You can’t replace it. You can’t duplicate it. Even in this day and age, where you can feasibly know every important piece of information about someone’s life without ever having spoken to them – or, for that matter, met them – human contact is still important.

People lived for centuries without the constant connection of social media, computers and smartphones. They didn’t live without real-world families and friendships.

We may be a digital generation, but we have analog lives, too.

I, for one, would much rather be at a party with my friends than at home reading tweets and text messages about what a great time they’re having. I would rather be taking the pictures than seeing them later on Facebook. It gets boring staring at a screen – and, if you do it long enough, it gives you a serious headache.

If anything, our analog lives are made more complex by our digital ones. Not only do we need stellar interview and phone skills, but our e-mail and texting has to look professional when the situation requires.

And that doesn’t even scratch the surface. Our Twitter accounts, Facebook pages, MySpace profiles (if they exist anymore), and everything Google-able has to appear spick and span and viewable by potential employers, colleges and parents. That keg stand you did at that frat party freshman year was a lot easier to hide 10 years ago.

Not to mention, your digital world wouldn’t be very exciting if your analog one wasn’t filled with people and activities. Without those first connections…well, you’re kind of just a creeper looking for friends in a chatroom.

When it comes down to it, our digital lives complement our analog ones. And it should never be the other way around.

Digital natives, what’s your take?

Photo Credit: detune

What made the night even more entertaining was the fact that two of my friends constantly tweeted their opinions throughout the night. Not gonna lie, some of the stuff they were saying was pretty funny, for example,

‘They announced that the Twilight kids would be coming up, and my mom goes: “Guess that’s the salute to horror.” BAM!’ via @grace_kendall

‘Feel like I watched an episode of I Love the 80s but really its I Love John Hughes #genius’  via @GTproductions.

At one point, I even acknowledged on my own Twitter how much I enjoyed both of my friends comments. The immediate response from @grace_kendall : Ha, glad you appreciate it! My mom thinks I’m just talking to myself. According to @GTproductions “I loved the tweets, it made the show a global experience, I was tweeting with someone in the UK and in Cali about it, and instantly!”

I didn’t go through the trouble of trolling the Twitter-sphere to see what everyone was saying, and would occasionally glance at the Twitter feed that showed up on the Google page when I needed to look up an actor or a film.

The thing that makes Twitter such a great platform for this kind of sharing is the fact that now, instead of just talking to those that are also watching the show with us (even if that is just our goldfish, Oscar) we have the ability to impart our opinion to the world. Plus, those that want to hear us, like I wanted to hear my friends, are able to do so. And those that want to shut us out, can just ignore us! I just wanted to know what my friends were saying, and Twitter gave me this option. For people like @GTproductions, she even took the opportunity to engage with others from around the world. If I had wanted to follow hashtag topics to see what everyone was saying, I had that alternative as well.

Who knows, Twitter might be the starting ground for the next Roger Ebert.

What was your Twitter Academy Awards experience?

Image via ianmunroe

Just finished typing up the notes from my internship meeting and outlined goals to be reached by the next conference. I realize I should go back over the notes for the two tests I have tomorrow, but I need to prepare my draft for my Ad Team presentation on Tuesday. Not to mention this post is long over due. After a deep breath and a drag from my Red Bull I prepare myself for another sleepless night.

Sound familiar? If you’re a fellow millennial I’m sure we could compare notes. Here is a snap shot of my responsibilities:

1. As a full-time student at Texas Tech, I have taken anywhere from fifteen to eighteen credits a semester and have participated in summer school every single summer of my college career. I spend roughly twenty-five hours a week going to school, studying for tests and working on homework.

2. I have three internships that require 45-50 hours a week.

3. I am the design editor at Daily Toreador Newspaper, which requires about twenty hours a week.

4. I serve as AE for a National Student Advertising Competition Team, which takes at least fifteen hours a week.

5. I write for The Next Great Generation for at least three hours a week.

In a seven-day week with 24-hour days there are 168 hours. I spend about 110 of those hours doing work. That leaves me about sixty hours to take care of the rest of my life.

