Facebook is for old people. The VMAs are for old people. So are the Emmys, People Magazine, Oscars and TMZ. E-mail is for really old people.
I know way more than my fourteen year old son about A) who Miley Cirus brought to the VMAs (a homeless guy), B) the name of Beyoncé’s daughter (Blue Ivy), and C) the latest Ariana Grande-Nicki Minaj song (Bang-Bang – looks like child porn). Jonah says that his friends don’t talk about Hollywood gossip or even have favorite bands. Some of the girls occasionally talk about Taylor Swift.
So, what do they do? Well, they will power watch a favorite show on Netflix. My son watched all nine seasons of the Office this summer. 300 hours of TV! On his laptop. I’m really proud.
Both of my kids spend a lot of time watching other people playing video games on YouTube. It’s so, so, so boring. I don’t get it. Don’t know about Twitch? Read this and this.
Twitch isn’t the only game in town. There’s Captain Sparklz on YouTube for Minecraft, and Harry101UK for Portal 2. Jonah likes Miniminter for FIFA 14, Inside Gaming and RoosterTeeth. Check out the hit numbers on those videos. Millions.
They spend a lot of time on YouTube watching news shows and music. But really silly music. Ian loves Weebl’s Stuff.
For worldwide soccer, Jonah looks at KickTV and Football Daily. There’s also Bundesliga.
For science, Jonah watches Vsauce.
For animination, there’s Domics.
Ian first music downloads have all been music from his favorite video games, like Portal 2.
Apt. 11d 
Are you sure part of this isn’t gender, not just age.
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Yes.
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Anyway, I don’t watch/read most of those things, but I do have a nearly complete set of enchanted diamond armor/weapons/tools.
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My teen girl is out of it, mostly. But, instagram, piclab, selfies, tumbler, vine are big in the rest of her crowd. And, there’s a definite craving for popularity (i.e. instagram posts are geared towards getting followers and likes). In a couple of the girls I’ve noticed a real eye developing for photography.
We’re also seeing Facebook accounts as the kids turn 13, for the public sharing. Very public, because many of the facebookers have parents, and even friends of parents as friends. They’re also using FB for their extracurriculars, some of which share info on FB, including scheduling info.
I do not understand the watching others play video games (recently read a linked article on a 9 yo who did that for fun, with the commentary leading him to a porn site — the player mentioned a site in the voiceover, kid searched for it, discovered porn, received lecture from parent on how he’s not ready for porn yet). Do the kids do it because they aren’t allowed to play, so watch instead? Or do they get something out of watching others play? (And I’m not being rhetorical. I think it’s important to understand why they enjoy the activity).
I’ll have to test out the weebl site on my 10yo old. He likes the Arrogant Worms.
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Here’s a video by one major twitch personality about why people watch it. http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=MN2jDtRNuCI
I personally watch a fair bit of starcraft online. Almost exclusively tournaments which I enjoy the same way other people like regular sports. I think for some of the biggest twitch events that’s the way to understand it.
For the streamers who play games and allow others to watch, it’s entertainment. And there are tens of thousands of them. You might not like most people playing most video games, but plenty of people enjoy watching people play games well, or badly, or with colorful commentary. Some are funny, some are educational in a how do I play this game way, lots only appeal to a very young crowd. Overall though twitch has something for most people interested in gaming. Most streams don’t get many viewers, but there are just so many and so much variety. Think about it this way – twitch is a little like an enormous aggregator. They provide the technology and anyone can stream. It’s like youtube that way. You don’t have to want to watch the top videos to find some you enjoy.
I very much doubt there is a significant percentage of players who watch because they can’t play unless they are wondering if they want the game in the first place.
Also an important caveat that didn’t make it in to those articles, twitch chat can be and often is as bad as the worst parts on the internet. Some people make extensive use of it, but there are lots of others who ignore it completely.
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I personally watch a fair bit of starcraft online. Almost exclusively tournaments which I enjoy the same way other people like regular sports.
If you enjoy it for the same reasons I like women’s tennis, you’re a sick, sick man.
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I apparently have my safety mode set so that I can’t watch a lot of youtube videos. Will have to figure out how to fix that. In the meantime I’m restricted to hair style and photography videos.
