THE "@" GENERATION STRIKES

Glenn Reynolds has the longest and most boring analysis of press decline, Craigs List, and the organization of tree media you may ever see, and he takes 5,000 words to miss the obvious. The much sought after young males between 16 and 25 have been joined by the "easy lay" girls between 14 and 21 who are using what can best be called "social web sites" as their method of communication. There are simply a thousand, and counting, local area web sites aimed at young people who "meet" over an interest about a rock band, a media hustler, or various other subjects of interest to them. They then actually "follow up" and meet with like minded young people at a coffee shop, club, or concert and continue the socialization.

This means that the dire predictions of a generation isolated from talking with each other is breeding the exact opposite, a generation that meets each other over the web and then in person to "talk." The dominant media is labeling the new generation "The @ Generation" a discription that might fit. There is advertising at the sites for products that interest teens (latest CDs, video games, sports, NY Jets etc.), but not other things. Yet.

I don't want to link you to a website so you can cruise hot high school babes but here is the dominant national site (MySpace) with 40 million members --- forty million is correct --- and it is growing. You will of course observe that there is no "news" there, but the need for certain kinds of information is provided by the teens and young adults themselves and not by MSM. A pretty long essay, but accurate according to my experience with kids, is HERE. Does this spell finito to advertising driven media? You decide.