In plain speak: I’M BUSY! Not to mention I am recently engaged and planning my wedding, actively searching for a job–feel free to forward any job opportunities if you’re in HR–and maintaining what limited social life I have (this occurs occasionally on Fridays and Saturdays). I pull all-nighters once or twice a week, and that’s just to keep up; it gets really crazy around finals time. Seriously, I should stock in Red Bull. With my purchasing habits I know this stock will not soon plummet.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining; I love absolutely everything I do. I participate in all of the activities only because I know that I am able to complete all tasks that are assigned to me to their fullest potential. Some people ask me how I have free time, it’s simple: multitasking! If I’m in class and the professor is late, I work on something else. When driving around town doing errands for my internship, I place all the phone calls I need to make during the day. During informal meetings I bring my dinner. Basically I’ll do what it takes to take care of all of my responsibilities and keep my sanity intact. There may be a few times I’ve changed for work in the car or inhaled dinner to make it to my meeting on time, but superior time management skills help me take care of business.

This situation isn’t unique, most of my friends are super humans like myself. They work several jobs, volunteer, rush for sororities and fraternities, participate in internships and various other activities. If you’re a millennial in college I’d bet that your schedule is just as crazy as mine, if not more so. I think it would be most accurate to call our generation a group of overachievers and I consider it to be a huge privilege to be apart of such an active generation.

I think @addy_dren said it best, “It seems like we fit 48h of activities into 24h.” Amen sister.

Do you have a crazy schedule? Share it in the comments. Do you have great strategies on how to accomplish everything? Share them.

Photo Credit: hiyori13

After confirming that I knew a good number of people that either use baby wipes or know of a close friend that uses baby wipes, I went to the place every question is always answered, Google.

To my surprise, that search was nothing new, and it actually came up first as you can see.  What I don’t get is why now?  Baby wipes have been around forever, what makes someone switch?

As I was recently ordering groceries on www.peapod.com, a new slew of products showed up: adult wipes, listed under the normal paper goods section.  So what gives? Is this a secret most have hid and is suddenly “tipped” as Malcolm Gladwell would say?

Now, I’ve been paying far more attention to toilet paper commercials.  I have not seen one for adult wipes, yet.   However, if you examine toilet paper advertising, as I’m sure most don’t, the debate between softness has subsided, at least for now.  Take a look at what Cottonelle is doing, www.cottonellerollpoll.com.  Which way do you roll?  But maybe, the question should be, do you roll?

So, I dug a little deeper to discover a bit about this trend.  First, I learned that this isn’t exactly a new product, but the moist wipes have not taken hold as quickly in the United States.  Cottonelle was the first to lunch a rolled moist cloth for adults in 2001.  I also read hundreds of individuals commenting around the web about wipes over toilet paper.  Here are my conclusions for choosing wipes over toilet paper:

1. Wipes get you cleaner.
2. Some say wipes are more refreshing. (Although I admit I’m not sure how your butt feels refreshed)
3. Wipes are softer on sensitive skin.
4. Some argue that using one wipe is more environmentally friendly than using a bunch of toilet paper.
5. Many also use wipes in conjunction with toilet paper.

So, my question to Gen Y is: do you use wipes or toilet paper?  Where do we stand on this trend?

The Film Your Issue competition, in its 5th year, is looking for solution-project ideas to front-burner issues from young adults 14 to 24 in a 3-minute video format, with accompanying one-sheet description.

The new Issue Song competition is looking for original 3-minute songs using the power of music to illuminate front-burner issues.

We see ourselves at the critical nexus of digital video media, user-generated-content, the internet, social networking, public service and activism – specifically geared to millennial youth 14 to 24.

-From the Film Your Issue Website

I’d like to begin by clearly stating that I think “Film Your Issue” is a good program. Gen Y loves creating content and sharing online, and this contest capitalizes on the current popularity of online video. It also benefits from a strategic partnership with YouTube, the #1 online brand as ranked by video streams.

The program has been able to secure some pretty awesome individuals on the jury. Tom Brokaw. Jack Black. Yoko Ono. Deepak Chopra. And the competition has a history of influential, distinguished judges, including Barack Obama, George Clooney, and Anderson Cooper.

Most importantly, the competition brings awareness to social issues using a medium with which Gen Y is extremely comfortable. So, yes — I think the competition is good — but I do have a few concerns.

