Welcome to theyoungandthedigital.com, the companion website to the book The Young and The Digital: What the Migration to Social Network Sites, Games, and Anytime, Anywhere Media Means for Our Future. The goal of this site is simple: to continue the exploration of young people’s enthusiastic embrace of digital media. This site, like the book, anticipates many of the conversations and controversies that drive the debates about the growing role of digital media in our daily lives.
“Bracing yet reassuring, often surprising, and always substantive, Craig Watkins acts as an honest broker, testing the contradictory claims often made about young people’s digital lives against sophisticated field work.”
–Henry Jenkins, author of Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide
“With thorough research, deep thinking, and lively prose, Watkins adds enormously to our understanding of how the combination of new media and a new generation is changing the world. Read this refreshing book to understand our future!”
– Don Tapscott, co-author of Wikinomics and author of Grown Up Digital
One of the more enduring lessons I learned from my research is that digital and mobile media behaviors are constantly changing. In a short period of time young people have moved from Email, to AIM, to texting, then Friendster, , and . As a result, research and analysis has to be both knowledgeable and flexible. The research team that I have assembled continues to rigorously study and keep our pulse on the digital world. We look forward to sharing some of our findings, analysis, and papers from our research with you.
Are you a professional journalist? You write very well.
I liked it. So much useful material. I read with great interest.
Thanks, Peter. I’m looking forward to the book launch. We will be building the site out more.
Glad to hear that.
Thank you Mackeran. I’m actually an academic by training.
Interesting and informative. But will you write about this one more?
I added your blog to bookmarks. And i’ll read your articles more often!
Valuable thoughts and advices. I read your topic with great interest.
How come people who know each other will ask each other to join several different social network pages, ie; facebook, twitter, myspace ect.?
If I know you, why ask me to join 4 or more sites?
Just wondering.
It’s a good question.
You are right, it is quite common for offline friends to “friend” each other in online communities. Most of us are drawn to social media primarily to interact with the people we know, like, and trust. Social media is how we communicate, cultivate our social ties, and share information and content.
To the extent that people find themselves actively using various platforms they tend to find themselves managing different contacts and networks. In many respects, how we use social media varies across the different platforms. For example, the way you present yourself in Facebook may be quite different than the way you present yourself in LinkedIn.
So, it could be that communicating with your friends in different platforms is a way to share different parts of yourself–your interests, your work, and your lifestyle–with them.
I don’t think, for instance, that day-to-day users are necessarily saying the same things to each on Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace. I have not come across any evidence that suggests that is a common experience though I’m sure it happens in some cases.