Petimo : Safe social networking robot for children

Nowadays Social networks are becoming the latest trend for online communication especially among young children and helps for making new friends while keeping old friends in close contact. With the expansion of digital media, the attraction of teenagers and younger children to social networks and other activities in the cyberworld, is growing. However, cyberspace is becoming an unsafe and more exploited environment, especially for children. This results in conflicting messages between parents and children, social isolation, and communication with unknown online people with unverified identities. Psychologists have theorized about the meaning of online relationships during adolescence, and have warned about the dangers of sexually exploitative online relationships. To protect children from the potential risks in social networks and the virtual world we have developed 'Petimo", an interactive robotic toy which helps to make a safely connected social networking environment. It adds a new form of security to social computing through parental authentication, providing extra safety in making friends by physically touching each others robot which is a much preferred form especially by children and natural means of making friends. The concept of Petimo could be extended to any social network thus making it child-safe. As a proof-of-concept a 3D virtual world which is called "Petimo World" is developed and includes all of the realizable basic features of traditional online social networks. Petimo World stands out from all other virtual worlds with its interesting and sophisticated interactions such as the visualization of a friends' relationships through spatial distribution in the 3D space to clearly understand the closeness of the friendship, personalized avatars and sending of special gifts /emoticons by physically squeezing the Petimo. © 2010 by Nova Science Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved.