Click first, ask questions later: understanding teen online behaviour.

Examined are how teenagers engage with technology, particularly the internet; what services, sites and programs they find compelling; and how libraries can use this knowledge to tailor their services to this critical segment of the community. Paper presented at Learning futures conference, Adelaide SA 9-10 March 2007.

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This paper starts with a story about a company that no longer exists. In the early 1990s one of the largest early internet service providers in America was a company called Prodigy. Prodigy was a joint venture between IBM and Sears and it was reasonably successful. One aspect of its service that its customers particularly liked was email, which Prodigy provided in the form of 30 free emails per month. Email was proving so popular that many Prodigy members were sending far more than 30 emails. Prodigy's managers decided to solve this 'problem' by charging for every email over the first 30 its customers sent, figuring that if people liked email so much they would surely pay for it. Not surprisingly, Prodigy's customers left in droves and the company itself was rapidly left in the dustbin of internet history. What is the moral of this story? Listen to your customers. Usually, their behaviour can tell you something about the service you are providing them. (1)

Now, if we as librarians and library service providers accept that we want--in fact need--to connect with young people between the ages of 10 and 20 as a core part of our service mission, then we face a critical challenge. Let us think for a moment about what this connection entails. In fact, it is about building a relationship. Any time we want to have a closer connection with anyone--personally, professionally--we need to improve our understanding of that person's interests, needs, likes, dislikes etc. To the extent we can develop such interests ourselves, we will find some common ground on which to base our relationship.

Now let us think about public libraries. They exist to serve communities, and that means every demographic in those communities. When I visit public libraries--and I have been to more than 100 different library services across Australia--I am nearly always impressed with the facilities and resources devoted to infants, toddlers, and small children. Indeed, at least once or twice a week, during storytime/arts and crafts time most public libraries sound like creches. We know what very small children like, and their needs have remained fairly consistent over the decades--big, durable books with colourful pictures, comfortable furniture that is built for little people, bright coloured walls and floor coverings, and friendly, smiling library staff.

Teenagers

What about teenagers? What sorts of things are they interested in, and how can we communicate and serve them more effectively? It is too easy to dismiss teens as dejected, sour, sullen, noncommunicative adolescents who will eventually grow out of the phase they are in. In fact, the 10-20 demographic represents one of the largest user segments of public libraries. They pour through the doors every afternoon after school, and they use libraries as places to socialise, study, and relax. Maybe it is time we gave more thought to how we can better serve these users and demonstrate relevance to their daily information and learning needs.

The role of technology

The most obvious way we can engage teenagers is through technology. As Timothy Hawkes, the headmaster of The King's School in Sydney said recently, 'technology isn't part of students' lives these days. It is their lives'. (2) Most adults--librarians included use technology as a tool to get their work done, communicate more effectively, and solve problems. Kids look at technology differently. For the vast majority of Australian teens, technology is a first port of call for entertainment. SMS is not used primarily to tell their parents they will be home late from the libraries. It is used to stay in touch with friends, gossip about peers, and generally to socialise. The world wide web is not primarily a research tool. Teens use it as an extension of their personality, to show their friends--and the world--who they are, what they care about, and to build connections with other like minded people.

What sort of technologies do teenagers find compelling? Broadly speaking, they fall into the category of what is coming to be known as web 2.0 technologies. Web 2.0 refers to a range of applications that have been developed for the internet over the past few years that take advantage, generally speaking, of high speed connectivity to deliver levels of interactivity, multimedia, and communication that we never imagined in the 1990s. A few examples worth mentioning are

* Social networking sites--MySpace, FaceBook and similar sites have become enormously popular with young adults as places to connect with friends, socialise, share pictures, music and video from their lives. Note that MySpace was recently purchased by News Corp for US$580 million.

* YouTube has transformed personal video clips--collected on camcorders and more frequently mobile phones, into one of the busiest sites on the internet. If you missed a segment on the evening news, or want to catch the latest gaffe by a politician, log on to YouTube and watch it at your convenience. Note that Google recently purchased YouTube for US$1.65 billion.

* Instant messaging sites--technically these have been around for years. Microsoft's Live Messenger has incorporated multimedia--video audio etc--into instant messaging (or IM) and allows a level of personalisation of its service that is exceptionally appealing to teens. It is worth noting that teens prefer IM over email by a factor of 4 to 1. In fact, most consider email old fashioned while 'instant messaging has become the digital communication backbone of teens' daily lives'. (3)

* VoIP and video conferencing sites--Skype is the most popular VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) service. It lets anyone with a computer talk to anyone else on a computer, with sound quality that leaves land lines in the dust. Recent upgrades make it possible to have video conferences with Skype, and also audio conference calls. Note that eBay purchased Skype recently for US$2.6 billion.

