Social Media and Millenials

My dog is trained to get the newspaper from the end of the driveway every morning. But it's more her thing than mine; I then set it on the counter top and forget about it.

There are four years between my husband and I, and in the realm of relationships that might not seem like a lot, but when you look at the generational wall standing between us our media preferences become clear.

I am a Millennial while he is of Gen X. The line is thin, but it is there. I rarely watch the news; I am online constantly getting my information from RSS feeds, blogs, and e-mail updates from my favorite local and national sources. He, on the other hand, chooses to sit down and read the paper in the morning and have the television on in the background throughout his day. I have no need for a hard copy of the paper... everything can be done online and what's more, updates are sent to me as they happen. I know there was a shooting on the other side of town mere minutes after it occurred. Although I have no interest in beat reporting, I have adapted the mindset of "quicker is better".

So on that note, my morning to-do list includes logging on or signing in to Facebook, MySpace, twitter, yahoo e-mail, my blog, and typically mediabistro.com. These remain up on my browser all day long and I'm amazed at how I manage to stay productive at work while continually flipping back and forth, keeping myself updated. There are several uses for these social networking tools, including both personal and professional. I know exactly what my friend Katie is doing right now, but I also know what my editor is working on- helpful in every sense of the word.

The face of media is changing; not only are newspapers on their way to extinction, but media personalities are not what they once were. Thanks to the likes of Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, the general population (or at least those who are tech savvy enough to have an account on these outlets) can see what their favorite (or least favorite) news anchor is doing at any given moment, see who they partied with on New Year's Eve and what they wore to dinner last night. Where as they used to be faces behind a news desk who told us the happenings of the city, they are now people we feel we know personally. On the one hand, this could add to their credibility because we tend to trust people we know. On the other hand, it could take away from their credibility if we decide we don't like who they are off-screen. For me, it makes them seem more approachable and personable; tapers down their "celebrity status". As the popularity of Twitter grows increasingly each day, it'll be interesting to see the social results of knowing what mood your news anchor is in 20 minutes before he/she appears on camera with a genuine (or is it?)smile.

It's not only that social media is blowing up everywhere that has my interest piqued. I'm also devastated to hear the projected fate of magazines. Although I'm tuned in online, I also adore the idea of reading print magazines. The dailies have failed to keep my interest, but the monthlies still have tremendous value to me through their editorial content; which is most interesting of all in my eyes. It's what I like to write, read, and analyze. I like looking at the layout of each page, the quality of the pictures, the font of the feature article, everything. It's a break from the ever-lovin buzz words that are damn near impossible to keep up with anyway.

USA Today mentioned in an article a few years ago that Millennials are famous for multi-tasking, and that is the essence of what we do. We are completely comfortable with chatting on Skype, checking e-mail, uploading new photos to Flickr, and updating our status on Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace while having a perfectly normal conversation on the phone with our unsuspecting mother who, if she ever found out we weren't giving her our undivided attention would launch into an entirely different lecture than the one she's currently spitting out.

There is much more to analyze regarding social media, but I will at least say this: It is time consuming, completely loaded with information and absolutely thrilling. To know that you can reach a mass audience in less than a minute and get your message across through so many different (and ever-changing) outlets is fascinating.