Editorial Articles

Those of us who attended the recent Figaro Conference pondered and debated whether social media has or will become, or indeed is an effective communications channel. Who are the experts here? Those of us speaking or writing about it or the very people using?

At the conference and in these pages we have listened, learned and considered the most effective ways. We read about case studies. We listen to ‘experts’. We tried and continue to try to rid ourselves of ‘mass media thinking’ as Alan Moore so rightly puts it. Classically we think in ways that define the world we grew up in. To a good number of us: we are trying to learn our way through this chaotic media shift. In short we are defining ourselves as digital immigrants. That is according to Professor Urs Gasser of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society. In the same way as a previous generation had the same unsettling feeling in 1954 with the birth of commercial television, albeit the digital wave is on steroids and the past 10 let alone 5 years has seen change in media like never before, there is a learning curve as consumers shift their media consumption. That learning curve is change and change is unsettling.

To those born after 1980 and especially those young consumers of tomorrow born after 2000 there are no barriers between digital and real world. That is obsolete thinking. Anyone born after 1980 has grown up in the digital age and to this generation media are not exclusive. There is no web 2.0, this term neatly puts this period of upheaval into an old, friendly term we digital immigrants grasp. Even the term web 3.0 is obsolete, that is if it was ever relevant. Investigations have already confirmed that today’s teenagers really do have more flexible thumbs. Ask a child in Korea to ring a doorbell and whilst most of us would use our index finger they automatically use their thumbs. Korea has the fastest broadband on the planet. It isn’t just parents and teachers, but also company executives and politicians who are quite rightly concerned with the consequences of this intensive use of new media. As an example Professor Gasser found that by the time our children reach adulthood they will have spent around 20,000 hours in contact with digital technologies – which is about the same amount of time to become a professional pianist. Let’s not forget: consumers are running mission control. Marketers, those in communications or the world’s CEO’s are not.

Digital Natives demonstrate their media juggling every minute of every day. Not because they think ‘what shall I use now’? They use a selection of communications channels at their disposal based on instinct. Professor Gasser went on to discover that only 16% of American youths send emails today (a widely known fact: email is in decline). The primary end up point of these emails? Parents or teachers who are, of course, Digital Immigrants. This fact alone Demonstrates ‘Digital Natives astonishing precision to fine tune tools to the requirement of a specific social situation’, as the Professor noted.

Ultimately it’s across the world of music that this new world order had the most impact. There has been an epic shift in power, consumption and business model. If the entire internet is strongly shaped by a strict code of sharing, music equals sharing. The notion that consumers are running mission control is absolute in the world of music and at the heart of this new order is social currency, the desire to let the world know ‘I found this band/artist/group before anyone’ and ‘I’m going to broadcast the fact wherever I can’. Just look at the number of tweets across the music category shouting ‘listening to ...’ or ‘just found ...’. Status updates regularly announce new bands being seen or listened to. Hundreds of blogs exist with the sole purpose of being first to ‘break’ a new artist or band, this is social currency, ‘I am at the forefront of the music world’.

Last fm launched 7 years ago and with 40 million monthly users worldwide is at the heart of this musical movement. As an example of this notion of sharing and social currency: up to 800 times a second users around the world share with us the music they are listening to. That’s 40 billion tracks since we launched, listened to across 600 different devices (iPod/touch/phone, Spotify, We7, Winamp work in partnership with Last fm for example). If an average song is 3 ½ minutes long this 40 billion equates to 4.4million tracks a day listened to, or 186,000 tracks an hour. The hype chart is one output of this. Users listen charts are created (most listened to track, band, artist. Biggest riser week on week, newest entry week on week and so on) so bands that are just breaking into the world are picked up by last.fm’s software and listed. The community then takes this information and shouts about it. All part of the rich tapestry that is Last fm, the world of music and the lives of Digital Natives.

Miles Lewis
Senior Vice President, International Advertising Sales, CBSi/last.fm