Robin Blandford [ ByteSurgery.com ]

17/02/08 Digital Teens: Still Landlining It

SINGAPORE - JP observes in the Pew Internet report on Teens and Social Media that across all teens, the landline is still the most common form of conversation.

While all this is happening, the landline continues to be important.

Why? Why is the landline #1? Why when teens have a mobile in their pocket do they opt for the home-phone. Here’s my understanding… the obvious answer is cost. But if the teens aren’t paying that cost, why do they care?

‘Text Messages’ is why they care. While both devices do voice, only their mobile does SMS. When limited to a certain channels by credit amounts, saving their credit on cell voice calls means they can communicate even more, and by more channels.

Super-communicators are an interesting idea too. I can relate a few teens to this category.

There is a subset of teens who are super-communicators — teens who have a host of technology options for dealing with family and friends, including traditional landline phones, cell phones, texting, social network sites, instant messaging, and email. They represent about 28% of the entire teen population and they are more likely to be older girls.

-Robin.

(Image Credit: Motorbikes tailing our taxi in Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam. By Author.)

Tags: General

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