Title: Read me - Who makes the rules?
Course: Cybersafety

Who is responsible for safety?
Before you start this course you should know one thing. YOU are the person responsible for your safety. Schools, teachers and parents will try to keep you safe but they can't be everywhere all the time. Your own common sense is your best resource for staying safe.

A word about rules...
Henry David Thoreau said, "That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves."
(Some say that Thomas Jefferson said this but most scholars now agree it was Thoreau.)

If you are smart, use common sense and have your own cybersafety rules, then other people don't have to make rules for you. In this case, freedom means taking responsibility for your own safety. The other extreme is to be careless and then others will have to be responsible for you. They will create lots of rules and you will lose your freedom.

Example...
Jack uses a school computer during lunch recess to access eBay.com and buys an iPod from a seller with a rating of 75%. He pays with cash through the mail. Jack never gets the iPod. His parents blame the school and the school turns off all access to eBay by blocking it in the web filters.

Discuss the result... (Discuss these questions in the course forum.)
Who was to blame for what happened?
Was the response of the school the best response?
Was the response of the parents fair?

Henry David Thoreau said, "That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves."

How does Thoreau's statement apply to you and your use of computers and the Internet?