From TikTok for Kids (Zigazoo) to Instagram For Teens

How safe is social media for our kids? On this episode of Mindful Bytes, we explore the app Zigazoo, often dubbed "TikTok for kids." Discover how Zigazoo aims to provide a safer online environment for children aged eight and up with features like parental controls, human-reviewed content, and educational challenges. The panel weigh the pros and cons of this platform, from fostering creativity to concerns about the long-term feasibility of human content review. Join us as Shawna and the panel dissect the innovative aspects and potential pitfalls of Zigazoo.

As we look beyond Zigazoo, we tackle the broader issue of child safety on social media platforms. Can you trust parent reviews, and do they align with your values? We discuss the impact of exposing young children to potentially inappropriate content, and the implications of platforms lowering age limits. The conversation highlights the developmental effects of early social media exposure, emphasizing the need for parents to set boundaries and think critically about the role of social media in their children's lives.

Lastly, we focus on Instagram’s new safety measures for teens and the complexities of social media. Reflecting on platforms like Lego Life, we examine the impact of social validation on young minds and how Instagram's teen accounts aim to create safer experiences. Despite these protections, doubts linger about the efficacy of tech companies in safeguarding teens from harmful beauty and fashion standards. We wrap up the episode by discussing the effectiveness of supervision and calling for listener feedback on these vital issues. Don't miss this compelling discussion on the future of social media for children and teens.

Chapters

• 0:00 Exploring Zigazoo
• 13:45 Child Safety in Online Platforms
• 17:49 Instagram Teen Safety Measures
• 30:12 Youth Online Safety Measures

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hey everybody, welcome back to the Mindful Bytes podcast.

Speaker 2: 0:02

Today we're going to talk about TikTok for kids the new teen Instagram account.

Speaker 1: 0:08

And with that, let's go ahead and dive on in. Hey everybody, thanks for tuning in to the Mindful Bytes podcast. Don't forget, you can check out the show notes and use the chapter markers to skip around to topics that you really want to hear about. Let's go ahead and introduce the panel.

Speaker 2: 0:24

I'm Olivia your social media savvy millennial.

Speaker 3: 0:28

I'm Ashton, your Gen Z tech enthusiast.

Speaker 1: 0:30

I'm Brian, your Gen X business leader, slash digital guy.

Speaker 4: 0:34

And I'm Shauna, your Xenial digital dinosaur.

Speaker 1: 0:37

Shauna, tell us about your topic today. What do you want to talk about? You said TikTok. Is it right? And is it TikTok and kids?

Speaker 4: 0:44

to talk about was you said TikTok. Is it right? And is it TikTok and kids? Okay, that's what I said TikTok for kids, because that is what this app is being called by a lot of different media outlets. It's been around for several years, but I personally just started hearing about it on ads for my podcast, so it's called Zigazoo, I think it's called-.

Speaker 1: 1:03

Zigazoo, zigazoo, I think it's called Zigazoo.

Speaker 4: 1:05

Zigazoo yeah, it's called Zigazoo Kids is what the app is called, and they're branding it as TikTok for kids and a safe social media outlet for kids to use. It's branded as being for ages eight and up, but I don't think they actually restrict any ages. Just, uh, anybody who's under 18 has to have their parents permission. So they have this whole uh kind of process where the parents have to verify that they're an adult through an email situation, and then it allows a kid to make their profile. And there are. They talk a lot in their ads about safety, security, no bullying, things like that. So you know, at first glance I thought, wow, this sounds really, you know, interesting and really a good option, possibly. So the first thing I want to do is tell you some of the pros. Then I want to ask you know, interesting and really a good option, possibly. So the first thing I want to do is tell you some of the pros. Then I want to ask you guys if you see any red flags or any things to be concerned about, and then talk about the cons. So here are the pros, and so I did a lot of research through third party websites to find out a lot of this information. I had heard the ads so much on my podcast that I could have recited it for you, and so I heard a lot of how they're marketing it, which helped me start to see some of the red flags myself. But okay, here we go. Pros more parental control. I already told you about the process of how they have to create an account.

