Youth, Social Networking, and The "Deification of Imbecility"

However, this inexorable wave of change sweeps us along, it might be fun to cast a gimlet eye upon upon youth-driven change. At least that's what Nathan Conz - incidentally I&T's most youthful editor - seems to think. Nate offers us all a welcome friday chuckle with Late Late Show host Craig Ferguson's wry take on youth-driven commercial culture as the "deification of imbecility" and the reason "everything sucks."

Among the prominent themes of I&T Daily this week was the emergence of social networking as a marketing and customer service tool. The concept appeared in our conversation with Northwestern Mutual's CTO Karl Gouverneur, in our blog entry about Conning's life distribution study, and in today's piece on the new Novarica report on P&C claims.The rapid rise of social networking has been driven by a combination of technology and demography, but mostly demography. Even if old dogs are learning these new tricks, they are being forced to do so by the activities young turks. The power of platforms such as Facebook and Twitter has been demonstrated by more youthful users, and as they mature as consumers (i.e., have more money to spend) their habits increasingly drive new standards of commercial activity.

New channels mean new opportunities, and it's a matter of indifference whether these things are ultimately good, bad, neutral or both from the whatever standpoint one might critique them. However, this inexorable wave of change sweeps us along, it might be fun to cast a gimlet eye upon upon youth-driven change. At least that's what Nathan Conz - incidentally I&T's youngest editor - seems to think. Nate offers us all a welcome Friday chuckle with Late Late Show host Craig Ferguson's wry take on youth-driven commercial culture as the "deification of imbecility" and the reason "everything sucks."However, this inexorable wave of change sweeps us along, it might be fun to cast a gimlet eye upon upon youth-driven change. At least that's what Nathan Conz - incidentally I&T's most youthful editor - seems to think. Nate offers us all a welcome friday chuckle with Late Late Show host Craig Ferguson's wry take on youth-driven commercial culture as the "deification of imbecility" and the reason "everything sucks."

Anthony O'Donnell has covered technology in the insurance industry since 2000, when he joined the editorial staff of Insurance & Technology. As an editor and reporter for I&T and the InformationWeek Financial Services of TechWeb he has written on all areas of information ... View Full Bio