The various scandals around social networking abuses have garnered lots of press in the past couple of years. Predators, bullying, slander, and harassment of all kinds on sites such as MySpace and Facebook are increasingly the subjects of horror stories and play into a renewed wave of fear about the dangers online. However, once the fear of safety is removed, social networking sites can open up broad and exciting new worlds of learning for both educators and students. Innovative teachers are recognizing the potential of tools such as MySpace and Facebook to bridge cultural gaps and create authentic 21st-century learning environments. In this article, the author discusses how educators could maximize the learning power of these participatory websites while ensuring students are protected and behave responsibly.