Parenting Press Issues First POD

Twenty-nine-year-old Seattle publisher Parenting Press chose print-on-demand through Amazon.com’s BookSurge for its new “Internet Safety and Your Family” (ISBN 1884734944, $9.95) for two reasons:

The company wants to be able to update the 38-page guide often, as new risks and new safeguards need to be publicized; and it wanted to test the quality of Amazon.com’s POD program.

The book is also available as a PDF at www.ParentingPress.com.

Written by Linda Carlson, who creates Parenting Press’s monthly newsletter for parents and quarterly newsletter for parenting education professionals, and writes for the Independent Book Publishers Association’s newsletter, “Internet Safety and Your Family” points out that even if your own family isn’t online, the Internet has all sorts of information that cyber criminals can use to stalk kids or parents, or to spoof, phish or bully. Almost all of this personal data is free—and it doesn’t take a computer geek to find it. The guide emphasizes that parents may inadvertently be putting their families at risk by what is posted to personal blogs and web sites, and to user groups.

The concise overview also explains how to research what is online about you and your children, how to control spam, hackers, viruses and access to risky and offensive web sites, and how to report cyber harassment. It describes virtual worlds, social networking, and how kids can be abused online.