While Tech Tribe has suggested that young people look at the older generations and want a life with more variety there is an argument to suggest growing up with digital technologies predisposes them expand their skills in a more remote and on-demand fashion. This is not a future that is yet to happen, young people are already significantly more involved in digital rather than physical media, yet this is not something startling to them, but is rather natural as digital becomes more layered on everyday life. The proliferation of digital and online has left us with, the still rather incredible fact that the average young person is online for about 20 hours a week, while only watching that old dinosaur, the TV for about 5 hours. But from looking at TechTribe results we can also do a more direct comparison, and report that they watch TV content via computer for an average of 3.5 hours a week. Even more incredible is that some 30% of 19-25 year-olds are spending a whopping 28 hours online every week. One third of those online have sessions of 90 minutes. That figure can increase with age, with 20% of 22-25 year-olds having sessions of 3 hours in length. The possibilities of online allow for the diversification of skills mentioned for the aforementioned desire to have more than one career in their lifetime.

There’s a lot of concern from the public at large about privacy in the digital age. This is especially the case when it comes to concern for young people. With sexting (sending explicit images, etc between digital devices) being reported and cases of parties being gatecrashed after ‘open’ invites on social networking sites, there’s a great deal of concern to protect youth from themselves. So, it’s encouraging to report that young people seem to be picking up on these messages to take care. Tech Tribe reports that in the last 12 months well over a half of 19-25 year-olds have upped their privacy settings: with 63% of 19-21 year-olds and 69% of 22-25 year-olds choosing not to display personal information such as their phone number on their social networking sites. 55% have also become more selective with who they friend-add online. As more and more of life migrates online, these figures point to a growing awareness of the fact that the worlds of ‘on’ and ‘off’ line aren’t so distinct.

Youth Starting To Stay Safe Online

This extensive amount of time spent online has painted a bleak picture for the newspaper industry. Tech Tribe reveals that 19-25 year-olds read print for an average of 25 minutes a day. Wherea they read news on their computers for an average of 28 minutes. And if you include online via mobile in that – which they read for an average of 15 minutes – we see that online has really overtaken traditional print by some margin. There will always be occasions where young people (indeed everyone) will want hard copy, but most of the time the electronic form suffices.

This change in medium for towards the internet has also affected the music and film industry negatively. If you take the case of watching films online, 77% of 19-25 year-olds never pay to watch film. Of the 23% of young people that do pay, the largest proportion are those that download ‘less often’ than once a month. The reality is that most are using file-sharing software like BitTorrent. The thing is that ‘free content’ is everywhere, from newspapers to Youtube. But with Youtube looking to make a loss of $470m this year and Rupert Murdoch’s plan to go ahead with paid-for news online, the real question is whether this demand for accessible content is enough for the media dinosaurs to change their business models? If this is the case, and it could well be with Disney and Paramount signing up for free film streaming service Voddler, then it could be suggested that young people’s behaviours are the lead for which innovation follows.

The Computer Hoodie Actually Exists!

Just as the internet is becoming more and more socially acceptable, our findings take in gaming across platforms, both on and offline and show that there’s nothing pathological about their playing. 54% of 19-25 year-olds do not play online at all, and of those that do 35% play for an average of 30 minutes. We also asked specifically about MMORPG type games like, for example, Second Life, and only about 5% of 19-25 year-olds ever play. And further more, offline gaming and mobile gaming is also pretty under control, with 57% playing offline, but for mostly for an average of 15 minutes a day; and 19% on playing on mobile devices for an average of 8 minutes. The innovation and transformation in gaming, is the fact that it is becoming more mainstream and socially acceptable to be labeled a gamer.

While online gaming levels aren’t particularly high, young people are spending on average nearly 3 hours a week online via mobile phones. Average use doesn’t tell the whole story, though. 19-21 year-olds spend 1 hour 50 minutes using mobile internet, whilst 22-25 year-olds spend considerably more, at 3 hours 45 minutes. Furthermore, the 22-25 group are generally accessing online via mobile about twice a day, compared to the 19-21 who are usually only online once a day. 30% of young people spend between 5 – 10 minutes online per session. Considering the difference in overall usability, these numbers are impressive, especially considering they watch television for only about 5 hours a week. So there is a comparison given the lifetimes of each, it can’t be long before mobile online has parity and beyond with TV. In accordance with the desire to get online via mobile a rather impressive 30% have iPhone or Blackberries. As you might expect, the Blackberries have greater penetration with older youth (21% of 22-25s, compared to 5% of 19-21 year-olds). iPhones also have a not unimpressive 9% market share among 19-21 year-olds; that figure rises to 13% market share among 22-25 year-olds. With surprising high figures of smartphones the question remains as to what they’re actually doing with mobile online?

Is Mobile Internet Finally About To Take Off??

Social networking was their top mobile internet habit – with 67% of mobile internet users getting involved. Our findings conclude that blogging is absolutely the least popular thing to do for 19 – 25 year-olds to do via mobile online, with just 11% saying they did it. This compares to an average of 18% for computer-based blogging, across the 19-25 year-old age range. So, all in all blogging is not quite what it used to be… and we say amen to that. Sure, you might think, that’s because Tweeting is the new blogging. Well, actually given the tremendous hype, young people aren’t very active, with just 17% having used it. Sure, it is growing, but nothing like the phenomenon the media would have us believe. This may also be to do with the lack of span, speed accessibility of wireless networks aswell as the functionality of browsers.

Let’s consider some of the other handset capabilities and daily usage. Only 9% of young people watched any TV on-demand on mobile, and even those that did only watched for an average of 5 minutes. Yet with Sky’s first subscription service to the iPhone recently launching this may also change. About one fifth of 19-25 year-olds read newspapers or magazines online, and averagely for about 15 minutes. About one fifth game using their phones and do so for only 8 minutes a day. 16% listen to the radio via mobile, for an average of 8 minutes a day. 18% watch film, or other content for just 7 minutes. And finally, perhaps most surprising of all, only 35% listen to music on mobile; and for an average of 19 minutes a day. Their interest seems to be piqued by the social interactivity dimension of iPhones, Blackberries and the like, rather than simply media. Also there are potentially greater cost/battery/memory issues with using some of the richer functionality.

In our wide-ranging exploration of Tech Tribe, we got to the bottom of the technology they’re using, not just right now, but that they intend to use in the next year. And it was interesting to the note the differences between what they’re currently using and what they intend to use in terms of levels of growth. Some of the things that caught our eye… Twitter has only been used by 17% of 19-25 year-olds and only a further 11% intend to use it. There’s been so much hype, in the first instance you’d think more people had used it; and that take-up in 2010 would be much greater. ‘Geotagging’ (tagging interactive content onto online maps) and video messaging/calling look to be in for some of the biggest growth with 22% already using them, but a further 17% intending to use in the next year. Skype also seems to be heading for success on mobile: usage is standing at 13% now with a further 22% intending to use; indeed 27% among the older 21-25 year-old age group. It’s not looking good for Blyk with 6% of 19-25 year-olds having used it and only a further 5% intending to use it. Nor is it looking good for QR Codes (‘Quick Response’): with current low use at 4% and only another 5% intending to use, it’s failed to capture young people’s imagination.