Today's Ypulse Youth Advisory Board post comes from Libby who reports back from SXSW Interactive on some of the youthier insights gleaned, trends spotted and more! Remember  you can communicate directly with any member of the Ypulse Youth Advisory Board by emailing them at youthadvisoryboard at ypulse.com…or just leave a comment below.

Gen Y Highlights From SXSW Interactive

Earlier this month, I attended SXSW Interactive in Austin. For those unfamiliar with SXSW (sometimes referred to as Adult Spring Break), it is a huge conference/festival with interactive, music and film components, equally famous for its nightlife and networking as its panels and product launches. It was my first time attending, and I was thrilled to be in an environment of like-minded individuals passionate about the future of communication. I absorbed way too much information to share in a single post, but here are the highlights I saw:

Panels.
Negotiating the parent/teen divide over social networking. This panel included two high school students and two parents with varying levels of comfort on social media. Moderator Karen Rayne has a great write-up with highlights on her blog. The teens talked about using their privacy settings (both were concerned with their family catching them in a lie if they posted a status update from a party), and although the parents differed in their knowledge of social media, they both agreed that understanding what Facebook, etc. does is key to knowing how to set limits and talk about it with their children. All agreed that parents and teens need to talk about social media. Parents need to understand what their kids do online without spying on them, and teens need to understand their parents’ concerns about privacy and safety.

Why Gen Y wants to work “with” you, not “for” you. I only saw a little of this panel after I skipped out on a dud down the hall. It was a group of 5 Gen Y employees discussing the Gen Y workforce and dispelling some myths about entitlement and narcissism. Overall I thought it was a successful panel (you can read good recaps here and here) although occasionally the casual town-hall forum crept into chaotic territory and confirmed the stereotype that our generation is more than a little disorganized and immature.

One wholehearted agreement: I do prefer a work-life blend to a work-life balance. I want to be friends with my co-workers; I want to skip the office in the morning to go running but then stay until 9:00pm to finish a project. But then again…I have a sneaking suspicion that will change when we have families of our own, and our kids’ soccer schedules don’t allow us to be as flexible and spontaneous.

Trends
Location-based. I’m not just talking about the much-hyped Foursquare (Editor's Note: See YAB member Chase's post on Foursquare for more) and Gowalla; I’m talking about smart mobile content that tailors itself to your location. Google mobile search results and applications like favored Gen Y resource Yelp are starting to tiptoe into this territory, but imagine if sites like Wikipedia or TripAdvisor knew where you were and could prompt you with information about the tourist attractions in your area?

Transmedia. Transmedia differs from integrated media in that each piece of media delivers a unique viewpoint into the story and experience. For example, I might get the Twitter updates from one character, read a blog about news events in the community where the story is taking place, and watch YouTube videos where the characters interact. I definitely see this taking off for Gen Y with a smart use of Facebook, YouTube and mass media to advance a plot.

Brands
Pepsi was a major sponsor and gave away gamer-friendly Mountain Dew, along with Diet Pepsi and Pepsi, around the convention center. Additionally, Pepsi hosted a Refresh challenge asking attendees to vote for the cause that would receive $50,000. Because the causes were each being pitched by prominent people in the interactive industry, the project gained a lot of awareness through Twitter and from panelists.

Microsoft. I wouldn’t ordinarily count Microsoft as a Gen Y brand, but displays at their rooftop party on Monday night were worth noting. Microsoft was demonstrating a kiosk that would be set up in a department store and allow shoppers to touch a piece of clothing on a model and be directed to that item in the store, along with price and size information. It still had a lot of kinks to work out (the controls were not even remotely intuitive) but the concept was outstanding, and it could really help stores like JC Penney and Sears connect with younger shoppers.

About Libby

After growing up on a farm in North Dakota, Libby Issendorf moved to Minneapolis to attend the University of Minnesota. She discovered her passion for brands and media as a member of her school’s first-place National Student Advertising Competition team. After graduation in 2008, she began her career as a media analyst at an ad agency in Minneapolis. Libby now works as a New Media Strategist at an ad agency in Fargo, ND. Outside of work, she loves blogging at Yaybia.com, the Minnesota Twins, being really geeky with her iPhone, and finally living in the same city as her fiance.

Categorized under: Web, Youth Advisory Board

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