Gen Y Isn’t Leaving Social Media – Are You Ready For Them?

I think a lot of the commenters are getting caught up on the wrong thing here.

I think it's pretty clear that social media has become engrained in the internet, and as long as any generation continues to use the web, they will continue to use these tools.

It'll take something very drastic and scare to get my generation to stop using social platforms. Of course, everyone will use them at their own rates. I'm sure many won't be as engaged in social platforms as others.

The fact is though, that the young people of today have grown up with these technologies. As long as "social" is tied to technological innovation, social will continue to develop and play a role in our daily lives.

David, Scribnia

The sample community here by definition is going to be very biased given they are answering a question where they already have the belief and a vested interest that Gen Y "not grow out if this".

Even if you asked only Gen Y people about this the data is still going to show only what they think they will do in the future.

None of us ever can be very accurate predicting our own future behaviors because it's always true that "you don't know what you don't know". This is especially true when asking people before they have kids what life will be like after they have kids. All of us with kids know they is no way to successfully communicate how drastically life and perceptions change when you become a parent.

Not saying that Gen Y'ers WILL abandon social media. I'm just saying that asking people what they will do in the distant future is dicey at best when it comes to accuracy.

A better approach I think is to try and divine the key ways social media tools will change and help business owners figure out how that will impact their consumers behaviors independent of age and era of birth

I am always cautious of the research that is founded on future predictions. I'm not sure we should be too hasty in basing our business decisions on what professionals think will happen in the future.

What is important, is what you think will happen in the future and find as much evidence as you can that assists your thought process and make the best decisions accordingly.

I think the "Gen Y isn't using social media" study is fascinating though again, I am cautious about the results.

Are Gen Y giving their right birth date on social networks or even providing it at all? I know many people don't like to disclose their age. I also wonder how accurate their calculations are considering the social networks don't freely give out the information of their users, as they shouldn't.

Trading financial markets for a number of years, I found more quality information came from talking with regular people than it did talking to the professionals about what they thought.

I think this is one of those circumstances. Finding out the reasons why Gen Y isn't using social networks, by actually talking to them, will help us make an informed decision about the future. Not asking the professionals who sometimes have a biased view from being involved in their own industries for so long.

Just my 45 cents...

The survey results are not surprising to me -- but what is surprising is who was surveyed.

From the report:

Many of the respondents are Internet veterans – 50% have been using the Internet since 1992 or earlier, with 11% actively involved online since 1982 or earlier. When asked for their primary area of Internet interest, 15% of the survey participants identified themselves as research scientists; 14% as business leaders or entrepreneurs; 12% as consultants or futurists, 12% as authors, editors or journalists; 9% as technology developers or administrators; 7% as advocates or activist users; 3% as pioneers or originators; 2% as legislators, politicians or lawyers; and 25% specified their primary area of interest as “other.”

In other words, I'll hazard a guess a small minority of the respondents consider themselves a member of Generation Y. I think this is an important aspect to consider, no?

Where I see gaming and social media might be different than game consoles and PC's. Gaming and social media is so much more.

Take for example Foursquares. Foursquares takes the idea of social media and gaming and marries the two together. If businesses, especially small businesses would take advantage of the gaming behavior, it would be a boom.

For example, award points to those who check in at your business. And those points would then in turn become discount points.

The ways social media and gaming could be used is limited only by a businesses own imagination.

I think a lot of the commenters are getting caught up on the wrong thing here.

I think it's pretty clear that social media has become engrained in the internet, and as long as any generation continues to use the web, they will continue to use these tools.

It'll take something very drastic and scare to get my generation to stop using social platforms. Of course, everyone will use them at their own rates. I'm sure many won't be as engaged in social platforms as others.

The fact is though, that the young people of today have grown up with these technologies. As long as "social" is tied to technological innovation, social will continue to develop and play a role in our daily lives.

David, Scribnia

It's good to see more data being added to the picture. I like everyone's skepticism because it indicates to researchers that there is a demand for good information.

I definitely agree. Although 2020 seems very far ways it's safe to say that Gen Y will most likely not abandon social media/sharing. Social media is still evolving and perhaps they will use social media differently in the future. However, to say Gen Y will out grow social media would be a stretch. Yes, their use of social media may mature but in my opinion it's here to stay.