Speaker 4: 2:53

This, I think, is a great thing. Every video it's mostly video based is reviewed by a human to look for any kind of bullying, any kind of negative speech, any kind of like a child. If they say any of their personal information, the video is not approved. So that's a good thing. And I want to say like I think they're coming from a good place. This app is developed by parents and teachers, um, to take out all of the uh negative things about social media for kids and to increase all of the positive things, so I think that's a good mission. It's highly educational in nature as far as they have challenges and things, and a lot of times they are based around doing an experiment or going to learn about something or going to read something. Then the kids do a video talking about that or showing their experiment. So that's where they're trying to increase.

Speaker 4: 3:45

The positive things about social media for kids is they want to get them active, become creators and not just consumers. There is no text commenting, so I think this is really smart. You know, we've all heard about how damaging negative comments can be to kids bullying, criticism, things like that, especially from strangers who have no reason to be gentle in their criticism. Kids can comment on each other's videos with stickers or emojis, and they're all Zigazoo's own creations, like their stickers and their emojis. Okay, so what are some red flags you see right off the bat? Or you know what you think is good about this too? I want to hear that too. I don't want to be completely negative on these people and their app, but I just want to have a conversation about it.

Speaker 1: 4:41

I do like the idea. If we're talking about the pros, I like the idea about the challenges how they're do like the idea If we're talking about the pros. I like the idea about the challenges how they're more like educational based Cause I think Olivia, wasn't it? What was it on Snapchat? You said that the kids are like kind of like become like oh, the streaks. They don't want to lose their streak and I love that. This is kind of like the streaks on this.

Speaker 4: 5:03

What is it called?

Speaker 1: 5:03

again, zigazoo, zigazoo. Wow, I can't believe I remembered that. I can't remember a real name, a basic name, but Zigazoo, gotcha, gotcha, covered. You can call me out, but your affiliate influencer no but I like that Target demo.

Speaker 1: 5:19

I like that their challenges are educational and it's encouraging kids to do that, and I do like that. I was concerned about the commenting and stuff like that, because one thing that was a red flag to me is okay, it's great that I wrote down that schools like that, these are all going to be reviewed by a person. But I also ask inside how long will it be reviewed by a person?

Speaker 4: 5:41

Yeah, because at some point.

Speaker 1: 5:42

if it blows up, they're going to start leaning towards something, as just that's my thought they're going to lean to towards the technology to do that. My concern is this is an app that you have to be very careful of when it comes to kids app. As we know and they probably no doubt already thinking about this you have, you know, pedophiles and stuff like that. They have to be aware of it. This could be drawn, this could draw them to this app and they could set up a fake account and then approve that fake account as an adult. So it's like what things do they have in place for that? Because you don't want to open up a door where they have a door to these children of this age range. So that would be a big concern for me. So just having the custom stickers and emojis made by them could help too, that they can't just put a normal comment in there, but do they have communications behind scenes or anything like that.

Speaker 4: 6:35

So I did see that you can also comment with a video. So that does kind of open a door for bullying, I think, although maybe those comments have to be, you know, reviewed too.

Speaker 3: 6:46

that's probably what it is, I would assume they would the thing about.

Speaker 4: 6:50

So they said. I read that there, um is a feature where every so often, the child has to um post a picture of their face to prove that they're a kid and to prove that they are who they say they are. I, I think there's probably plenty of ways around that, but, um, that it's an interesting idea. I think it was probably a smart idea, yeah.

Speaker 1: 7:14

Yeah, Cause I remember there was a. There was an app I was using that, remember? Oh, actually it was somebody on Facebook that texts me. They sent me a private message and you guys have probably all got them. You're like, this person is sending me a friend request and they're sending me a message in chat, but I'm already friends with them. Has anybody else experienced that before?

Speaker 4: 7:33

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 7:33

And then we're like so there's one person that did that, and Shauna, you'll probably remember. I said can you prove to me that you are who you are? And they sent a picture of their license, their license like their personal license their license, just the picture of them holding it.

Speaker 1: 7:51

And I said, oh, that's great, but just to be, I want to make sure this is a real person and this is my friend. I would like you to take that. Take that picture again with the license flipped around. So the person that was messaging me literally took the photo and they flipped it multiple times, didn't actually hold the photo, the idea, different way, they just kept flipping the picture and I was like sorry, you're not the real person, because they obviously were trying to get around it. But that is a good thought though.

