Thursday, August 19, 2010

Roblox Gets It Right

I wrote a post earlier this week about the site roblox.com and how they were carrying ads for a St. Louis casino.  That wouldn't be an issue, except Roblox is a site aimed at 8-18 year old kids, including my three sons. 
I have to say that I am completely blown away by the response from Roblox to this unfortunate situation.  I had a very frank and meaningful chat with David Baszucki, the Founder and CEO or Roblox, and he was every bit as bothered by this situation as I was, perhaps even more.  Roblox is a site that takes its commitment to child safety and obeying the myriad of laws that govern web activities by children, and Mr. Baszucki's response to me, and his action of taking all display ads served by outside networks off of his website was incredibly impressive.
I also got a reply from Roxanne Kinkade from Ameristar Casinos, and they quickly took steps to make sure the ads were no longer appearing on this kid-targeted site. 
Its somewhat long and boring to explain how some ads get  on websites, but it involves third party providers of advertising, and it seems that some third party ad network was responsible for the casino ads appearing on Roblox.  I know that Roblox has gone far beyond the call of duty to make sure something like this doesn't happen again, and I commend them for their actions. 
Let's face it, there are a lot of scumbags doing business on the Interwebz.  However, I stand corrected and can now say with complete certainty that Roblox is not one of them.  Kudos to them for doing the right thing and doing it quickly.  My youngest son, who was playing on Roblox when this incident happened, is back on the site, and with my blessing. 
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