I was reading a newspaper article the other day, and it basically said that there was a generational gap in the use of technological communication. The gist of it was that boomers were found to prefer e-mail, and teenagers (Generation Y) preferred instant messaging.
It was interesting, to be sure, but I was a bit disappointed that they didn’t make broader observations.
The “Greatest Generation” or Depression-era folks generally prefer e-mail, but in general, they are much less familiar with personal computer technology. The kinds of e-mail I get from my grandparents, however, mirror those of Gen Y in a few ways– they like to pass along messages in the old “chain letter” style, which are usually humorous, anecdotal, or express political or personal opinion that is fairly common to their generation. They are different from the versions of Gen X and Gen Y, however– I have not seen any that repeat urban legend or most anything else that would appear on Snopes.com.
Everyone loves cell phones, but what I see among those younger than me is that numerous accessories are more of a “must have”– including ringtones, built-in cameras, mp3 playback, text messaging, fancy covers, and video games– much to the chargrin of late Boomer and Gen X parents, when the cell phone bill arrives.
Many of them have allowed text messaging acronyms and shortened spellings to enter into other modes of communication, including term papers at school and everyday face-to-face communication. ‘lol’, ‘brb’, and ‘afk’ were more or less invented by Gen X tech-heads, but the kids use them much more freely, which tends to annoy the rest of us who are older, or more meticulous about grammar and spelling.
The coffee shop will always be a fixture, but the reason to gather has changed a great deal. It used to be about jazz combos, folk artists, and poetry reading, but technology is much, much more popular– from the older cybercafes to the recent offerings of Wi-Fi access.
Repetitive stress injuries have been around for a long time, but when I was younger, “Nintendo thumb” was the worry. That’s been assigned to the Blackberry now.
If the contrast was supposed to be between Boomers and Generation Y’ers, Generation X must be somewhat in the middle. The mainstream of our generation has seen a good deal of the changes that PCs and portable media brought about. Now, I know darkeros might twit me because he’s seen a whole lot more, but it was back in the days when ‘geeks’ and ‘nerds’ were made fun of, and many people were not as interested in digital technology. Anyone remember the Newton? It was Apple’s early offering that evolved into the PDA. Sony Walkman? They play CDs or mp3 recordings instead of compact cassette tapes. Once upon a time, it was the Macintosh computer that was the big deal at Apple, but now it is most assuredly the iPod.
Anti-technology sentiments have been around for a long time, but some are reacting to the obvious barrage of information that permeates modern society. Some time ago, I watched a show describing an IT professional that finally decided to move up into the mountains and to remove all modern technology (at least, computing) from his house, to only deal with it at work.
Many techno-geeks and hackers were very excited and enthusiastic when the Matrix came out, for it seemed to be a statement of the digital underground vs. the establishment. In the original script, the Agent connections to the Secret Service were much, much more obvious, with the scene between Smith and Morpheus occurring in the White House. But it could also be considered a statement about breaking free from the grasp of technology– to exit the Matrix and journey to Zion, the last settlement controlled by humans.
It has been observed that social interaction is occurring more and more online, with birthday celebrations, weddings, and holiday events being re-enacted in MMORPGs. Some folks still use the Post Office, but more send out e-cards, e-mail, and shop online.
There has been speculation for years on what this would mean for our society. Where are we going? Will technology eventually turn on us, as some science fiction writers have written about? What about cybergenics? There are rumors that the Armed Forces have expressed interest in a cybergenetic super soldier. Whether this is true or not remains to be seen. Artificial intelligence (AI) remains largely elusive. Many ideas concerning androids are not fully a reality– and some are downright hoaxes– see an earlier post of mine, cross-referenced to a post by luckychance. “Valerie” was conceived by an individual that also promised to take people to Mars with the cost of a 1 million USD ticket, which appears to be a scam, and the android has been derided an amalgam of pictures of existing technology, and pictures of a mannequin.
As technology progresses, there is sure to be generational gaps in familiarity with the latest– what is to come, however, is pure speculation.
the tao of jaklumen 