The sample community here by definition is going to be very biased given they are answering a question where they already have the belief and a vested interest that Gen Y "not grow out if this".

Even if you asked only Gen Y people about this the data is still going to show only what they think they will do in the future.

None of us ever can be very accurate predicting our own future behaviors because it's always true that "you don't know what you don't know". This is especially true when asking people before they have kids what life will be like after they have kids. All of us with kids know they is no way to successfully communicate how drastically life and perceptions change when you become a parent.

Not saying that Gen Y'ers WILL abandon social media. I'm just saying that asking people what they will do in the distant future is dicey at best when it comes to accuracy.

A better approach I think is to try and divine the key ways social media tools will change and help business owners figure out how that will impact their consumers behaviors independent of age and era of birth

While making a prediction using the above data I think it is also important to address the fact that the way one engage with social media and vice versa will also evolve. By not taking this into consideration there could be some insight that will be missed out.

I think you've missed a fundamental distinction here, between the information that social media users share in their use of the services, and the information that the services try to glean from their accounts, to share with PR and marketing types.

Users don't want their personal information shared with parasites, sorry, marketeers, and the recent debacle over Facebook's privacy settings showed this to be the case. The fact, which nobody in the SEO, marketing, bullshit business wants to admit, is that users are not, and will not engage with advertising, and are unlikely to engage wholly with brands or businesses in a social media setting.

I think the whole idea of "leaving social media" is flawed. The point here is that the web today is social by default... you can choose to share / broadcast what you want, but the ethos is unlikely to change, the social aspect, what I call "social everything", is going to remain, as it is human nature to want to be social. So, businesses just need to adapt to how best to interact in this space.

I am always cautious of the research that is founded on future predictions. I'm not sure we should be too hasty in basing our business decisions on what professionals think will happen in the future.

What is important, is what you think will happen in the future and find as much evidence as you can that assists your thought process and make the best decisions accordingly.

I think the "Gen Y isn't using social media" study is fascinating though again, I am cautious about the results.

Are Gen Y giving their right birth date on social networks or even providing it at all? I know many people don't like to disclose their age. I also wonder how accurate their calculations are considering the social networks don't freely give out the information of their users, as they shouldn't.

Trading financial markets for a number of years, I found more quality information came from talking with regular people than it did talking to the professionals about what they thought.

I think this is one of those circumstances. Finding out the reasons why Gen Y isn't using social networks, by actually talking to them, will help us make an informed decision about the future. Not asking the professionals who sometimes have a biased view from being involved in their own industries for so long.

Just my 45 cents...

The survey results are not surprising to me -- but what is surprising is who was surveyed.

From the report:

Many of the respondents are Internet veterans u00e2u0080u0093 50% have been using the Internet since 1992 or earlier, with 11% actively involved online since 1982 or earlier. When asked for their primary area of Internet interest, 15% of the survey participants identified themselves as research scientists; 14% as business leaders or entrepreneurs; 12% as consultants or futurists, 12% as authors, editors or journalists; 9% as technology developers or administrators; 7% as advocates or activist users; 3% as pioneers or originators; 2% as legislators, politicians or lawyers; and 25% specified their primary area of interest as u00e2u0080u009cother.u00e2u0080u009d

In other words, I'll hazard a guess a small minority of the respondents consider themselves a member of Generation Y. I think this is an important aspect to consider, no?

Where I see gaming and social media might be different than game consoles and PC's. Gaming and social media is so much more.

Take for example Foursquares. Foursquares takes the idea of social media and gaming and marries the two together. If businesses, especially small businesses would take advantage of the gaming behavior, it would be a boom.

For example, award points to those who check in at your business. And those points would then in turn become discount points.

The ways social media and gaming could be used is limited only by a businesses own imagination.

I think it's unlikely that after building up the habit of "broadcasting" their lives, my peers will suddenly grow out of that behavior. Interesting post and cool charts. I guess this will effect how I run my own business as I mature, but I'm not really targeting people above my age at base, so...

I just wanted to point out that saying gaming is a part of this is ridiculous, considering it hasn't stopped generation after generation of teens from playing video games before. Games founded on social networks (like Farmville), maybe, but the idea of "social games" isn't a new one. Games are social by default.