Mobile Youth

Ruby Pseudo: How Kids Use Their Phones

Category: Marketing
Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted on: July 12th, 2010

Below is my response to an article posted on Ruby Psuedo’s blog. The original post, ‘10 Notions to consider about how kids use their phones… Up and at ‘em again: Vanity‘ is 12 months old. But the themes are still being widely discussed.

Physical manifestations of technology—like phone handsets—undoubtedly accompany an element of vanity (like any other ‘wearable’ good). And the idea of phones as a fashion accessory is by no means a new idea. But the maintenance of a digital presence is just a function of technology, social trends and the migration of everything that once existed offline, online (and vice versa). As you pointed out in a previous post, there’s no such thing as online/offline anymore –which means [save the proportional few who would tend towards vain anyway] kids living through social applications are not vain. The cloud is just part of where they/we live.

In short, how kids choose their handsets is often seeped in vanity, how they use them isn’t.

Thoughts?

  • Zoeo

    My Daughter Ruby, loves her purple metallic Samsung phone, prepaid – by me. Its goes to school with her, and she uses the txt and email functions to communicate to either her mum or dad, depending on which week it is.. (separated family) She is very adept at using it, and shares information about school, send pics..etc, To Ruby, its just a phone, no vanity, and is a part of her everyday life, ie like packing her lunch for school, she also makes sure her phone is charged and in her bag.

  • andyjmiller

    Thanks Zoe. I think the point you're making is quite similar to mine. Although, for your daughter neither the choice of handset or how she uses it is in any way vain.

    How old is your daughter? Do you think that's likely to change between the ages of 9-15? That's the key age group I'm referring to in this post.

  • Zoeo

    Ruby, is 7 years old, and will probably change the use the use of her phone, most likely as more of her own friends start to use phones as well.. Then I suppose her digital network will expand as gets older.

blog comments powered by Disqus