New Media for Children & Young Adults, 2010-11

Although Tapscott’s use of Bob Dylan lyrics to try to explain to Baby Boomer’s that they don’t get the “Net Generation” was amusingly ironic, and despite the fact that his positive outlook was a far cry from the angsty “kids these days are so lazy and self centered” articles crop up in the NYTimes and other old-media standards from time to time, I found it very difficult to relate to an article that refers to me as “they.”

Perhaps my negative gut-reaction pegs me into the very stereotype I’m resisting (and yes, the TV is on mute, MP3s are blasting and I have 12 tabs and 10 programs open across four virtual desktops), but I’d like to think that any member of a specific demographic is inclined to be skeptical of the generalizations of an outsider. I appreciate that Tapscott is painting my generation in a better light to his peers than many others are inclined to see, but the article strikes me as inescapably ‘by Boomers for Boomers.’ As such he spends a lot of time explaining behaviors that I live daily, and his generalizations of ‘our’ motivations come across as incomplete.

For example, he writes that “a twentysomething in the workforce wants the new BlackBerry, Palm or iPhone not because the old one is no longer cool, but because the new one does so much more.” Well, yes and no; it’s more complicated than that. Because it “does so much more,” the new phone is inherently more desirable than the old one, and therefore the old one is ‘no longer (as) cool.’ Some people will want it for the features, some people will want it to brag to their friends. It wouldn’t surprise me if these motivational differences correlated more closely with socioeconomic demographics or even personality types than generations.

That said, I found his breakdown of generational age groups by geographic location to be quite interesting, particularly in the context of North America as the primary cultural exporter. It will be interesting to see if this shifts to more accurately represent global populations as the traditional mediums of cultural transfer continue to change.

I agree with Jillian that Tapscott is VERY pro Net Generation.  It’s neat to read; I think his unabashed love of the Net Generation is something that likely needs to be said.  And he’s not the only one saying it.  What I find so fascinating about Tapscott’s argument is how he seems to believe that companies need to adapt to their employees.  This is a theme that came up time and time again at my workplace; I sat through multiple training sessions on the recruitment and retention of the Y Generation.  There were a few key factors found in all of them.  1) Gen Y is me-centred and needs to feel that everything they do has a reason.  2) Gen Y has never really experienced failure (I don’t know how true this is outside of Ontario, but in the ON school system, no child can fail a grade).  On top of not failing, they should not fail.  3) Gen Y is all about teamwork and working collaboratively.  4) Gen Y needs to be able to modify their tasks and job as they see fit, or they will leave and go somewhere else.   All of this was tied into the digital world that they lived in- another thing that “a Gen Y must have in their job”.   All this to say that the focus of these workshops was to get companies to adapt their jobs to the people.  This must be a fundamental shift in thinking; up until now it seems that the idea of the workforce is that you enter it and adapt to it, not it to you.  In some ways, this is great, but it also has some major downfalls.  For example, what if your company/position can’t shift?  What if the idea of flexibility or teamwork isn’t built in?  And aren’t we painting an entire generation with one brush?  I like also what Jillian pointed out, procrastination and lollygagging are central to the workday Tapscott demonstrates.  I wouldn’t want to see a doctor or a lawyer who has their Facebook open in their office, or who is texting my diagnosis to the lab.  I also think that Gen X will fight back a little; we Gen Xers are an indignant bunch- if we couldn’t have a pingpong table in the staff lounge, why should these kids?

As one who is on the cusp of generations- it all depends on what source it comes from where I land, I did find my identity as a digital user stood firmly in Rheingold’s article moreso than Tapscott.  I don’t know if that means anything since I could be Gen X, but it sure did make me feel better than I don’t really know what the youtube video of the day is.  What I do think is that it’s best to be familiar with the trends, even a little bit.  Each new variation has built upon the last variation, and if I don’t jump on board now, how will I ever even be able to check on what my kids’ are doing in the future?

What is my point here?  I don’t know, actually. I kind of lost track when my skype video rang.

I was surprised by this except from Topscott’s book, in that he wasn’t more critical of the Net Generation and the way use of technology, and specifically the internet, has completely changed the way we use our time. He repeatedly states that Net Geners are intelligent and can multitask unlike previous generations, but he barely broaches the subject of how technology, specifically the internet, and even more specifically Facebook, has become a vortex for procrastination and wasting time. He campaigns heavily for Facebook as a means of social connection, communication, and marketing; he notes the safety concerns of Facebook; he doesn’t mention that it, by and large, functions as a place to spend three hours a day refreshing your news feed and commenting on pictures (fact: I checked Facebook four times already when writing this post, countless times while reading the article, and probably will open it several more times before I’m done writing).

I think a key point that he is missing is that all of the technology that is readily available to us – smart phones, mp3 players, internet shopping and games – attracts our attention for such large amounts of time that the reason Net Geners work quickly is because they must fit more into their day than generations before, not all of it productive. A perfect example is the daily timeline of Rahaf, the independent new-media strategist. He writes that she charges her clients for 50hrs a week, but by my calculations, she doesn’t claim to work, on average, more than 5.5 hours a day. The remaining time (during which she is constantly multi-tasking) is spent reading blogs, Skyping, and generally gallivanting around the internet.

