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I talk to a lot of kids under 10 who are already familiar with Tiktok and Twitch at a bare minimum.

Social media is a part of life, not much different than the chat rooms of decades ago. I remember using internet chat rooms as soon as we got the internet. I was around 12 and excited to learn everything I could about it.

By that point, I already knew how to build my own computers. It was in the early 90s. My dad worked in military intelligence my whole childhood, so we had early access to computers before we even had residential dial up internet available.

I always had a love affair with computers, but in the 20th century, that wasn’t the norm. People didn’t have cell phones (I certainly didn’t), and those who did certainly never accessed the internet on them. They were exclusively used to called people who beeped you on your pager (which I did have) so you don’t have to use a pay phone (which existed everywhere).

Because the internet didn’t exist like it does today, we were always told to avoid adults we don’t know in real life. But nobody ever taught us about how to avoid them online, because online wasn’t really a thing.

My parents didn’t teach me about social media – I taught them. And I learned about TikTok myself as an adult from kids too.

Have you ever been on Discord? https://typo.today/everything-you-need-to-know-about-discord/https://typo.today/everything-you-need-to-know-about-discord/

My clients who use social audio always want to build Discord server. What they don’t understand is that unlike Clubhouse (minimum age 18, average age 40) and Spotify Greenroom (minimum age 17, average age 25), Discord has a much younger demographic.

When you compare Discord Stages to Clubhouse, the content is very much the same. Rooms with talent shows, troll opinions, philosophical and theological debates, and fan community meetups. But one is adults and the other is mostly kids.

Kids figured out Discord faster because they use it for video games. They socialize in Minecraft, Roblox, and Fortnite at much younger ages than Facebook.

My nine-year-old has been on Minecraft since he was six – he played Roblox for a couple years now too by this point. Sure, we’re controlling his access, but overall, he has free reign to that and the Nintendo network.

He also watches YouTube through our accounts, although we did set up a Google account for him that we control until he’s 13. We pre-vet the creators, but you can’t control things like when his favorite Creator Markiplier suddenly switched from Minecraft to Five Nights at Freddy, which gives him nightmares.

And YouTube is a social network too.

It’s easy to say they need to wait until they’re 18 to get a Facebook account, but good luck keeping them off YouTube. People are chatting on there and creating accounts – there’s an entire YouTube Kids section, and I’m personally more worried about the stuff being sold to them on there by adults like Jake Paul or even the slime and surprise eggs sold by kids and their parents.

Social aspects are being introduced into everything, and your kid is learning about social media everywhere. You’re not saving them from anything by making them wait longer than the age limits implemented by the platforms themselves.

And honestly, I’d let them on earlier if they had a reason to be there. Kids are smart, and mine knows who to stay away from. I provide guidance, but overall he’s in charge of what he wants to do with his free time. 

You may not want your kids using tiktok or instagram, but they’re still being exposed to social media. They’re not oblivious to it, and there’s a good chance they’re hanging out in online forums you didn’t even know existed