(Fanboy 2008) Teenage e-society has divided itself into distinctive subcultures due to the continued embrace of the Internet and World Wide Web in their every day lives. Results taken from a study of a residential school using findings from observations, surveys and interactions with students discusses how teenagers dominate online environments (Brown et al). The realm for teenagers in cyberspace forms a virtual subculture around them and resonates to the offline 'real world'.
The five main subculture fragmentations of teenage e-society include explorers, socialisers, gamers, transporters and publishers (Brown et al). If you're an explorer (37.6%), you primarily use the Internet to gather information. A socialiser (35.4%) is an individual who uses it to interact socially with family and peers. The gamer (14.9%) involve themselves in online gaming by playing solo or interacting in group play with other peers. Transporters (10.7%) are individuals who use the Internet to download files including movies, audio files and programs. Publishers (1.4%) upload and create content on the Internet for their own purposes or for the benefit of other peers.
Our economy is currently in an Information Age, which refers to the global economy's shift in focus away from the Industrial Age of the production of goods towards the manipulation of information. The majority of teenage e-Society utilises the Internet for exploring (37.6%). Kavanaugh (2005) suggests high Internet usage combined with geographical proximity results in increased communication among existing subculture groups. The close interaction online by teenagers increases subculture stability and it is typical to find gamers discussing gaming online and offline in the 'real world'. Information technology and the Internet relates to the use of electronic mediums to store, process, transmit and retrieve information. These technological advances have drastically changed the lifestyles of teenagers around the world and enabled the introduction of new niche industries around controlling and providing information to users. Since the invention of the World Wide Web (WWW) in 1989, the Internet has transformed into a global network for its users and teenagers of e-Society. It is currently the best place to speed up the flow of relevant information.
Teenagers are emotionally and socially linked to their use of the Internet and WWW, using the medium to break into cyberspace subcultures which are further integrated into their daily lives. The research article by Brown et al. (2005) is a successful research article because the findings are continued on from a previous study at the school and can be resonated back into the 'real world'. It was observed in the study that teenagers at school settle into one of the five subcultures within approximately thirty days of arriving at a school. It is interpersonal experiences which are the pivotal point of subcultures and computer usage since the early days of the Internet. It is particularly useful as an example of data for future research on the residential school and will also enable future researchers an opportunity to understand how the interests, behaviours, patterns and personality types reflect each individual teenage e-society subculture.
We are in a digital world where teenagers across continents unite to share ideas, compete interactively, download files, and work together to build projects and ideas. The development of wireless Internet increased the possibilities of personalising social networking and e-Society subcultures to a broader range of situations. Occasionally, teenagers use information for their own purposes to create and redistribute ideas for other peers and users on the Internet. John Gage (2002) states the Internet is not a thing, a place, a single technology, or a mode of governance. It is an agreement and in the language of those who build it contains a protocol or a specific way of behaving. The dramatic speed of the agreement is startling the world and sweeping across all industry areas including communications, media, governance and commerce.
References
Brown et al. 2006. Subculture Fragmentation of Teenage e-Society. From Iadis Virtual Multi Conference 2006. http://www.iadis.org/Multi2006/Papers/17/S019_WAR.pdf (accessed 3 April 2008).
Fanboy. 2008. Fandom Archives. http://www.fanboy.com/ (accessed 10 May 2008).
Gage, J. 2002. "Decentering Society" available from http://www.civmag.com/articles/C9910E03.html (accessed 1 April 2008).
Kavanaugh, A., Carroll, J.M., Rosson, M.B., Zin, T.T., Reese, D.D. 2005. Community Networks: Where offline communities meet online. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication. Available from http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol10/issue4/kavanaugh/html (accessed 24 March 2008).
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