I’m not sure that this is a negative side-effect of technology, nor am I sure that it is positive. I know that, personally, I spend a lot more time texting, Tweeting, and YouTubing than I do finishing assignments or working. I am incredibly efficient when I have to be, but this is by and large because my pleasure romps around the internet suck up time and attention that should be given to time-consuming projects. I even complain about the lack of time I have in my life on social networking sites and my blog, fully aware of the irony, and this cycle increasingly stresses me out – and I know I am not alone in this trait.

I suppose I expected Topscott to comment on how stressed our generation seems to be about time, and how this trend can be attributed, at least in part, to how much time we spend using technology.

This is, in general, how I feel most of the time.

I hope you’ve all been as intrigued by the reading this week as Rob — I selected it because it’s provocative and represents a strong view of young people as enabled by technology.  It also hints at lives constrained, more or less, by technology: people unable to start their day without Facebook or Twitter, always on and constantly connected, seemingly dependent on technology use as a defining aspect of their lives, even as it appears seamlessly integrated (flows like water or surrounds them like air, both commonly used metaphors).

Tapscott’s view is one of many that have emerged in recent years attempting to define the role of media in the lives of young people, and in particular attempting to identify the effects of media on a generation of connected youth.  We have extreme detractors, such as Mark Bauerline’s treatise on the Dumbest Generation.  Or Nicholas Carr, who poses the question of whether Google Makes Us Stupid.  More balanced approaches, which document both the risks and opportunities can be found in books by John Palfrey and Sonia Livingstone, both significant scholars with a wealth of empirical evidence for their claims.

A recent interview with Howard Rheingold frames the challenge of defining a generation that many regard as “digital natives” but might better be thought of as digital naives: “I think we need to dispense with the assumption that a majority of young people are skillful users of social media.” It’s one thing to be connected, another to understand what to do with the information you find or assess it effectively. Where do you stand with regard to these portraits of young people?  Since many of you are of this generation, what do you think of these depictions of yourself and peers?  How good is your “crap detector” (to borrow from Howard’s interview)?

Of course I can’t comment on everything within these chapters, so I’ve just chosen a few points I found interesting.  So I hope other people have taken some other stuff from later on in the chapters (like the section on working from home and entrepreneurship as opposed to office work…  cool stuff!)  Anyway, here goes:

I think, out of most of the reading, this was my favourite line put forward by Tapscott.  And I think it’s very true.  I’m honestly still unsure of what “generation” I am from, but I really don’t care for the purposes of this reading.  I think a bit like Tapscott’s son, and I’m hoping to start thinking more like Tapscott.  Indeed, his son was looking at Mars through the Hubble Telescope from his bedroom thinking how awesome Mars is, and completely forgetting how incredible the technology is that is letting him get such a great view of the planet.  I am much the same way, and for the purposes of this course, I suppose that will need to change.  This blog, for instance, to me, is a place where I put my words down through my keyboard, and then the computer amazingly does things and this all ends up in the ether for you all to read.  I never think about the behind-the-scenes technological makeup of the internet, or the coding that went into creating WordPress.  I can only hope that I will soon be starting to think a little bit more critically about the things that allow me do to do what it is that I do on a daily basis.

I think what I’m curious about is what other people think about some of the broad assumptions that go into Tapscott’s understanding of the Net Generation.  I do believe that whatever generation I happen to be a part of is very involved in technology, and there are certainly some who I would consider to be overly-involved with their technological thingamajigs, but I hesitate to say that our use–and perhaps reliance on–technology has made us in any way less able to express ourselves or work or think critically.  Of course, maybe that’s just me being defensive or something.  Who knows?  I like to think that it’s about how we utilize new technology that makes us different, and not that we are somehow lesser in any way.  New Media just forces us to think about things more, and to consider what we used to do before these new bits and pieces showed up on the technology stage, as it were.

But what do you all think about some of the assumptions in the reading?  Did you agree with the majority of what Tapscott had to say?  Or do you think he went overboard with his theories?

Thanks for listening!

As mentioned in class on Monday this study, as summarized in the London Times, reveals that younger students prefer the lower-fidelity of mp3s to CDs and vinyl.  Sad but true.  The suggestion by Jonathan Berger of Stanford University is that changing technology affects individual preferences for music, both in terms of formats and styles.

This Creator’s Project post on Generative Filmmaking provides some pretty cool examples of algorithm-based media objects that illustrate Manovich’s concept of “automation.” The blog is definitely worth browsing if you’re interested in this type of thing.

See also: Processing-based installation and video artwork by Quayola that invsigates the “improbable relationships between contemporary digital aesthetics and icons of classical art and architecture.” Link: http://www.quayola.com/index.php?/strata-1/

Rome from Quayola on Vimeo.

And for a more direct New Media deconstruction of physical architecture there are quite a few artists using sophisticated projection setups to develop visual sets tailored to specific buildings. ie: http://vimeo.com/15713774

Amazing Building Mapping – Vimeo Festival from Dan Ilic on Vimeo.

I mentioned this video in class and thought I’d share.  I found it to be quite inspiring and it fits in quite nicely with the issues of the role of technology in education and universal access / demographic inequality that we brought up yesterday.

[ Apparently the embed code is not working. Link: http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/sugata_mitra_the_child_driven_education.html ]

Every day the same dream is a game where you basically go through a day in the life of an avatar dude, but then at the end, you go right back to the beginning and do it over again.  Not really a game per se.  More like an art piece, but one that is interactive.  Interesting in light of part of our discussion today, as brought up by Schuyler.

Just for some fun y’all!

Hyperbole and a Half