YouTube Stars!

This post is for people who are 18 years old or older. If you are not yet 18, please click here to read an excellent article I wrote about the popular Nickelodeon TV show, iCarly.

I have known about this new site for a few months now, and I've been debating about whether to write about it, or not. I am now posting on it because I want to get the word out to parents with younger kids, or people with younger brothers or sisters. If your children have access to the internet, they will more than likely hear about this site and may be interested in visiting it. Read this post and watch the 4 videos to understand what this site is about. Then decide if you want your children to visit it, or not.

ChatRoulette (CR) is a website that connects the webcam on your computer to the webcam on someone else's computer, at random. You will see and hear them, and they will see and hear you. You can also type to each other. You have no idea who's image is going to pop into the top window of the CR screen. You have no advanced warning of what they might be doing. You also have no idea if they are actually on the webcam or if they have hacked the site and are playing a pre-recorded video, which is not uncommon.

In many cases, it is fun and interesting to see who shows up to video chat with you on CR. The videos below will give you a taste of what kind of craziness goes on at CR. But please be warned! A high percentage, as high as 10% or more, of the people who will pop up in the video box will be guys who have their sexual parts exposed. This is something that you probably don't want to see yourself, and you wouldn't want your younger children or siblings seeing this. There is no way to know what will pop up in the video box. You can "Next" the person, which disconnects them and brings up a new connection in a few seconds. But you will never know what they may be doing.

Women do not expose themselves as often on CR, but there are often groups of guys using CR who encourage females they may be connected to, to flash their chest, etc. Please be aware of my main point - you never know who will randomly be connected with you when you go on CR, and what they will be doing or showing. The rules on the CR site are succinct: "Rules: 16+, clothes, report button" so if you do visit the site and see inappropriate behavior, use the Report Button!

Here are 4 videos recorded from the CR site that are very popular on YouTube right now. They will give you a taste of what goes on, on the CR site. Beware - there is some bad language in these videos.




MeMeMolly has been on YouTube for years and lately has been making videos for the RocketBoom channel. Molly gives an introduction to the site, letting you know how to do the initial setup. It doesn't take long before Molly runs into a guy with his penis out - it occurs at 1:40 and they have blurred the scene out. Molly agrees with me; at 2:26 she says she would not recommend it for anyone under 18, or those at work.






"This video is not suitable for children" - this is the opening warning in this video. Adults may get a laugh out of 2 guys who are improvising comments and songs in response to whoever shows up in their video box. One comment they make is, "Aren't you glad we're not a couple of naked guys!" Of course they did get connected to a guy masturbating, at one point. I repeat, you might not want your kids on this website!





This video starts off by stating, "Viewer Discretion Advised, This video may contain swears" - and it does on 2 occasions. But for adults, you may be amused and impressed by the improv this man does. He sings an improvised song in response to whatever he sees in the CR video box. "Merton" of the PianoChatImprov channel just joined on March 08, 2010 and only has 2 videos so far. But he was already up to #79 on our YouTube Top 100 Weekly chart. This video has over 3 Million views in the last 6 weeks.





Ben Folds did something similar to Merton, but he did it live in front of 2,000+ people. This video starts out with the comment that "there are dirty words, ... but we edited out the penises." This video has 3.5+ Million views.

Labels: bad language, ChatRoulette, children, curse, girls, guys, kids, naked, parents, random, sex, warning, webcam

posted by KennyCrane at 5/01/2010 03:28:00 AM 0 Comments

Hello YouTubers!

This post is directed to the parents out there, or people with young brothers or sisters. We all love YouTube, but there are many videos there that are not appropriate for young children. I have written about this in my two popular articles:

Sex on YouTube - A Parent's Guide

Sex and Porn on YouTube - A Guide For Parents

I just read this news release today which starts with the headline:

Children use Web to watch videos, look up "sex"

It talks about a study of the top 100 search terms used by youngsters to find items online. As YouTube fans like us might expect, YouTube was the top search term! The ninth most popular search term was "Fred" - the most subscribed YouTuber - as we all know by looking at the Top 100 Weekly Chart.

But the words "sex" and "porn" were also it the top 10, at number four and six respectively. The news article says:

California-based Symantec's Internet safety advocate Marian Merritt said the list showed that parents needed to be aware what their children were doing online.

"It also helps identify "teachable moments" when parents should be talking with their kids about appropriate online behavior and other issues in their kids' online lives," she said in a statement

If you are a parent or a concerned older brother or sister, you may want to read my two articles so that you are educated about the situation. Make your own decisions, based on your research, about what level of YouTube access you want to provide to your children.

Labels: children, parents, porn, sex, teen, Video, young, YouTube

posted by KennyCrane at 8/12/2009 04:09:00 PM 0 Comments