But, I think I can understand the analogy of watching sports. I don’t really understand watching sports, either, but at least I understand that there are people, normal people, who enjoy watching sports and I accept it as an interest I just don’t share.
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My 14 yr old daughter did watch the VMA’s but only because her favorite band (5 Seconds of Summer also called “5SOS” prounounced 5 Sauce!) was going to be on. I think after their awards/performance(?) she stopped watching. She mostly finds new music on Vine and YouTube- lots of cute teen boys with OK voices .
My 12 yr old son has a school project where he has to make a CD cover with artwork and 5 songs listed that convey who he is. He can’t even think of 5 songs he likes or listens to- the songs he likes are all parody songs and mostly he watches YouTube for videos of rollercoasters (his current obsession), soccer from Europe and a few video games.Music is just background for the videos, not something he actively listens to.
Both kids do Instagram but not facebook.
All pretty interesting to think about where this all is going.
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I really like the portal song, why? I think there’s a ear-wormy repetition in the music, and that might be a feature of many video game sounds. Kind of like the Magnum theme.
It would have been a struggle for me to identify 5 songs that describe me when I was 12. But, I wasn’t very musically inclined. When we made a record album cover, I had to ask friends for a name of a band to use. Heart, I think it was. I didn’t listen to their music until years later.
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My son is entering college this fall and we were horrified at how many of his future classmates named Netflix as their hobby. That’s not a hobby! My son also spends hours watching other people playing games, but at least he knows it doesn’t count as a hobby.
All the screen time is really eating into reading, especially reading anything book-length. My son has a couple novels to read before his orientation and he’s been slogging through them and is now starting to look for them as books on tape so he can draw while he listens. Even I, who grew up reading for hours for entertainment, notice I have less patience for books these days, so imagine how it is for younger people, many of whom never developed a lifelong reading habit.
There are so many great things online and I weep for my childhood curiosity which was so often stymied by not being able to figure out the answers to anything I wondered about, but all in all I’m glad I grew up in the 70s and 80s and was always out doing stuff (or in my room reading), and not hanging around online watching makeup tutorials.
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I try to push myself on thinking about these generational divides. The world is a constantly changing place and I find it valuable to think about why I think one activity is better than another. On first glance, calling Netflix a hobby sounds dreadful.
But, is watching video really less intellectually stimulating than reading? It seems to me a lot depends on how you do it. There’s intellectually undemanding reading, too. I do think that reading requires more active involvement than video (that is, at the lowest common denominator of each). But both can be experienced in sophisticated ways as well. There’s solid analysis suggesting that video complexity has grown tremendously, and I feel that I can detect this increase myself, when I watch old movies/tv. My daughter, who has grown up on the most recent diet of television (with longer story arcs, etc.) yells at the television when we watch old stuff, because she thinks they’re hammering ideas into the ground (with looks, and props, and signs).
Calling reading a hobby is socially acceptable, so why shouldn’t film/video be? Socially problematic to refer to a particular streaming service, but, they don’t really mean that, right? They mean they like to watch television series in sequence, as a completed oeuvre.
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I feel that way about mainstream tv – “duck, here comes the exposition”. Everything has to be SOOO spelled out!
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I agree about old TV–a lot of it is almost unwatchable because it’s so slow.
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I’ve gotten out of the habit of watching videos or listening to music at my PC because it tends to wake the sleeping dog. And you know what they say about that.
That said, if I was together enough to slap on a pair of Beats, I’d have no excuse except to listen to online videos and music. Except I much prefer text and images as my delivery system so I gravitate to sites which support those. Long live A03 and Tumblr!
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Linley knows pop culture, though she does marathon Netlix just like Jonah. Her favorites have been Bob’s Burgers, Parks and Rec and OINTNB. I actually look in her Netflix cue to see what to watch. Mason watches other people playing games constantly. I sat down and did it with him one night to convince myself that it wasn’t a lure for pedophiles.
