On the old site, you could enter whatever you wanted into the date of birth field, as long as you were at least 13 years of age. Now, we can also *hide* our age. Due to the (historical) nature of this site, being that it was a community geared towards teens and young adults, it made sense to display ages. Users would regularly come into contact with people with huge age differences. The question is, should it be mandatory to display your age?
Yes. It's a comfort thing, for a lot of people - they're not comfortable giving that much information out on the internet. If people find that they are unable to hide their age, the likely outcome would be that they would fake it (as I often did when I was a young teen on here) or worse, not even bother reactivating/creating their account. This is purely anecdotal, but it feels to me like people are much more wary about what they put online than they were when this site was in its heyday.
Yeah, for me, I don't think age is important (although having it for admin purposes is probably useful). And it can be faked anyway so no point in making it mandatory.
The time where people broadcast their lives on Instagram, Twitter, et al rather than post a few personal details intentionally on a profile that can only be viewed by fellow members? I think, the majority of people broadcast far more personal information these days than they used to... not less.
I think people are posting more, yes, but emphasis on privacy and locking down social media visibility to everyone except your friends is much higher than it was in the past. People are paranoid about their info getting out there. On top of that, a birthday just seems much more personal than a mundane twitter or instagram feed...but maybe that's just me. One little piece of information that I get to keep to myself.
Perhaps. I always got a kick out of the ages people chose on the old site. But, don't forget, the old site had the "close age" options to restrict who could message you. Though, you could change your birthdate at will.
Personally I think its a great idea sinply because of internet security. Especially if the site will be opened up to minors again.
Would prefer to be able to hide it! It's can be a discriminatory issue, but I am indifferent towards it either way.
I feel like in society they should have to issue separate cards as people turn certain ages to confirm their identity based upon age, like when you are 19+ in Canada you receive a real Identification card that shows you are legal to partake in any adult hoe downs. Same with Seniors, This would really make everything much simpler even on Nex it would work based upon multi-levels of ages themselves that just group someone as either teenager or adult or senior citizen. And making the ID Cards so differently designed would be key.