* Blogging--Blog is an abbreviation of web log and is essentially an online diary with the sort of interactivity and global accessibility that the internet brings to all types of publishing. Websites such as Blogger.com make it easy for anyone to create a blog free.

Web 2.0 is much more than the above but if you are not already familiar with these services, give them a try. Most importantly, if you have never sent an IM, download free software--Yahoo, Google, AOL, MSN all offer it--and give it a try. If you and your colleagues at your library all sign up together, you will be able to chat online. It is critical that you start to understand what makes this compelling for young adults before you start to think about tailoring service offerings to better match their needs. I hope you will learn from your experience of web 2.0 technologies just how much the internet in 2007 is about user created and shared content, multimedia experiences, and instant communication and immediate gratification.

Now let us think about how we currently communicate with young adults. Picture your library right now. How does your website communicate with your under 20 users? Do you offer any electronic services specifically geared toward them. Have you ever asked young adults in your library to give you their opinions of your service offerings or what they would like your library to provide?

If we want to communicate with this demographic, we are going to have to think of ways to meet them using the media they find most comfortable. This means enewsletters, blogs for keen readers, SMS alerts and podcasts about events at the library and developing your library's website to provide web 2.0 type experiences for users.

This is not as hard as it might at first sound, and it should be a lot of fun. Blogging software, for example, is free to anyone. Let us not forget that librarians, as some of the first users of listservs, should be well suited to creating these types of communities. I have often wondered what would happen if a library created its own MySpace site that described its offerings and services for young adults and then encouraged its student users to link to it on their MySpaces. In fact, this is exactly what a growing number of libraries across North America are already doing. What a wonderful way to encourage young adults to engage with the library in their virtual world.

Listening to customers

A critical part of this process is learning to listen to what customers are telling us and be willing to respond and move in new directions. Here is an example that you may be familiar with. Nearly five years ago the Council of Australian State Libraries (now National & State Libraries Australasia) established the AskNow! service. AskNow! was imagined as an innovative approach to reference librarianship. Reference librarian operators would log into computers and be available for users who visited the libraries' websites and wished to obtain real time, immediate help with ready reference questions.

It was a fabulous vision and NSLA should be commended for its willingness to innovate in this way. What is even more fascinating is the result of this experiment. Who would you imagine is using this service and what are they using it for? What is the profile of the average user? A hint--it is not a busy 45 year white collar worker looking for a faster way to grab a piece of information before making a presentation to a business group. Over 60 per cent of all users of AskNow! are under 24, and most are school students looking for help with homework.

Yet AskNow! operators are not trained to assist with homework and do not have the sort of online communication skills young people expect when using this technology.

A similar service is New Zealand's AnyQuestions service for school students. Its operators are trained to help kids with reference related homework questions. This is an important step forward and AnyQuestions has, as a result, longer, more meaningful interactions with students and more satisfied users. At the same time AnyQuestions is not able to assist with many curriculum specific questions where students need help that requires expert knowledge of a subject, not just reference expertise.

What lessons can we take from all of this? The world of public libraries is changing, but the world around libraries may be changing even more quickly. It is essential for libraries to keep up with this change in order to remain in touch and relevant to the public. Failure to do so will relegate libraries to serving dwindling constituencies and fading into dusty corners of councils.

Daring to step forward into this new world of technology and innovation does carry risks--but no risk is as great as failing to take that first essential step.

References

(1)For more information about Prodigy see http://internet.eserver.org/Prodigy.txt

(2) Hawkes, T quoted in The Sydney morning herald 2005

(3) PEW Internet & American life project Teens and technology 27 July 2005 p4

Jack Goodman CEO Tutoring Australasia

Jack Goodman BA MPhil is the founder and managing director of Tutoring Australasia. Tutoring Australasia is the only provider in Australia of live, one-to-one, on demand homework support and tutoring services to public, state and territory libraries, schools, and departments of education. Prior to founding Tutoring Australasia Jack was a senior executive at Tutor.com in New York, where he introduced the concept of live homework help to North American public libraries. He received his BA from Princeton University where he majored in American history and wrote his thesis on consumer advocate Ralph Nader. After Princeton, Jack was one of 40 recipients across America to receive a Marshall Scholarship from the British government. He used the scholarship to attend Jesus College, Cambridge University where he earned an MPhil in 17th and 18th century British and American political theory. Email [e-mail]