Hi, I'm Chris. I run The Story Thus Far, a site for World of Warcraft players to set up World of Warcraft-specific blogs. (My guess is that you're coming here from the main page and already knew that, but I've said it again just in case.) You're here because you're wondering whether it's safe for your child to set up a blog here.

A bit about myself to start us off: I'm 32, and I live in Indiana. I live with my wife, my 11-year-old son , and lots of pets. Until late 2008, my son lived almost exclusively with his mother in California, so I've only had custody for about a year and a half. I'm sure you can see why I'm a little overprotective of him. (He does play WOW, but only with an add-on I wrote for him that prevents him from significantly communicating with other players who aren't on a list of trusted players that only I can modify. He doesn't blog about it!)

Now that you know who I am (you might want to check out my personal blog, Lost In Translation, if you want to know more about me), here's the information you really want: your kids' information is safe with me. I do keep a record of all of the registrations I get for The Story Thus Far, just in case something goes horribly wrong on the server and I have to set everything up again. But I will never, ever give their information away to anyone else. They'll never be put on someone else's mailing list, and I'll never use the information myself to shill a product. The absolute closest I'll come is using the email addresses of the people who've signed up to announce new features on The Story Thus Far, and maybe send out a community newsletter once in a while (with the addresses hidden, so the other members of the community won't get that information either).

That being said, I really can't control what TSTF bloggers put on their blogs. I check the blogs on TSTF routinely to see if they're violating the rules I set forth on the main page (no pornography, no spam, no viruses, etc.), but if your child decides to put up personal information on his blog, I can't tell whether he has your permission to do that. If you allow your child to start a blog here, I need you to be responsible for its content. I'm sorry that that's the case, but since I don't have administrative access to the blogs here (that would be a violation of the trust between me and the bloggers), I can't simply go in and redact information that might not be permissible.

If all that makes sense to you, and you'd like your child to have a blog here, please return to the main page (this page should have opened in a new window, but I put the link there just in case) and sign up for a blog in your name. That way I'll know that the person ultimately responsible for the content is over 13 years old, and I can relax a little!