Today, things are different. Our family albums live in the cloud, and pieces of them flow freely across social media. Ordinary photos have become posts, memories have become content, and our children, whether intentionally or not, have become the protagonists of stories watched by thousands of strangers.
At what point did we start trading our children’s digital footprints for likes, reach, and in some cases, even commercial partnerships? And how are we supposed to make sense of it all?
When the dream job is being on a screen
While many of us dreamed of becoming garbage collectors, veterinarians, or astronauts, today’s children see the world differently. According to research from the Faculty of Social Sciences at Charles University, as well as other Czech and international studies, more than half of children in primary school want to work in media or become YouTubers, streamers, or influencers. They see freedom, fun, recognition, and a world where success is measured by the number of hearts beneath a video.
But the line between a child pretending to be a YouTuber in front of a mirror and becoming the face of a public profile is surprisingly thin. Entire family accounts and the phenomenon of so-called kidfluencers have emerged. Parents document first steps, first tears, new outfits, and morning routines. Children’s time becomes working time, and their private lives become content.
There is no point in pointing fingers or judging anyone. Most parents don’t share their children’s lives out of bad intentions. They do it out of pride, joy, or simply because the boundaries of the digital world have shifted so quickly that we hardly noticed what we were leaving behind along the way.
A topic that resonates: from Influcon to heated debates
The fragility of this boundary has become impossible to ignore. The conversation is growing louder. At Influcon, the topic was addressed by Zuzana Holá, Head of Communications at Vodafone and Director of the Vodafone Foundation. She spoke about the importance of opening discussions around sharenting, the excessive sharing of children’s lives online, without moralising, but with an emphasis on prevention and empathy.
At the same time, an awareness campaign is running for the RODIcheck project, which encourages parents to look at the photos they share not through the eyes of a proud parent, but through the eyes of the child and the risks we often fail to see.
The reactions beneath posts from influencers supporting the campaign have shown just how sensitive and complex this issue really is. Comment sections quickly turn into debates about where the line lies between an innocent photo and exploitation, whether a child can be identified by their hair or voice alone, or whether we even need an app to tell us what is right.
One thing becomes clear from these discussions. We’re all navigating unfamiliar territory. There is no universal rulebook, and everyone’s comfort level is different.
The right to a blank page
What we, as adults, see as a sweet memory of spilled soup, a supermarket tantrum, or a holiday photo in swimwear may feel like a serious invasion of privacy to that same child a few years later. Worse still, those moments do not disappear. They remain online, ready to become material for future bullying or misuse through AI technologies.
When we were growing up, we had the privilege of starting with a blank slate. We could decide for ourselves what identity we wanted to build as adults, even if most of us never realised how valuable that was. Today’s children are slowly losing that privilege. Their digital identities begin to take shape long before they learn to walk or speak.
It’s not about fear, it’s about pausing.
The central message behind this discussion, and behind the campaign itself, is not to make parents feel guilty or pressure them into deleting every family photo from their phones.
It’s simply about taking a moment to think before pressing “Post.”
Ask yourself whether you would share the same photo if it showed an adult in a similar situation. Or whether your child might feel embarrassed by that image when they are thirteen or fifteen. Most importantly, ask whether this moment really belongs on the internet or whether it is something better kept around the family table.
Children don’t need us to build them an audience or chase followers on their behalf. They need us to be the trusted guardians of their stories until they are old enough to start writing those stories themselves.
