Monthly Archives: March 2014

Parentology: The first parenting book I actually liked

As a researcher and parent, I quickly learned that I have no patience for parenting books. When I got pregnant, I started trying to read parenting books and I threw more than my fair share of them across the room. I either get angry at the presentation of the science or annoyed at the dryness of the writing. Worse, the prescriptions make me furious because anyone who tells you that there’s a formula to parenting is lying. My hatred of parenting books was really disappointing because I didn’t want to have to do a literature review whenever I wanted to know what research said about XYZ. I actually want to understand what the science says about key issues of child development, childrearing, and parenting. But I can’t stomach the tone of what I normally encounter.

So when I learned that Dalton Conley was writing a book on parenting, my eyebrows went up. I’ve always been a huge fan of his self-deprecating autobiographical book Honky because it does such a fantastic job of showcasing research on race and class. This made me wonder what he was going to do with a book on parenting.

Conley did not disappoint. His new book Parentology is the first parenting book that I’ve read that I actually enjoyed and am actively recommending to others. Conley’s willingness to detail his own failings, neuroses, and foolish logic (and to smack himself upside the head with research data in the process) showcases the trials and tribulations of parenting. Even experts make a mess of everything, but watching them do so so spectacularly lets us all off the hook. If you read this book, you will learn a lot about parenting, even if it doesn’t present the material in a how-to fashion. Instead, this book highlights the chaos that ensues when you try to implement science on the ground. Needless to say, hilarity ensues.

If you need some comedy relief, pick up this book. It’s a fantastic traversal of contemporary research presented in a fashion that will have you rolling on the floor laughing. Lesson #1: If you buy your children pet guinea pigs to increase their exposure to allergens, make sure that they’re unable to mate.

Why Snapchat is Valuable: It’s All About Attention

Most people who encounter a link to this post will never read beyond this paragraph. Heck, most people who encountered a link to this post didn’t click on the link to begin with. They simply saw the headline, took note that someone over 30 thinks that maybe Snapchat is important, and moved onto the next item in their Facebook/Twitter/RSS/you-name-it stream of media. And even if they did read it, I’ll never know it because they won’t comment or retweet or favorite this in any way.

We’ve all gotten used to wading in streams of social media content. Open up Instagram or Secret on your phone and you’ll flick on through the posts in your stream, looking for a piece of content that’ll catch your eye. Maybe you don’t even bother looking at the raw stream on Twitter. You don’t have to because countless curatorial services like digg are available to tell you what was most important in your network. Facebook doesn’t even bother letting you see your raw stream; their algorithms determine what you get access to in the first place (unless, of course, someone pays to make sure their friends see their content).

Snapchat offers a different proposition. Everyone gets hung up on how the disappearance of images may (or may not) afford a new kind of privacy. Adults fret about how teens might be using this affordance to share inappropriate (read: sexy) pictures, projecting their own bad habits onto youth. But this is isn’t what makes Snapchat utterly intriguing. What makes Snapchat matter has to do with how it treats attention.

When someone sends you an image/video via Snapchat, they choose how long you get to view the image/video. The underlying message is simple: You’ve got 7 seconds. PAY ATTENTION. And when people do choose to open a Snap, they actually stop what they’re doing and look.

In a digital world where everyone’s flicking through headshots, images, and text without processing any of it, Snapchat asks you to stand still and pay attention to the gift that someone in your network just gave you. As a result, I watch teens choose not to open a Snap the moment they get it because they want to wait for the moment when they can appreciate whatever is behind that closed door. And when they do, I watch them tune out everything else and just concentrate on what’s in front of them. Rather than serving as yet-another distraction, Snapchat invites focus.

Furthermore, in an ecosystem where people “favorite” or “like” content that is inherently unlikeable just to acknowledge that they’ve consumed it, Snapchat simply notifies the creator when the receiver opens it up. This is such a subtle but beautiful way of embedding recognition into the system. Sometimes, a direct response is necessary. Sometimes, we need nothing more than a simple nod, a way of signaling acknowledgement. And that’s precisely why the small little “opened” note will bring a smile to someone’s face even if the recipient never said a word.