My first concern is regarding the set age limits. When first researching this program I mentioned it to a Gen X friend. He thought it was such a great idea that he expressed interest in participating. Hearing the unfortunate news that that contestants must be between the ages of 14 and 24 was a real buzzkill. I understand the reasons for the limitations, but I’m not convinced that this was the best move. As a marketer who always wants to maximize competition submissions, I generally adhere to the belief that limiting participation in any competition is a no-no.

Another concern is that the range of artistic and technical capabilities (and lack thereof) may result in a playing field that isn’t quite level. What if one contestant has an absolutely groundbreaking solution for a major problem, but he simply doesn’t have the technical skills to create a compelling video? I know that the What’s Your Issue Foundation will soon offer video tutorials for beginners, but as of now, this issue remains.

My greatest concern, however, is the application of the solutions. How will winning ideas be put into practice?

In terms of prizes and awards, the competition’s site advises that winners will receive the opportunity to privately present their solution to the Obama administration. Other prizes include an Apple iPod Touch, a trip to Los Angeles to attend the awards ceremony, and a presentation of the winner on iTunes and YouTube. These prizes are fine and dandy (and some are pretty cool!), but none of them will directly result in implementation of the winning solutions. I’m surprised that there are no sponsors offering the funding needed. How has this not been picked up on by socially-conscious corporations? The mainstream press? CNN? MTV? WTF?

When it comes to solving major world problems, ideas are great and essential, but in the end, it’s all about the benjamins, baby. And I think this is the key issue I have with the competition, as well as many other online social initiatives — it’s all talk, and no action.

In his blog Ingenioustries, Joel Kelly recently suggested that social media lowers the bar for doing good, in that it enables us to “participate” in a social movement via “small, inconsequential actions.” He claims that essentially we are “a generation of conspicuously compassionate, ‘passionate’ people who accomplish nothing.” Well, are we?

So overall, I would like to reiterate — this is a good program — but if there were actionable ways to bring the solutions presented to life, it could be great.

Do brands have a duty to offer healthy food? Or is the individual entirely responsible for making good eating choices?

What does Gen Y have to say? Should we hold brands to a higher standard? McDonalds, Pizza Hut, Frito Lay? What do you think?

Universities supposedly give us a global education. They encourage us to take foreign languages and study abroad. They encourage us to study the histories and political systems of foreign countries. But that is how far their global education goes. Universities supposedly prepare us for real life in a world of globalization. I appreciate their efforts but the sad truth is that they don’t.

At one point of our lives, each one of us will work with someone from a different country. Some of us will live and work in a foreign country. Universities should prepare us for this instead of wasting our time with pointless classes and partial programs.

We take theology classes to find inner peace, but many millennials still walk around confused or atheist, not knowing the differences between major religions or appreciating them. We take ethics classes and study Aristotle, Plato, and Kant without recognizing that ethics is influenced by culture. We waste our time studying biological processes and physical laws that we forget as soon as our final exams are over instead of investing our time in something that would be more helpful for our future careers in a global environment.

We study foreign languages and literature but we rarely have the opportunity to take a class in Business Chinese or Business Italian. An engineering or economics student almost never takes a class in Intercultural or Cross-cultural Communications and learns what the social and communication norms are in different societies. We are taught complex theories and ideologies to supposedly apply to our future careers, but we don’t even know how to apply for a job in a foreign country.

We don’t know how to write a CV in the European format. Who would think that one has to put a picture and a date of birth? We don’t even know how to hand a business card in Japan. We don’t know how to greet people in Indonesia. We don’t know that the American hand sign for OK means zero in Germany. We don’t know that the American hand sign for one actually means two in many southern European countries.

How are we supposed to know all this information and even more? Maybe you would say “google it; you are the digital natives.” I don’t pay tens of thousands of dollars every year to google things. I don’t pay tens of thousands of dollars to learn things on my well-tested trial-and-error method, because some errors are too big and too costly. I don’t want universities to teach us everything. But they should provide us with the basics to successfully adapt to different cultures and societies and collaborate with people from different countries. They should provide us with the basics to successfully start a career in a foreign country. They should provide us with the basics to do business with people from around the world. That is what I pay tens of thousands of dollars for every year.

