News that a year-old girl, Nicole Madison Lovell , chatted with an year-old man on Kik the night before he kidnapped and murdered her, however, has added urgency to the parental quest of understanding what kids are getting up to on their phones these days. At first glance, Kik is just another free messaging app for smartphones.
You log in, you pick a user name, and you send texts, selfies, and emojis to your friends. You can play mobile games, make memes, watch videos, listen to music, and check out the funniest content on Reddit. Crucially, you can find and chat with total strangers on Kik. Two of the top five internal apps are Flirt! While the ability to match people up with strangers for a conversation is nothing new remember AOL chatrooms? That freedom seems to foster a certain breed of cyber-libertinism.
Within a day of downloading Kik, two Guardian reporters were sent unsolicited photographs of butts and breasts. Have these delivered to your inbox each week. Become a member today , login here , or have your district request a partnership to make these resources free for your community. District Admins and Principals: Request a partnership on this page to share our resources with your community.
This is great info, thanks for giving me some ideas on how to start a dialogue with my teen! Josh's presentation about social media was unbelievably fantastic. Our students learned so much about what kids should and shouldn't be doing. The fact that it is such a thoughtful process made it all worthwhile. This webinar is a very helpful eye-opener on the apps that are popular with my students.
Parents and Teachers: This app is listed in the SmartSocial. Parents and Teachers: Please note this app is listed in the SmartSocial.
Parents should participate in these apps with students to keep them safe. We believe this app is not safe for students to use without adult supervision. Knowing about social media challenges before your teen does can help you keep them safe before an incident occurs.
Teenagers are always looking for new and fun ways to connect with their friends on their smartphones. The Kik app offers one more opportunity to send individual and group chat messages with text-based messages, photos, or videos.
They will need your username if you have onethough you may not want to add them anyway. They're saying they want to contact you privately i. As for the app's actual name, Kik isn't an acronym. It doesn't mean anything in particular, though some suggest it derives from a typo. Like WhatsApp, Kik tells you the status of your messages. Whereas WhatsApp does this by displaying different ticks, Kik primarily uses letters. On iPhone and Windows Phones, a faded "D" will appear to show that Kik has sent your friend a notification.
When that "D" solidifies, they've opened Kik, but not your message. You'll need to wait for an "R". A red exclamation mark tells you there's been an error and you'll need to resend your message. And an ellipsis indicates that Kik is still trying to connect which depends entirely on your internet access. Instead, it works through bots, additional features that are there simply to drive chats.
You can see Web History by clicking on the grid icon at the bottom right of a conversation. Think of bots like automated apps already built in. You can tell which chats are bots because their profile images will always have a purple bolt underneath. They can be practical.
The Weather Channel will try to render your Weather app pointless by sending you forecasts each morning. They can be educational. Astronomy will show you stunning images from space and tell you more about the universe. Bots can help with decision making. Swelly means friends can vote to help you decide where to go on a night out or what to wear.
They can relieve boredom. But bots also have commercial value, due to big brands buying into the instant messaging service. With millions of users, it's no surprise to see celebrities like Kim Kardashian have a presence on Kik.
You might be pleased to see there's an Isaac Asimov bot, or dismayed at the number of Christian Grey chatbots. Here's what every parent will be asking. How do you know your youngsters are safe if they can chat to strangers? Kik's reputation is particularly bad because it can be used by online predators.
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