Speaker 2: 8:22

Yeah, Number one. I think it's a good idea. But my red flag is why does a kid, eight years old, even need something like this? That's the one thing that I you know. When it comes to other social platforms, you have to be at least 13 to get on them. But I'm like why does the eight, nine, 10, like? There's just no need for it in my opinion. But also the same thing, that of Brian's red flag. I'm like, yes, a human is looking at them, but every human makes mistakes. And what if one video Gets through? That's detrimental to Everyone and everything. So, yeah, that's.

Speaker 3: 9:16

Those are my quick red flags that I'm I was kind of thinking along the same lines Like why even risk it With that young of an age, especially when things are so impactful, like basic principles haven't been set up and stuff, so allowing influences like that could be dangerous, brian, in the way that like it's not a great business model basically not a great business model but like a it's not a solid business to have every single video reviewed by a human. That's not viable. Once it gets bigger, the second it gets bigger. They have to hire so many people and in the end it's a free social media, isn't it? It's a free app.

Speaker 3: 10:04

Yeah, Like it's going to be so hard to keep that company in the green.

Speaker 1: 10:12

but I don't know. Well, I mean, even if it is in the green, let's say they, let's say this app blows up, there's going to be people that wants to buy that app, so it's like this app could transition to somebody else's hands too. So there's a lot of things there. But I think that you know, olivia, I think that was a really good question. You know, and I know, like you said, it was teachers and parents that were over this. Is that what you said?

Speaker 4: 10:38

The ones who started it, yeah.

Speaker 1: 10:39

The ones who started it. So I'm guessing, like I would love to talk to them, like what? What made them decide to start this? Because I'm sure they're probably seeing this, this, this age group that wants that. They don't feel part of something. So they they're looking for something. They're probably asking their parents I want to be on social media, but this is the thing.

Speaker 1: 10:56

This is the line where us, as parents, have to draw the line and say it's kind of not not putting it out there as as like Like no, we don't trust you on social media. We did this with Ashton. He didn't get on social media until he was 18 years old. As parents, it's all right for us to tell our kids no, but I think it's explaining to them why, when Ashton was wanting to be on those things, we said it's not that we don't trust you on there, it's just that there's a whole community and things that happen on there that you don't need to be part of, because it's not good for you, it's not healthy and like there's other things that could be life given to him.

Speaker 4: 11:33

I did read about that and that was one of the reasons why they started. It is because kids are wanting to be on social media at a younger and younger age and they wanted them to at least have a safe place to do it. This was one of my big red flags is that in the ad the mom says like now I feel fine letting my kids run loose on Zigazoo and, but then in other places I was reading that it's actually designed to be used with your parent right there with you, and that just seems so unrealistic to me that a parent's actually going to do that, because there's so many things you know that you could do with your kids. Do you really want to sit right next to them as they use a social media app and are you actually even going to be paying attention to what they're doing? That seems unrealistic to me.

Speaker 1: 12:22

I think that's a great. A great thing to point out, shauna, is because if we're using it as it's not good, if we're using it as a way to escape our kids and it's also not good for we know what it's like to be sitting in a room with friends that have their phones and they're looking at their phones. This is a precious time of your kids. We know that Ashton is 20. He's like we always talk about it all the time, like it goes faster than what you think. So if parents are listening and they're thinking about this, do you really want them in there to be engaged on that, on that device, all the time, when your time with them is so short, so short?

Speaker 4: 12:58

And so another thing is that even though you know kids can join you know, possibly younger than eight, but definitely by eight their data is still treated as if they're over 13, which is all very confusing to me, but that has to do with the child. It's called COPPA. It's like something about children's privacy protection. That's what the act is, and so because of that act, they have to have certain protections in place for kids to be able to use it under 13, because that's where that act places the line. If you're under 13, there have to be additional protections in place, but yet the app still treats your data as if you're 13 or up, no matter how. So that's all confusing to me.

Speaker 4: 13:45

Um, I, I was starting to read through reviews. Um, they were supposed to be parent reviews, so a lot of them did sound pretty trustworthy. Um was talking about how, even though the videos are approved by a person, like not every person has the same values, so that doesn't automatically make everything safe. There were some videos that are kind of like I mean, I don't want to go real far into this, but like videos where children are like trying to teach other children about like furry culture, so like I think a lot of people would agree that that's not really a safe thing for an eight year old to be watching.