What do you pay tuition fees for?

I graduate in May.

If you are in the same situation, this sentence probably frightens every brain cell you have. The fact that everyone asks what I am going to do after graduation doesn’t help at all. If you have the luxury to have graduated already—or if you just started college—lucky you! I am jealous.

I started researching companies, networking, cleaning up my Facebook profile, and all other things we are advised to do to get a job in this economy a long time ago. This winter break I was just checking what kind of jobs are out there. Just to get an idea. Then my mom asked: “Why are you so picky? Why don’t you apply for every job in your field that you can do?”

Dear Mom: I don’t want just any job in my field! I don’t want to work something just because I know how to do it! I don’t want to spend eight hours a day designing surveys and focus groups because I know how to do it. I don’t want to spend eight hours a day writing copy for resort brochures because I know how to do it. I don’t want to spend eight hours a day crunching numbers and trying to find out what percentage of people between eighteen and twenty-five buy frozen pizzas because I know how to do it. I don’t mind doing all these and other activities, but I can’t imagine doing only one of them every day, five days a week, fifty-two weeks a year.

I want a job that challenges me every day. I want a job that allows me to be creative. I want a job that is interesting. I want a job that makes me wake up in the morning and go to work with passion and desire. I want a job that makes me go to bed thinking, “that was a great day!” every night. I want a job that makes me happy!

A few days ago, I came across such a job. The job description was amazing. According to it, the job was interesting, challenging and required creativity. I researched the company and it turned out it was innovative and socially responsible. I knew I would be happy to have the job, so I applied. I applied for a job in Singapore.

Have I ever been in Singapore? No. Do I speak the language? No. Do I care? No.

All I care about is that I want a job that makes me happy for a company that is socially responsible. That’s it. I can sum up all my requirements in one sentence. I don’t need a job in a prestigious firm. I don’t need a job that pays me well (well I do, but it is not a major requirement). I don’t need a business car or any other perks. It doesn’t matter if the perfect job is in the USA, Bulgaria, UK, or Singapore. Borders won’t stop me. Applying for visas, getting work permissions, and navigating bureaucracy won’t stop me.

What do you think? Would you look for the perfect job in a foreign country? Would you move to a foreign country for a job?

But now, here’s something that might not be so obvious: social media has changed our friendships – how we start them, how we maintain them, and even what we consider a friendship.

When you’re in pre-school and kindergarten, you choose your friends based on who is nice and shares their toys with you (and, if you believe in cooties, you avoid the opposite sex). If you meet a friend outside of school, it’s usually in a playgroup or activity arranged by your parents.

In grammar school and high school, you start finding friends with similar interests, both in school and at after-school activities. Generally these friends all live in your school district or at least your town, so the friends you make are at least partially based on your location. The field is even more narrowed if you consider that, based on where your school is and if it is public or private, or based on the activity you’re involved in, the friends you make may be from a certain class or socio-economic group, or of a particular race or background.

In college, though, there’s a whole world of new friendships opened. You can meet people from different places and completely different backgrounds than yourself. You won’t become friends with everyone, but you will encounter these different people in class, activities and social situations, some more often than others.

Social media, at least message boards and sites like Twitter, is a virtual college – it considerably expands your pool of potential friends and acquaintances, even more, in fact, than college does. It’s perfectly acceptable to “follow” or converse with people you do not know, because they have something to say that is interesting or relevant to your hobbies and interests, career or life.

(Due to some crazy, unspoken rules, however, most people would tell you that doing the same thing on Facebook is just plain creepy. You don’t friend those you don’t know, for the most part, but exceptions do occur. We could do an entire piece on social media etiquette because of this stuff.)

But social media doesn’t just alter how we start friendships. Once we have these virtual and real-life friendships, social media also affects how we keep them.

If you’re connected on Facebook and Twitter, if you have Skype, a cell phone, and an IM screen name, there’s virtually no way to feel disconnected from a friend, no matter how far away they are. Even if you catch up via a nightly or weekly phone call, doing so is completely different than it would have been 10 years ago. By the time that call comes, you’ll already know most of what’s going on thanks to social media or texting.

