>.> As of Saturday there isn’t any chatting anymore. Lol. I might have it wrong but apparently they have turned off ALL chatting for now while they try desperately to fix things – so it’s at least a good sign that they’re serious.

Of course, now people spam ‘friend’ at you instead but hey… At least that’s not all that… graphic?

Oh and this was even though I said I was born on 1st January 1900.

(okay, kindergarteners if we’re going to be precise, but I just like the word ‘toddler’, it has a nice ‘hobbity’ sound)

Add to this what Pardoz said, and we both get the problem with social media and one with current MMO’s (because of lack of imagination, Devs have to spell out ‘what to do’ instead of players making their own game with the tools given by Devs)

I do always wonder where these parents are and what kind of relationship they have with these kids. It’s not that parents can watch every breath the kid takes. But I hope my children (when they’re much older) will have the presence of mind, the trust, the desire to at least talk about what’s going on with them. Kids do things in secret, that’s to be expected. I definitely did. But it’s the nature of the secrets that one hopes their kids are able to discern. To know when they are in a bad spot and to talk to *someone* about help.

This makes me nervous for my little ones and they oldest is only 3.

The other factor is going ot be demographics. Habbo is teenagers hanging out with teenagers (plus potntially unsavoury characters who pretend to be teenagers) so they tend to act like a mob of teenagers. My experience in MMOs, and especially in decent guilds, is that most of the players are adults and the handful of teenage players find themselves trying to conform to that peer group instead, which (usually) results in more mature behaviour.

As for Second Life and its reputation as a den of unbridled online debauchery – most of it actually isn’t, as far as I can tell. It’s just that some rather specialised communities have come together in Second Life and they tend to get the most attention.

It’s possible to be a victim of cyber bullying on social networking sites without ever visiting those sites. If something is posted about your child on Facebook and all their classmates can see it, then that’s going to affect your child even if they don’t use Facebook at all.

As an educator it always infuriates me when parents are more than happy to let their kids occupy themselves online for hours, and then go all hysteric because some game company did not erase all types of possible threat to their child. which is not humanly possible, as you pointed out too. hello parents: Habbo is not the guardian of your child; you are. they can establish some ground rules and controls, but that does not mean the internet is 100% safe. ever.

Perhaps it could be the fact that the reporter posed as a 11 year old girl. It’s really classic troll bait which will incite other players into such sexual harassment. Such a response is actually quite common on 4chan.

Or it might be like what Scopique says as well, just bored players with nothing better to do than to harass another player.