Speaker 1: 14:25

I think that is an interesting thought. I would love to hear what other people that's listening to the podcast have to say about it, because I mean, if you have young children, what are your thoughts about them being on a platform, even a platform that's like this, that we know, like these platforms probably all start off with the mindset of this is safe for kids. But this starts changing over and over and I think that it's kind of like OK, let's just really look at it from a business perspective too. Is that Even stuff like in the metaverse, which was 13 above, dropped to 11.? Now they're dropping it to 10. They're always looking at how can we expand?

Speaker 4: 15:02

our marketing.

Speaker 1: 15:02

How can we expand our target audience? I think we talked about it recently, about how we're in the last generations that have experienced life without digital and generations that are coming up that have only experienced connection through digital, generations that are coming up that have nothing, have only experienced connection through digital. So, with that mindset, how do you expand your platform and grow your audience unless you start going younger.

Speaker 4: 15:25

The last thing I want to say about it and it's kind of going back to what you guys were saying about what is the need that's what I think is probably the biggest danger of the whole thing is that you're setting up a pattern at such a young age of like needing the validation of social media, of like spending so much time just producing content for someone else to consume, um, and I think that can be done responsibly as the child is older, but yeah, it's just such a young age to start making those patterns. You know those thought patterns and so I think that's like you know you're just ushering them in to the adult social media and they're going to want to do that, you know, at a younger age too, because they're they've already been doing this, like, how long is a kid really going to be interested in a kid's social media? You know what?

Speaker 1: 16:18

I mean so, yeah, and I think it's concerning. It's also like you think about, like how much social media and what people are saying on social media can influence us as adults. Now put that in a child's mind, right, it's so different.

Speaker 4: 16:31

one thing I try to tell parents is like, keep the door shut for as long as you possibly can, because once you open, open it it's so hard to take back, like that's true with a lot of things you know. That's true with um video games. That's true with you know everything really like. Whatever you allow your kid to do, you almost can never take it back.

Speaker 1: 16:52

And this is why you're not against it. This is why you're not the favorite co-host to the kids on this podcast.

Speaker 4: 16:59

I know, I know, and that's all right.

Speaker 1: 17:01

I should be because I know, I know exactly.

Speaker 4: 17:05

Literally, but yeah, so it's just. It's something I try to think about is, you know, are there other things you want to be building in your children at these young ages, you know, to set them up well as adults, and does this really fit into your plan for them? And maybe it does. Maybe you're trying to, you know, grow a TikTok influencer.

Speaker 3: 17:27

Something that that kind of just reminded me of is. I think it also has to do with subject, and I kind of remember this was a really long time ago. This was like at least a long time ago. For me this would have been like nine years ago, I think, but I had a Lego. Social media.

Speaker 3: 17:48

And it was. I think it was called Lego life and I think it also like kind of depends on the subject. If you have something like Lego life where it's like I don't remember like if anything was even moderated on there, I'd have no memory of that. But I never remember having a negative interaction on there. I don't remember if it was because there wasn't comments. I just remember like everybody was always publishing photos of their little figures, their little Lego figures, like out on adventures. You may remember like I had a Star Wars set and I would go and I would have them like on an adventure, like they would walk through all this snow and like over our Creek and like all kinds of really interesting things.

Speaker 4: 18:30

But I remember.

Speaker 3: 18:31

I would get like hundreds of likes. I think a few of them were in the thousands, and so there definitely were people on there and I remember seeing all kinds of posts on there and like stop motion movies. I never remember a comment. So maybe it also like, if you are introducing your child that young, maybe it's a social media like that where it's more geared towards a certain subject, not open, kind of like youtube kids or um, zigazoo, is that what it was called? Yeah, uh, nothing like that, where it's like real niched down, because I don't even remember ever seeing a child's face on there. I've only I only remember the lego minifigures I think that's a good thought there.

