{"id":648231,"date":"2013-03-14T12:35:06","date_gmt":"2013-03-14T16:35:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blandinonbroadband.org\/?p=8369"},"modified":"2013-03-14T12:35:06","modified_gmt":"2013-03-14T16:35:06","slug":"teens-technology-is-mobile-the-right-tool-or-the-only-tool-available","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/648231","title":{"rendered":"Teens &amp; Technology: Is mobile the right tool or the only tool available?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blandinonbroadband.files.wordpress.com\/2009\/11\/rural-phone.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-2643\" alt=\"rural phone\" src=\"http:\/\/blandinonbroadband.files.wordpress.com\/2009\/11\/rural-phone.jpg?w=500\"   \/><\/a>Pew Internet and American Life released a new report this week on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pewinternet.org\/Reports\/2013\/Teens-and-Tech.aspx\">teens\u2019 use of technology and the Internet<\/a>. I\u2019m always interested in these reports \u2013 both because of my obvious interest in broadband but also because after a big birthday in February I am now the proud keeper of two teens. And as of this week they each have an iPhone.<\/p>\n<p>Here are some of the broadband highlights from the report\u2026<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>95% of teens are online, a percentage that has been consistent since 2006.<\/li>\n<li>One in four teens (23%) have a tablet computer, a level comparable to the general adult population.<\/li>\n<li>Nine in ten (93%) teens have a computer or have access to one at home. Seven in ten (71%) teens with home computer access say the laptop or desktop they use most often is one they share with other family members.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I\u2019m impressed by 95 percent of teens being online \u2013 although that is a huge wake up call to the five percent who aren\u2019t. It would be interesting to know why those teens aren\u2019t online. Yesterday <a href=\"http:\/\/blandinonbroadband.org\/2013\/03\/13\/minnesota-broadband-adoption-leaps-up-6-to-78-home-adoption\/\">Connect Minnesota<\/a> released a report on Minnesota adoption. They found reasons that most Minnesotans who aren\u2019t online have stayed offline. The top answers are:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Don\u2019t want it (19 percent)<\/li>\n<li>Broadband fees are expensive (13 percent)<\/li>\n<li>No content worth viewing (13 percent)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Since I just saw my teen send SnapChat\u00a0pictures to a friend on the whole drive home from dinner last night \u2013 I can\u2019t believe the bar for\u00a0&#8221;cotent worth viewing&#8221;\u00a0is that high with teens. You wonder if it\u2019s cost or access or parents\u2019 decision. The bigger question is how do we prepare those teens to use the technology their peers take for granted?<\/p>\n<p>There were also range of statistics on cellphone use by teens:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>78% of teens now have a cell phone, and almost half (47%) of those own smartphones. That translates into 37% of all teens who have smartphones, up from just 23% in 2011.<\/li>\n<li>About three in four (74%) teens ages 12-17 say they access the internet on cell phones, tablets, and other mobile devices at least occasionally.<\/li>\n<li>One in four teens are \u201ccell-mostly\u201d internet users \u2014 far more than the 15% of adults who are cell-mostly. Among teen smartphone owners, half are cell-mostly.<\/li>\n<li>Older girls are especially likely to be cell-mostly internet users; 34% of teen girls ages 14-17 say they mostly go online using their cell phone, compared with 24% of teen boys ages 14-17. This is notable since boys and girls are equally likely to be smartphone owners.<\/li>\n<li>Among older teen girls who are smartphone owners, 55% say they use the internet mostly from their phone.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>So now I have the data to contrast my teens\u2019 whining that they were the <i>only ones in the world<\/i> without smartphones \u2013 but I have to admit 37 percent is pretty impressive. I\u2019m intrigued by 25 percent of teens being cell-mostly internet users. I get that 71 percent share a computer at home, which makes it harder to use the laptop or desktop, but that number still surprises me. And I wonder\u00a0if\u00a0it is because their cell use is virtually constant through the day so that any other time spent on a traditional computer seems brief? Or is the cell use replacing traditional use?<\/p>\n<p>For me the difficulty with smartphone\/cell-only (or mostly) access has been my difficulty understanding how someone could get their \u201cwork\u201d done on a smartphone. For example \u2013 I don\u2019t want to read a Pew Report, cross reference\u00a0other studies or type out this blog post on my smartphone. I do want my smartphone for directions (maps and occasional how-to videos), contact management, easy communication (Facebook, Twitter, text), music while I workout, ready reference, comparison shopping; some of those activities are work related.<\/p>\n<p>The big question to me \u2013 for teens and others who choose cell\/smartphone\u00a0access \u2013 are we doing things differently? (Do they find a smartphone\u00a0sufficient for research and writing?) Is the \u201cwork\u201d changing? For example are people watching videos instead of reading reports and are they commenting via video? Because I\u2019d choose a smartphone for that work too.<\/p>\n<p>Do they choose smartphones because it\u2019s the right tool for the job or because it\u2019s the only tool available?<\/p>\n<p>  <a rel=\"nofollow\" href=\"http:\/\/feeds.wordpress.com\/1.0\/gocomments\/blandinonbroadband.wordpress.com\/8369\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"\" border=\"0\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.wordpress.com\/1.0\/comments\/blandinonbroadband.wordpress.com\/8369\/\" \/><\/a> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"\" border=\"0\" src=\"http:\/\/stats.wordpress.com\/b.gif?host=blandinonbroadband.org&#038;blog=785113&#038;%23038;post=8369&#038;%23038;subd=blandinonbroadband&#038;%23038;ref=&#038;%23038;feed=1\" width=\"1\" height=\"1\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Pew Internet and American Life released a new report this week on teens\u2019 use of technology and the Internet. I\u2019m always interested in these reports \u2013 both because of my obvious interest in broadband but also because after a big birthday in February I am now the proud keeper of two teens. And as of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-648231","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-wireless"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/648231","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=648231"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/648231\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=648231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=648231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=648231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}