In fact, due to the nature of social media, we sometimes refer to people we’ve only talked on online as friends, only to then find ourselves fishing for an explanation of how and why we consider these people friends although we’ve never actually met because others think it’s strange.

I do find the whole online friendship thing a little odd, but that doesn’t mean I don’t do it. I’ve never met the other writers on this site because I don’t live in Boston, but I know that if I were to meet them, we’d probably soon be talking like we’ve known each other forever – because of social media.

And just because I find it odd doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate it. Twitter allows me to find funny and interesting information and share it with other people, like I would in a conversation. Skype makes it so much easier to keep in touch with a friend in China. And Facebook and IM allowed me to keep in touch while I was away at school without running up a huge cell phone bill.

That’s not to say we don’t appreciate the importance of real-world interaction. We really do. No matter how a friendship begins, it cannot develop through instant messages and Twitter updates alone.

But I’m grateful that social media makes it all a little bit easier.

Photo Credit: intersectionconsulting

Teenage girls get them to rebel against their parents.  Many businessmen have them hidden under their three-piece suits.  Soccer moms have butterflies on their ankles because they “look pretty.” Thirty years from now, either 50% of the population will be inked, or the next generation will see what a 30 year-old tattoo really looks like, and the trend will slow way down.

Tattoos are an art form.  Some people like oil paintings, others like ancient sculptures. I think there’s nothing more beautiful than a well inked tattoo. I love the stories behind tattoos.  Most tattoos have meaning, and generally it represents an important moment in a person’s life. There’s something compelling about the permanence of a tattoo.

The other thing I love about tattoos is how much they can tell us about people. A tattoo can tell you a lot about the person wearing it, but it can also tell you a lot about the people who react to it.

The reactions to a tattoo are fascinating because while they run the gamut from surprised, to impressed, to nauseated, to disdainful, they almost always give a small glimpse into the person who has the reaction.  I’m not suggesting that you can tell exactly what kind of a person someone is based on how they react to the news that someone has a tattoo, but I do believe it says something about that person, and about what that person thinks of you.

I have a tattoo on my left shoulder. Not many people know that, because I don’t often walk around with my shirt off. Still, somehow, in the past two weeks, I’ve had people remark on the fact that I’m inked on three occasions.  The reactions have gone from, “That’s so cool,” from a colleague at work, to “Is that political?” from a stranger, to “I never would have thought you would have a tattoo,” from a fellow writer.

The last reaction got me thinking.  Why not?  What kind of person has a tattoo?  What about me makes me seem like I would not be that kind of person?

Obviously, tattoos still have not reached the mainstream level where the mention that you have one no longer causes a reaction.  In fact, tattoos are still marginal enough that the knowledge that a person has one is enough for others to adjust their perception of him or her, even if only slightly. In that sense, people who have tattoos are lumped into a subculture. A very strange subculture, with very little common ground among them.

The only thing that people with tattoos have in common is that they’ve been inked, and in most cases, they like body art. Beyond that, there is no longer a “type” of person who gets a tattoo. There may be various types, who get them for similar reasons, but there is no one type. I have a hard time identifying with the soccer moms with butterflies on their ankles, or with bikers that have more inked flesh than not.

Still, despite this fact, there’s still a social perception that there is a “type” of person who gets tattooed. Western societies are very fond of breaking people up into pre-defined types. It makes the job of the census bureau easier. It makes government’s job easier when passing laws for large groups of people. It makes marketers’ jobs easier when advertising to a specific demographic. It’s time we all stopped to consider just how similar the individuals within these groups really are.

One such group that might be more dissimilar than we think is Gen Y.  The one thing that Gen Y has in common is age, and while there might be some similar traits among individuals in this group, it doesn’t do anyone any favours to try to define a specific set of characteristics for an entire generation. It’s tempting to say that Gen Y is entitled and tech savvy, but it’s no more accurate as a blanket descriptor than it is to say that anyone with a tattoo is a rebel.  I can think of no better proof of this point than the articles on this very site.  They express individual viewpoints that show as many points of divergence as they do of convergence.

I have a tattoo. I am part of Gen Y. You can use that to describe me. But please don’t use it to define me.

Photo Credit: vramak