Speaker 1: 19:19

Ashton, too, I would even challenge that too, to be thinking about like, if something like that like we still have to be careful of that like button, because now we're teaching kids at such a young age to kind of like be judging everything they do by what those likes, those likes, so maybe it's like not even having a like button, you know what I mean. Like, those things can trigger us those addictions, but even at a young age, all right. So let's go ahead and transition over to olivia olivia. Okay. So we've been ripping apart social media for kids, so let's go ahead and talk about instagram for teens. Let's take it up a level well, we can all agree.

Speaker 2: 19:54

Apparently, social media is the devil. No, um.

Speaker 1: 20:00

The dinosaur said so.

Speaker 2: 20:01

The dinosaur said so um, okay, so adam nasseri, the head of instagram, my best friend, I'm always listening to are you guys like, are you guys dating or something Cause you're? Always talking about I am married. He is married with children. Um, we're just besties, um, just besties.

Speaker 1: 20:22

So, uh, don't worry about it, nate, You're good.

Speaker 2: 20:27

Well, um, okay.

Speaker 1: 20:31

It's another podcast now.

Speaker 2: 20:33

Yeah, yeah, adam Aseri came on his Instagram page and announced that they are now introducing Instagram teen accounts, and what these do, he said, is they automatically place teens in built in protections and reassure parents that teens are having safe experiences.

Speaker 2: 20:58

So if currently any of your teens have just a normal Instagram account, right now they're automatically moving all teens over to these teen accounts that have these built-in protections, and so some of the protections are teen accounts will limit who can contact the teens and the content that they see. So they are going to be moderating what is being put out in the feed and they're also helping to ensure how much time the teen is actually spending on the platform. So any teens under 16 will need a parent's permission to change any of the built-in protections if they want to be like, less strict where they're like okay, you're 17., you can manage your own time, or whatever. Um, anyone under 16 can't change any of the built-in protections. Um, so they said they're doing this to help parents feel more confident, um, and things like that. So there are more like little details I'll give, but I wanted to hear your guys' thoughts first.

Speaker 1: 22:24

I'm here. I'm seeing red flags again. I'm just, I'm sorry about this, but I'm thinking red.

Speaker 1: 22:29

This is like my. My day is red. It's, everything's red. But first off, I mean some of the things gosh, it's just we. But first off, I mean some of the things gosh, it's just we. We are living in this time where there's I don't know. It's like we're trusting these, these tech companies, like how much they want to rest assured and let us rest assured that this is a safer environment. They're going to be moderating, they're going to be taking these things. But the question is that we just talked about earlier was well, we don't really know who the person is that's making those decisions. We don't know where their ethics stands, we don't know what their beliefs are. So it's like, if we can customize those things, can we choose some of the things? I mean we're letting kids make decisions that even today, kids their minds Shauna will tell Shauna, you've taught me that kids' minds are so underdeveloped. Like do we want to trust these platforms to make those decisions on what is okay and what is and is not okay for our kids to see?

Speaker 1: 23:30

I guess, that's kind of a struggle with that.

Speaker 4: 23:33

Honestly, too, for teenagers, I think some of the most dangerous things that they're consuming are things that make them feel like they're less than other people. So fashion, beauty, things like that there's nothing inherently wrong with those things, but that's what teenagers look at and they're like oh gosh, I'm never going to look like that, I can never afford to dress like. That's what teenagers look at and they're like oh gosh, I'm never going to look like that, I can never afford to dress like that, I can never, whatever. And that's not going to be moderated out because it's not bad. It's just not good for you to be consuming all the time and comparing yourself, and there's no boundary that anybody can set that's going to change a teenage boy or girl from thinking that way.

Speaker 1: 24:17

I would love to see Adam and them reach out to your buddy, adam, adam and them.

Speaker 4: 24:22

Is that what you said?

Speaker 1: 24:23

Yeah, adam and them, adam and them. It's a new sitcom, adam and them. I would love for them to put out a list of the things that they are going to moderate. What are the things that they're looking for, like what? What hits those marks, what is considered okay and what's considered not okay?

Speaker 2: 24:41

Those are like both. Yeah, really, really great points. A list would be fantastic. So they said that they're going to have sensitive content restrictions, so teens will automatically be placed into the most restricted setting of our sensitive content control. So this limits.

