To use or not to use parental monitoring software?

[SueWayang]

Hello, everyone!

My name is Sue, I'm a mother of 13 years old boy.
Recently I've caught my son, watching X-rated web-site…
We've discussed it with my husband, he wanna use parental control software. Actually I've always thought, that it's not a solution of the problem, but we've finally decided to try some…anyway we can always reinstall it..

So I've got 2 questions for you:

What do you think about parental control software (to use/not to use, may be some one can share his experience)

Which software to choose? We've checked some and stopped on 2: Care4teen (www.care4teen.com/) and NetNanny (www.netnanny.com/). NetNanny has many good reviews, but what I like about Care4teen is that parents build base of bad resources (everyone can add some resource to a black list), so it seemed to have a good filter. Or may be you can recommend smth else?

I am also struggling with this issue.

On the PC we have Family Safety, but unfortunately that doesn't work with iPhone and iPad. So ideally want a solution that works across all platforms (I don't mind paying), but which has the flexibility to allow access to materials for different users (young children, teens and adults in the household).

OpenDNS is mentioned above as are other solutions. Google searches for any product comes up with YouTube videos showing children how to bypass any parent controls set by the parents. (Eg

Now, I could ban YouTube of course, but that is not realistic.

Seems a nightmare. I would have thought that it is technically possible to stop circumvention by most children (if perhaps not the geekiest of the geeky) by some password protection.

Any solutions which do that which work on Apple as well as PC (and indeed games consoles such as Xbox).

Help?

I'm a third year student conducting psychological research on how parents protect their kids online and in real life. Part of the questionnaire focuses on protection software so I think it would be very valuable for you to take part. The link is below. Thanks.

www.surveygizmo.com/s3/2012173/Protecting-Children-Online-and-Real-Life-A-Parents-Perspective

I don't understand how this can be a top priority when raising children in the modern world. I was born in 98 and I grew up with no internet restrictions or xbox live restrictions; I can confirm that I'm not a psychopath and I plan to lead an exceptionally normal life. Yes obviously children are likely to come into contact with pornography with increased use of the Internet, however it's pathetic to keep them locked away in your perfect little world. Like it or not they are going to see it at some point and it isn't going to change them one bit. Focus on raising your children to be independent and capable adults with a realistic view of the world rather than keeping them locked away. Kids that have oppressive parents usually go absolutely crazy at the first chance of freedom. I've seen girls turn into total sluts and boys developing drug habits because they spent half their teenage years being kept in the dark by their "concerned" parents. Don't make the Internet a taboo for your kids, talk to them and explain why it is the way it is. Please people enough of this senseless spying on your children. Take up a new hobbie or something