The Kids Are Alright!

Annual Realtime Generation Survey Reveals 13 – 17 Year Olds Are Tech Savvy, Secure And Demanding • Social ‘not’ working – Majority prefer ‘face-time’ than Facebook; 78% not posting personal information online; are more concerned about internet security or have stopped using social networking sites – savvy and secure! • 46% will expect universities to provide a PC to use or own while they study – the price tag for British universities would average £150million per annum • Only 11% plan to study sciences - Realtime Generation (1) to remain consumers rather than innovators

of technology; Britain faces shortage of tech workers • 65% concerned about credit crunch – Will influence choice of university and anticipate ‘career crisis’

Research commissioned by international IT solutions provider Logicalis, has revealed that today’s 13-17 year olds are becoming far savvier about managing their digital fingerprint, preferring instead to mix and match their use of mobile gadgets and social networking sites with traditional methods such as face-to-face communications, according to formal or informal correspondence. In fact, the majority (29%) would prefer to have face-time with, for example, prospective universities, than any other communications or technology medium. This is a generation that has developed its own 21st century communications etiquette.

Referred to as the ‘Realtime Generation’, 78% are now not posting personal information on social networking sites, are more concerned about their security, or have stopped using these sites altogether. Furthermore, 46% admitted that social networking was less important to them, and that they were using them less frequently. Chris Gabriel, solutions and marketing director for Logicalis, said of the findings; “Whether this is down to better parental control, the effect of media scare stories or just a growing understanding of the risks of social networking, they are now actively managing their digital fingerprints. Or is the social networking explosion starting to wane?”

Conducted annually, the survey, entitled ‘The Realtime Generation – How UK 13-17 year olds are coping in a digital, dangerous and dynamic world’, aims to uncover how this age group is utilising technology, and how they are evolving their lives to cope with the ever growing opportunity to engage with, and through, work and social communications and information tools.