I'm actually okay with parents letting kids communicate with strangers in games so long as it isn't unsupervised. I've known parents who'd play with their kids in MMORPGs without much issue. They might get exposed to some 'adult content', but as long as a responsible adult is around to contextualize provide guidance and stop things before they progress into something harmful it can be good.

I agree, canned responses are ideal if the play has to be unsupervised. Friend codes were frustrating though and a ton of people just posted them online where strangers could see them anyway.