Below are the first two paragraphs of a posting from danah boyd on her blog Apophenia, related to how young people use online and offline venues for everyday activities like shopping. It is a striking anecdotal story and I recommend reading it in its entirety. Also interesting from a research perspective is that this blog entry is part of a research project in which boyd is involved: Digital Youth Research. This particular form of collective observation and reflection seems most suitable for those of us involved in this seminar and the research papers each of you will be writing. This PhD candidate is, by the way, one of the leading authorities on youth and social media; see the JCMC theme issue (October 2007) she co-edited and her list of scholarly publications.
Technology and the World of Consumption
I had just finished giving a talk about youth culture to a room full of professionals who worked in the retail industry when a woman raised her hand to tell me a story. It was homecoming season and her daughter Mary was going to go to homecoming for the first time. What fascinated this mother was that her daughter's approach to shopping was completely different than her own.
Using Google and a variety of online shopping sites, Mary researched dresses online, getting a sense for what styles she liked and reading information about what was considered stylish that year. Next, Mary and her friends went to the local department store as a small group, toting along their digital cameras (even though they're banned). They tried on the dresses, taking pictures of each other in the ones that fit. Upon returning home, Mary uploaded the photos to her Facebook and asked her broader group of friends to comment on which they liked the best. Based on this feedback, she decided which dress to purchase, but didn't tell anyone because she wanted her choice to be a surprise. Rather than returning to the store, Mary purchased the same dress online at a cheaper price based on the information on the tag that she had written down when she initially saw the dress. She went for the cheaper option because her mother had given her a set budget for homecoming shopping; this allowed her to spend the rest on accessories.
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