Oracle Online

These post-teenage values are nothing new, though. Ask your parents if they enjoyed your grandparents blaring Lawrence Welk over the stereo when they were getting ready to watch their favorite TV show. We are no different from any other generation of young people in our quest for individuality, except for the fact that our self-molded culture has acceptably shifted the focus from social and interpersonal interaction to the empowerment of the individual. Our comfort zone is the widest it’s ever been and becoming more personalized; we now have playlists for every mood of our lives.

Working to make life easier is a human instinct that we share with every other generation. Every generation has technologically advanced past the previous, so naturally, life is easiest for us. We should all be in favor of progress, as we (iPods in hand) represent a progressive culture, but the finish line of person-to-person interaction seems to be in sight. Well, at least it’s nearing the last lap.

People said the same things about television. Everyone will become zombies in front of the glow and people will never leave the house. Reality will be reduced to simply an electromagnetic concept. Well, people didn’t become zombies (at least in popular conception), but it did open the door for a whole new means of advertising and channel for commercialism.

The same thing happened with the Internet, but to a different degree. Unlike our parents’ generation of strictly one-sided advertisement, the Internet now offers a reciprocal advertiser-consumer relationship. The audience sees ads, but now is empowered to delete the window, investigate, or select not to receive ads entirely.

Our iPod generation, formerly defined by the Internet, accepts this not as an innovation, but the norm. Don’t want to go to the wildly outdated supermarket? Well, Simon delivers. Like the changing face for the iPod interface, we want to maximize the efficiency of our lives using the minimal amount of space.

The Internet is the new mall. Sites such as MySpace and Facebook line the e-hallways with comments and wall posts, as well as every retail site imaginable advertising to us and offering their goods. The “new stores” offer us a cheaper rate, the complete selection, and above all, customization. That’s what we’re aboutčtailoring our lifestyles. Why? Because we can.

In combination with those once degenerate Gen X-er’s we have reached the point that a person could never leave the home, and depending on one’s mental stability, could live a manageable to decent life.

We could never do that though, could we? Of course not, we’re social creatures. Right? Well, because we realistically still have to go out, let’s it easier on ourselves. Let’s just take home with us in our pockets.

Our comfort zone is as wide as it’s ever been, and thanks to the work of generations before us, we have been e-socialized. One would hope that we all still enjoy social contact, and although the preceding are arguments given to emphasize a point, our generation will forever be bound to mobile technology. We are linked, but it is important for us to recognize and reinforce interpersonal skills, regardless.