Snapchat is a reminder that constraints have a social purpose, that there is beauty in simplicity, and that the ephemeral is valuable. There aren’t many services out there that fundamentally question the default logic of social media and, for that, I think that we all need to pay attention to and acknowledge Snapchat’s moves in this ecosystem.

(This post was originally published on LinkedIn. More comments can be found there.)

TIME Magazine Op-Ed: Let Kids Run Wild Online

I wrote the following op-ed for TIME Magazine. This was published in the March 13, 2014 issue under the title “Let Kids Run Wild Online.” To my surprise and delight, the op-ed was featured on the cover of the magazine.

Trapped by helicopter parents and desperate to carve out a space of their own, teens need a place to make mistakes.

Bicycles, roller skates and skateboards are dangerous. I still have scars on my knees from my childhood run-ins with various wheeled contraptions. Jungle gyms are also dangerous; I broke my left arm falling off one. And don’t get me started on walking. Admittedly, I was a klutzy kid, but I’m glad I didn’t spend my childhood trapped in a padded room to protect me from every bump and bruise.

“That which does not kill us makes us stronger.” But parents can’t handle it when teenagers put this philosophy into practice. And now technology has become the new field for the age-old battle between adults and their freedom-craving kids.

Locked indoors, unable to get on their bicycles and hang out with their friends, teens have turned to social media and their mobile phones to gossip, flirt and socialize with their peers. What they do online often mirrors what they might otherwise do if their mobility weren’t so heavily constrained in the age of helicopter parenting. Social media and smartphone apps have become so popular in recent years because teens need a place to call their own. They want the freedom to explore their identity and the world around them. Instead of sneaking out (should we discuss the risks of climbing out of windows?), they jump online.

As teens have moved online, parents have projected their fears onto the Internet, imagining all the potential dangers that youth might face–from violent strangers to cruel peers to pictures or words that could haunt them on Google for the rest of their lives.

Rather than helping teens develop strategies for negotiating public life and the potential risks of interacting with others, fearful parents have focused on tracking, monitoring and blocking. These tactics don’t help teens develop the skills they need to manage complex social situations, assess risks and get help when they’re in trouble. Banning cell phones won’t stop a teen who’s in love cope with the messy dynamics of sexting. “Protecting” kids may feel like the right thing to do, but it undermines the learning that teens need to do as they come of age in a technology-soaked world.

The key to helping youth navigate contemporary digital life isn’t more restrictions. It’s freedom–plus communication. Famed urban theorist Jane Jacobs used to argue that the safest neighborhoods were those where communities collectively took interest in and paid attention to what happened on the streets. Safety didn’t come from surveillance cameras or keeping everyone indoors but from a collective willingness to watch out for one another and be present as people struggled. The same is true online.

What makes the digital street safe is when teens and adults collectively agree to open their eyes and pay attention, communicate and collaboratively negotiate difficult situations. Teens need the freedom to wander the digital street, but they also need to know that caring adults are behind them and supporting them wherever they go. The first step is to turn off the tracking software. Then ask your kids what they’re doing when they’re online–and why it’s so important to them.

What’s Behind the Free PDF of “It’s Complicated” (no, no, not malware…)

As promised, I put a free PDF copy of “It’s Complicated” on my website the day the book officially launched. But as some folks noticed, I didn’t publicize this when I did so. For those who are curious as to why, I want to explain. And I want you to understand the various issues at play for me as an author and a youth advocate.

I didn’t write this book to make money. I wrote this book to reach as wide of an audience as I possibly could. This desire to get as many people as engaged as possible drove every decision I made throughout this process. One of the things that drew me to Yale was their willingness to let me put a freely downloadable CC-licensed copy of the book online on the day the book came out. I knew that trade presses wouldn’t let a first time author pull that one off. Heck, they still get mad at Paulo Coelho for releasing his books online and he’s sold more books worldwide than anyone else!

As I prepared for publication, it became clear that I really needed other people’s help in getting the word out. I needed journalistic enterprises to cover the book. I needed booksellers to engage with the book. I needed people to collectively signal that this book was important. I needed people to be willing to take a bet on me. When one of those allies asked me to wait a week before publicizing the free book, I agreed.

