mechanisms available is community moderation, which gives users the ability to report someone violating the rules or use the ‘ignore’ feature to block all content from the other user.  Members may have more latitude within a group setting than in the public area – if they don’t like the conduct of group members they can leave the group and join another.

Sometimes groups are predisposed toward nefarious activities like bullying and hate speech, so the community moderator must use moderation tools to identify the participants and their group affiliations.  The moderator can use severity settings that trigger different responses depending on the severity assigned to words or phrases.  The response might be an auto-pop-up that informs or warns a participant when their conduct is flagged.  They can also set up the system to auto-ban users for high severity violations.  Using these tools, the moderators can monitor activity of group members and work within the group to cultivate more appropriate behavior by use of warnings, bans or even shutting down the group.

Private Chat

Community members can sometimes use private chat to speak freely with one other person.  This allows people to form closer relationships and creates a higher level of intimacy within the community as a whole as each member forms and cultivates more one-to-one friendships.  This is good.

The challenge with private chat is that groomers, trolls and online predators may be able to entice members they targeted in the public or group areas into the private channel where oversight of their behaviors is greatly minimized.  It is in this channel that intelligent profanity filters like CleanSpeak from Inversoft are invaluable to the community moderator.  Carter Pham is the Online Community Manager for Animal Jam, a virtual world for children that is heavily moderated. He says his team uses a different protocol for each chat paradigm.  He points out “while we monitor all the paradigms closely, we consider content in the private dens more carefully because the chat that occurs there has the potential to escalate due to the player’s perception that no one is watching what they do in their private den.”

A good filter blocks profanity, sharing of Personally Identifiable Information (PII) and all other words or phrases deemed inappropriate by the community moderator.  There are many levers within the filter and moderation tool set that enable the moderator to actively monitor and control behavior within the community.  Pham says, “Sometimes when the filter flags questionable content, in a certain category we can use the opportunity as a teachable moment to help players understand the rules and proper etiquette for our online community.”

Just as in the real world, the setting affects the nature of activity.  People are more inclined to refrain from the worst activities in a public setting while they speak and act more freely the smaller the group.  Community moderators must strike a delicate balance between giving members freedom to communicate openly and controlling content to ensure the mood of the community is positive and healthy.

Further Reading:

Types of Profanity Filters for Online Safety

Prevent Users from Sharing PII & Account Information

Online Communities: Approval Processes 

The post Online Community: 3 Types of User Communication appeared first on Inversoft.

Consumer Privacy Education

This is a significant sign of progress: The National Association of Attorneys General (NAAG) is working with Facebook on consumer privacy education. We’re still only in the first half of this decade, and in the second half of the last one, the state attorneys general were threatening legal action against a social media service – MySpace, the most popular one of that time. Now NAAG is actually co-branding a consumer-ed campaign with this decade’s biggest social media service. Today NAAG and Facebook launched “Safety and Privacy on Facebook.” On the page, parents will find privacy tips, videos from Facebook’s “Ask the Safety Team,” and a public service announcement from FB CEO Sheryl Sandberg and Maryland Attorney General Douglas Gansler, president of NAAG. [For more, see our Parents' Guide to Facebook.]

The post Law Enforcement & Social Media Now Working Together appeared first on Inversoft.

On behalf of the entire team here at Inversoft, we extend our hearts and sincerest thoughts to all those affected by the Boston Marathon Explosions.

It is times like these we are reminded to take a moment and be thankful for the freedoms and luxuries we sometimes forget, and most importantly those we appreciate and hold close to our hearts.

“Make it a habit to tell people thank you. To express your appreciation, sincerely and without the expectation of anything in return. Truly appreciate those around you, and you’ll soon find many others around you. Truly appreciate life, and you’ll find that you have more of it.”

- Ralph Marston

 Inversoft discontinues all original content for this week.

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