back to article Oldsters beat twentysomethings at social networking

We now know where Microsoft went wrong with its KIN "social phone": it mistakenly made twentysomething hipsters its target market. Twentysomethings are the least likely age group to share information via text messages, and they use social networks such as Twitter and Facebook less frequently than baby-boomers in their fifties …

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  1. Charles Manning

    Broken

    Only 26% of 20-somethings text? The question was surely poorly phrased or the analysis was terrible.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Joke

      Phrasing may have been

      "If you are not someone who doesn't text, indicate this by ticking the box with two mutually bisecting diagonal lines. Use only black pen or blue pencil, but beware that blue pencil will not be not ignored."

      I'd have pegged the number at nearer _126_% of 20-somethings text.

  2. Darryl
    Thumb Up

    That...

    "Despite admitting that in-person meetings are often inefficient and don't achieve their goals, workers still seem to like them. That's probably because people are hard-wired to see people and read body language."

    that and the free doughnuts

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "workers still seem to like them"?

    That's probably because PHBs like them and so failing to "like" them is a CLM for the plebs. Not too surprising this /vice president/ AND /general manager/ "reads" his workers all wrong.

  4. Pete 2 Silver badge

    A passing phase?

    We've all heard of early adopters, but they're only a small proportion of the whole - and not even the earliest group to latch onto a fad. Maybe what we're seeing is that the innovators (the first group) and the E/A's have done the social networking thing, discovered it's emptiness and moved on. Leaving the field clear for the majority of people to start toying with the technology. However, if the original theory is correct, they too will find that social networking is no substitute for real-world friends and acquaintances and in time, abandon it too.

    This doesn't mean that social networking is for old people, or that older people actually like it. Just that they didn't jump in, feet-first as soon as the nascent technology appeared: preferring to bide their time before trying it out. Although for the upper end of the age range, it definitely has advantages for the housebound or immobile: to use this sort of thing to keep their social lives going.

  5. Andy Hards
    Pint

    That's cos going to meeting means

    you don't actually have to do any real work and the Gen Yers would rather not be doing any real work at their own computers where they can be doing their own shit rather than real work or being in a meeting with tossers who don't like them checkng their phones every two seconds.

    If you see what I mean.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Thumb Up

      I quite agree

      I am generation Y (apparently) and I would rather be reading and posting on El Reg than getting powerpoint poisoning.

      I also don't have any social networking accounts, but I do text... rarely.

      Texting was a stopgap when I didn't have access to MSN/Skype etc on my phone.

  6. Steve 13
    WTF?

    26%

    It seems more likely that the research is flawed than that it's accurate. At least based on my own anecdotal evidence of knowing lots of 20 somethings, all of whom text even when it's not the best way to communicate.

    Given that such a basic part of the research has come back with complete rubbish, I'm going to ignore the rest of it as flawed as well!

  7. Da Weezil
    Coat

    Meh

    I've never bought into the facepalm/my arse/twatter thing. My friends are diverse, and I believe that as a friend with respect for their place in my life as individuals, they deserve to be treated as such with our interactions tailored to the interests we share, rather than treating them all to the scattergun approach of SN sites where everyone is told everything. These are real friends though.. I really don't get having a list of hundreds of people gained simply by getting a "friend request". Maybe I'm clinging to an old definition of friend huh? To me they are special people, and the term is being cheapened by this whole sector. Friends to me are those people I will get out of bed to help at 2 am on a cold winters morning

    If I cant make some time to show my friends the attention they deserve then what sort of a friend am I? Oh and by friends I mean people that I know, care about and converse with by diverse methods, some of whom go back over 20 years, others that I have only recently encountered.

    I do about 500 text messages a month, right across the age ranges from a neighbours 14 year old son (he has X box connectivity problems) to a friends mother who is in her late 70s and sends me some really wicked jokes.

    Surveys and studies... now there is a sector where this country alone could save a shed load of money!

    Coat.. mines the one with the well worn 6230i in the pocket

  8. Aaron Em

    "workers still seem to like them"

    Bullshit. *Management* seems to like them, but when do those tie-wearing bastards ever do any real work anyway?

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