Consumer 3.0: They aren't just like us

We are now living in a world that is more connected and instant then ever before. We are constantly being bombarded with media messages influencing almost all of the decisions that we make on a day to day basis. The Kaiser Family Foundation recently reported on media multitasking and America's youth and found that today's youth uses media in a much different way then any other cohort. This generation is all about media multi-tasking, using multiple forms of media and balancing more then one message all at the same time. For example, I am right now typing into my blog, listening to i-tunes, and checking my e-mail, all while the t.v. is on in the background. Now it may sound like a lot, but a media multi-tasker would not be that impressed because this is their norm. Introduce generation 3.0, as Peter Lauria calls them in a February 2007 issue of Media Magazine. Generation 3.0 is the new group of media multi-taskers growing up in our fast paced world, and they don't look like consumers at all. They are as much a creator as a consumer, as Lauria states, "Consumer 3.0 writes, edits, splices, shoots, and manipulates original or reproduced content".

Media is being used as a tool now to create identities for this generation's youth. Most kids have a myspace or a facebook, which instantly connects them to millions of people all over the world. On this page they can create, explore, or explain through their words, music, videos, and pictures their own personal identity.

So how do you reach or even just learn about an audience that knows how to use media maybe even better then you? I would say instead of learning how you can target this audience and make them listen to you, the industry should listen to them. Involve their work in projects, get them involved. This is a generation that doesn't just want to read about what's going on, they want to act, create, move. What better way then to stand aside and let them?