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Both of my sons LOVE watching other people play. A lot of the time is to learn how to play better (e.g. Clash of Clan or Minecraft or the Mario Wii games), but sometimes it’s just for fun — and they do play sometimes, not just watch. My older son, however (12) wants to MAKE those videos himself, edit and have his own YouTube channel (I don’t think he knows what Twitch is, I’d never heard of it until Amazon said it’s buying it!). He’s recorded himself playing and even posted some things, but he doesn’t have enough time to really do much of it.
My kids listen to the music we listen too, but sometimes they find things online. They know and like a few current pop singers. They don’t watch any tv or movies and aren’t interested in that at all! (and when they were little they did watch quite a bit, not anymore).
Thankfully they love to read and I hope that will continue into their teenage years and adulthood. But it’s only some authors that interest them (12 year old LOVES Rick Riordan) and they do binge reading and then don’t read for a while (10 year old likes the Wimpy Kid series).
Kelvin (12) is obsessed with model trains and has spent a lot of time watching youtube videos about it, on & off, like once a year for a few months. It comes and goes, alternates with videogames & reading.
Oh, he’s the little guy who was always obsessed with all things apple and who at 8-9 years old spent hours watching Steve Jobs’ keynotes. 🙂
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(and I should have just posted a general comment, not necessarily under LisaV’s comment… but I had already clicked & started, so I just did it)
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The 12-year-old started guitar this summer and very soon after became enamored of the ukulele (!!!!). She eventually bought herself a ukulele with her own funds and I ordered her a Ukulele for Dummies book, a ukulele chord guide, and 21 Songs in 6 Days. The latter book has a sign up for daily emails with video tutorials, which I’ve set up for C. She’s done a couple of them. It’s a very intriguing model and I’d like to find a similar daily tutorial for the guitar.
I have to mention that the ukulele is not as terrible as I expected. I think I was misled by the fact that not knowing how to play the ukulele has never stopped anybody from playing it in public.
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My junior (wow! junior): anything Benedict Cumberbatch, until this year when he apparently lost favor; Skins, a British teen program of some sort; Miyazaki (but that might be because of me; I started taking them years ago to Miyazaki films), especially Spirited Away; Freaks and Geeks, although it was so so short-lived; the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo trilogy (books, and Swedish movies, not the American one); Mass Effect. Good music, but that’s probably my husband’s influence.
The almost-teens: Appear to be a different generation even than my older daughter. (I think formally they may be classified as a different generation, actually.) They watch games played on youtube, yes. They watch youtubers all the time. They want to do cosplaying and know about strange Japanese characters from I don’t know what–games? cartoons? youtube? That’s who they want to dress up as at Christmas, and has been for a few years, so we have to order their costumes from China. (They come really, really well made and for nothing). The Walking Dead video game. The last episode just came out and my daughter was going absolutely insane; she had to watch it played through on youtube because it wasn’t available for download yet.
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Oh, and I forgot. The Hunger Games books are horrible and Battle Royale, the Japanese book which is similar but much more gory, is better, according to one daughter (I promised to read it, as soon as I’m done with Goldfinch, so I guess I’ll find out…)
And of course I meant dress up at Halloween!
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That’s too bad. I was just thinking “you wear costumes at Christmas?!” That’s awesome!!
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My daughter says the kids in elementary school are a different tech generation, because they grew up w/ iPhones and iPads.
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It blew my mind when I first realized how many people are willing to hand a $400 iPad to a 3-year-old.
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My 11 year old daughter, Netflix’s cooking shows. Lots of cooking shows. Then she goes and cooks. The boys (9 and 5) watch a lot of gaming videos, (especially Stampy Longhead). He’s clean, British and kind of funny. They then try to recreate what they’ve seen although they are migrating to Roblox. Funny videos are in with all ages. Narwhals, It’s raining tacos etc.. I have a hs student who has 67k followers on Vine.
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“My daughter says the kids in elementary school are a different tech generation, because they grew up w/ iPhones and iPads.” What bj said is pretty fascinating. My sons bought an ipad (one to share) with their own money when they were 9 and 7, I think — only 3 years ago, does that qualify as “growing up with it?” They both used computers since they were 3 years old. (sesame street and other PBS websites, mostly).
they did use ipod touches a couple of year earlier. No iphones for our family until 2 years ago. Pretty fascinating discussion!
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