If you haven’t published a book before, it’s pretty unbelievable to see all of the machinery that goes into getting the book out once the book exists in physical form. News organizations want to promote books that will be influential or spark a conversation, but they are also anxious about having their stories usurped by others. Booksellers make risky decisions about how many copies they think they can sell ahead of time and order accordingly. (And then there’s the world of paying for placement which I simply didn’t do.) Booksellers’ orders – as well as actual presales – are influential in shaping the future of a book, just like first weekend movie sales matter. For example, these sales influence bestseller and recommendation lists. These lists are key to getting broader audiences’ attention (and for getting the attention of certain highly influential journalistic enterprises). And, as an author trying to get a message out, I realized that I needed to engage with this ecosystem and I needed all of these actors to believe in my book.

The bestseller aspect of this is the part that I struggle with the most. I don’t actually care whether or not my book _sells_ a lot; I care whether or not it’s _read_ a lot. But there’s no bestread-ed list (except maybe Goodreads). And while many books that are widely sold aren’t widely read, most books that are widely read are widely sold. My desire to be widely read is why I wanted to make the book freely available from the getgo. I get that not everyone can afford to buy the book. I get that it’s not available in certain countries. I get that people want to check it out first. I get that we haven’t figured out how to implement ‘grep’ in physical books. So I really truly get the importance of making the book accessible.

But what I started to realize is that when people purchase the book, they signal to outside folks that the book is important. This is one of the reasons that I asked people who value this book to buy it. For them or for others. I love it when people buy the book and give it away to a poor grad student, struggling parent, or library. I don’t know if I’ll make any bestseller list, but the reason I decided to try is because sales rankings – especially in the first few weeks of a book’s life – really do help attract more attention which is key to getting the word out. And so I’ve begged and groveled, asking people to buy my book even though it makes me feel squeamish, solely because I know that the message that I want to offer is important. So, to be honest, if you are going to buy the book at some point, I’d really really appreciate it if you’d buy a copy. And sooner rather than later. Your purchasing decisions help me signal to the powers that be that this book is important, that the message in the book is valuable.

That said, if you don’t have the resources or simply don’t want to, don’t buy it. I’m cool with that. I’m beyond delighted to give the book away for free to anyone who wants to read it, assign it in their classes, or otherwise engage with it. If you choose to download it, thank you! I’m glad you find it valuable!

If you feel like giving back, I have a request. Please help support all of the invisible people and organizations that helped get word of my book out there. I realize that there are folks out there who want to “support the author,” but my ask of you is to help me support the whole ecosystem that made this possible.

Go buy a different book from Yale University Press to thank them for being willing to publish me. Buy a random book from an independent bookseller to say thank you (especially if you live near Harvard Book Store, Politics & Prose, or Book People). Visit The Guardian and click on their ads to thank them for running a first serial. Donate to NPR for their unbelievable support in getting the word out. Buy a copy or click on the ads of BoingBoing, Cnet, Fast Company, Financial Times, The Globe & Mail, LA Times, Salon, Slate, Technology Review, The Telegraph, USA Today, Wired, and the other journalistic venues whose articles aren’t yet out to thank them for being so willing to cover this book. Watch the ads on Bloomberg and MSNBC to send them a message of thanks. And take the time to retweet the tweets or write a comment on the blogs of the hundreds of folks who have been so kind to write about this book in order to get the word out. I can’t tell you how grateful I am to all of the amazing people and organizations who have helped me share what I’ve learned. Please shower them in love.

If you want to help me, spread the message of my book as wide as you possibly can. I wrote this book so that more people will step back, listen, and appreciate the lives of today’s teenagers. I want to start a conversation so that we can think about the society that we’re creating. I will be forever grateful for anything that you can do to get that message out, especially if you can help me encourage people to calm down and let teenagers have some semblance of freedom.

More than anything, thank *you* soooo much for your support over the years!!! I am putting this book up online as a gift to all of the amazing people who have been so great to me for so long, including you. Thank you thank you thank you.

{{hug}}

PS: Some folks have noticed that Amazon seems to not have any books in stock. There was a hiccup but more are coming imminently. You could wait or you could support IndieBound, Powell’s, Barnes & Noble, or your local bookstore.