KIDS R US

The number of teenagers using the internet grew 24% in the past four years and 87% of those between the ages of 12 and 17 are online.

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Email is losing its privileged place among many teens as they say they prefer instant messaging (IM) and text messaging on cell phones as ways to connect with their friends. Email is increasingly seen as a tool for communicating with adults such as teachers, institutions like schools, and as a way to convey lengthy and detailed information to large groups. Meanwhile, IM is used for everyday conversations with multiple friends that range from casual to more serious and private exchanges. At the same time, the landline phone still continues to be the most dominant communications medium in teens’ everyday lives, even as 45% of all American teens own a cell phone.

Young people also approach online content from a unique perspective; this is a generation for which the ability to customize and participate in the content they find online has become a normalized practice. In all, 57% of online teens are “Media Makers” and engage in at least one content creating activity: 19% keep a blog, 22% create or work on a personal webpage, 32% create or work on webpages for others, 33% share personal artwork, media or content online, and 19% remix content they find online.|link|