This weekend I spent time thinking about Milk Media and the Milk Rocks! campaign in schools. (See previous posts “The Brawl Begins” when Milk Media meets my son and Troublemakers and Peacemakers for background information.) According to the representative I talked with, the video games and movie previews available on the Milk Rocks! website are posted through automatic feed. That is why the violent content gets through (such as the shoot-em-up Commando game I found). The company is responsive to parents, they say, which is why the violent content I found has been taken down.
But whose responsibility is it to monitor the content of a website marketed to K-12 children in schools across the country? Contests such as the Bakugan/Nintendo Wii give-away grab a lot of kids’ attention. That is what MilkMedia wants – kids’ attention. But when you have that attention – especially when you’ve gotten it at school – you have a deep responsibility to make sure your message is appropriate. Young children can not fully grasp the marketing techniques at hand. If the message is received at school, in their young eyes the school is endorsing the message. So when they get home and go to the website, the messages they see are, in effect, endorsed by the school.
At this point, Milk Media is committed to making milk cool for kids, as a way to combat the obesity epidemic in our country. Lowfat milk is healthier than the sugary drinks that are out there. I get that. But what price do we have to pay?
In my opinion, a step in the right direction, would be to vary the milk carton “promotions” depending on the school population, so that a K-6 school, such as my son’s school, wouldn’t have the promotions aimed at the 13-18 year-olds. That seems reasonable. And more responsible.
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