Speaker 2: 25:04

They're going to not show content of people fighting. It does say that they're going to limit content or they're not going to show any content that promotes cosmetic procedures or different things like that. So your Explore and Reels pages are going to look a lot different than any teens would look. They're also going to have messaging restrictions, so you can only be messaged by people that you follow and they follow you back. So there has to be that mutual connection and teens can only be tagged or mentioned by people that they follow. So they're also automatically turning on the most restrictive version of their anti-bullying features, so hidden words, so that offensive words and phrases will be filtered out even of the DMs, like they're filtering those out of DMs and keeping an eye on those. And then teens will get a notification after they've been on for 60 minutes each day, telling them to get out of the app. And then the last one is sleep mode is going to be turned on at between 10 pm and 7 am, which will automatically mute any notifications that they get during that.

Speaker 4: 26:40

Olivia, let me ask you a question. It's been a long time since I've set up an Instagram account, but do you have to prove your age on there, or do you just choose your birthday or whatever?

Speaker 2: 26:49

Yeah, you just choose your birthday, so there's an easy way to just make a different account with a different age.

Speaker 4: 26:57

Yeah, and I mean, I don't know if you I'm sure you've heard of this, olivia, but it was news to me and I think Ashton knows about it too. But OK, let's ask Brian. Brian, what is a finsta?

Speaker 1: 27:12

It's a fence, duh.

Speaker 2: 27:22

Oh Shauna, yeah, OK, it's offense, duh. Oh shauna, yeah, okay. So I just came across.

Speaker 4: 27:23

This was I right.

Speaker 2: 27:24

Teens lie about their age and that's why we're requiring them to verify their age. How so they're coming up with a new verification system to verify the age.

Speaker 1: 27:39

I was going to say the biggest way is to have the adults have to scan. I mean, if you get verified you have to take a picture of your actual ID. But kids at that age I don't know, sorry. Well, I guess they would have an ID. But yeah, go ahead, shauna.

Speaker 4: 27:52

If I learned anything from raising a teenager, it's that they will find a way around whatever block you put in the way.

Speaker 4: 28:00

And they're so much faster at learning about new technologies and things like that. They think of things. Ashton has thought of things that I never even knew, never even thought of thinking about. So it's just like I appreciate that they're trying, though I have a feeling that it's probably more so for the optics of it. Like, like, look, we, we want to, you know, create a safe place. Like they know everyone's worried about this, so they're like good on them for doing something. But at the end of the day, I don't think any of those are really going to make a huge difference. Teenagers are going to get where they want to get.

Speaker 3: 28:38

They need a group of teenagers to start combating teenagers. They need people just as fast as them and they need people with good programming skills.

Speaker 1: 28:46

I think that was a good point that you're sharing there, sean always, because I think we have to give them credit. They are trying to do something, but I think even as parents, we have to say we can't trust it 100%. Again, we don't know the people behind that's running all this, but I would love to see if they can turn on features like sleep modes, where the phones automatically do that. Then can they figure out a way where the parents can set that sleep mode?

Speaker 2: 29:10

Well, funny, you say that this is my last point. They are also adding a supervision feature. So what this includes is a parent actually gets insight into the teen's account to see who they're chatting with, the types of messages that they're sending in the past seven days. They also have the ability to set total daily time limits for their kids usage. So if they only want their kid on there 15 minutes a day, they can set that up, and they can also block teens from using Instagram for specific time periods. So they can also block teens from using Instagram for a specific time period. So they can block their account from 10 pm to 7 pm, from 7 pm to 7 am, and they can also see the topics that your teen is looking at and making sure that they're age appropriate.

Speaker 1: 30:12

So supervision I'm a fan of that. Sounds good. 're age appropriate. So Supervision I'm a fan of that. Sounds good, I like that.

Speaker 2: 30:17

Yeah. So I mean I agree with Shauna and I unfortunately would say this to my bestie Adam's face. I think it's more of an optic thing versus like, is this actually going to help with anything?

Speaker 1: 30:34

I think it's good. I think it's good to be putting something out there, adjusting it, but, like you said, shauna, kids figure out ways around it. I mean awesome. Well, hey, that's all we have for today. This is some really good conversations. Again, we want to hear your guys' thoughts, so make sure you click that text link in the show notes. We'd love to hear your thoughts on each one of these topics. All right, if you enjoyed this episode, click, follow and don't forget to leave us a review.