Thousands of children barely old enough to read are already online.
Virtual networking environments aimed at young kids have blossomed into serious businesses, earning millions for their grown-up creators.
In August, none other than The Walt Disney Co. paid $350 million for Canada-based Club Penguin, with a promise of $350 million more if it meets its traffic targets.
Club Penguin claims to have 10 million users, of whom 700,000 have managed to persuade their parents to pay subscriptions of a few dollars a month so they can use virtual money to buy clothes for their penguins and furniture to decorate their igloos.
There are safeguards, appropriate for young children, but these kids seem to have been born with a mouse in their hands.
Club Penguin's biggest rival, Webkinz (Graphic source: Leader Talk.org), 
turned a formerly family-owned Canadian company that makes stuffed animals, into a high-tech media firm.
Webkinz has not released sales figures but once word of their shipments of stuffed animals were released parents flooded the stores resulting in sold out signs all over.
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