With Mother’s Day pummeling kids with media and marketing “must-haves” most moms I know would prefer “the gift of time.” Can social media networks wave the fairy wand and make mom’s dream come true? Maybe so! Check out Sittercity. It’s a database driven hub for pre-qualified profiles of babysitters near YOU. Zap in your zipcode … [Read more...]
Ok, gang, let’s reiterate this branding nightmare of mixed messages one more time...Monster movie promos+junk food tie-ins=chubby cherubs. Nothing wrong with Shrek promoting apples and milk (though that combo is sour under ANY circumstances, eww!) BUT: if McDonalds is going to be a poseur for guiding kids toward healthy choices, they need to eliminate the beastie from … [Read more...]
Thumbs down to cyberbullying! It’s heartening to finally hear some GOOD news to counter-balance the media hype on this harassment. Totally Wired author and über youth guru Anastasia Goodstein flagged the new Harris Interactive research and National Crime Prevention Council report on cyberbullying in this article, adding much needed perspective. Not to belittle … [Read more...]
There are plenty of spins on the Spider-Man 3 record-breaking $382 million worldwide “priciest movie ever made" buzz...so I’m going to take a deconstructionist view about summer box office biggies, and look at the impact of media hype-fests on kids. Not pickin’ on Spidey, here; haven’t even seen the flick yet, I’m talking about a global web … [Read more...]
The mousehouse has some holes in its cheese, and this one really stinks. Disney's new preteen social networking portal is geared to fill a void for chatty tweens, as TechCrunch reports here. I'm not alone in finding it unfathomable that Disney didn’t do their due diligence on naming it Disney Xtreme Digital, and branding it Disney DXD. Aside from … [Read more...]
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