Swedish teens aren't on Twitter
Young Swedish blogger Gustav Holmström has written a thoughtful insight into how young Swedish teens are communicating right now. This comes hot on the heels of Morgan Stanley’s report that Twitter isn’t for teens earlier this week.
The upshot of Holmström’s post is that Swedish teens in the 15-16 age group are primarily using text messages (or SMS as we say here in Sweden), Bilddagboken, a social media photo site a bit like Flickr, and MSM as their communication channels of choice.
Swedish teenagers…already have their set routine of Texting + Bilddagboken + MSM and don’t want to change channel under any circumstances because [they] know that all their mates will answer by text, are logged into MSM and check Bilddagboken. [My translation]
As Holmström points out, one of the benefits of all these channels is that they are available in Swedish. He also reckons “there’s no point wasting time using communication channels that your mates aren’t on.”
Precisely.
The rest of Holmström’s post pretty much confirmed some of my own suspicions about the digital media habits of teens based on my own observations of Mr Teen who lives in my house. Born in 1993, his digital media habits reflect those of Gustav Holmström almost exactly.
A few other highlights from Holmström’s post.
Mobile Phones
I wasn’t shocked to read that Holmström noted that the mobile phone is a central feature of Swedish teens’ life. Mr Teen chez moi is connected to his phone by an invisible umbilical chord. He sends something in the region of 3000 text messages (sms) a month.
Holmström notes:
A mobile is a really important part of a teenager’s life. And in the 15-16 age group Sony Ericsson rule. Everyone has one. Primarily because they’ve always had one, but also because of the Walkman-function which is an important part of a teen’s daily life.
Holmström also notes something that I’ve suspected for a while now:
No one uses email. No one checks their email. You already have you contact channels which are much quicker and better. And more fun. Texting + Bilddagboken + MSM…that’s what counts right now.
Mr Teen has an email address but never uses it. How do I know? Last time I asked him to email me something he asked me if I remembered what his address was!
None of my mates actively use Facebook. It’s used more by senior high school students.
Mr Teen would say the same. He claims Facebook is for people over the age of 35. Rather worryingly, I suspect he might be right.
Image:FlickrCC
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