Correction: Anastasia misread a headline about the premiere of "The American Mall" yesterday -- it wasn't last night if you went looking for it on MTV -- it's Monday night. Sorry about that!
Hi-tech dorm digs (universities are tricking out dorms to make them more appealing to millennials) (Engadget)
- Gen Y is still broke (with the average college grad having at least $20,000 in debt... on top of credit card debt...) (MSN)
- WB Online (now in beta, will officially launch August 27 and plans to stream old favorites like "Gilmore Girls" and "Friends," as well as a brand new series from Josh Schwartz, the creator of "The OC" and "Gossip Girl") (Media Week)
- Nickelodeon's magic formula (the network finds success because of their easy-to-digest 22-minute entertainment) (Ad Age, reg. required)
- The kids aren't alright (kid magazines' ad sales and readerships are quickly declining. But one mag, "Discovery Girls," might be doing okay) (Media Post, reg. required) (Mercury News)
- ShopLikeAnna (new social networking site that allows girls under 15 to shop and chat in a safe, parent-approved environment)
- Scion's funk (after five year's of success, Scion hits a bump in the road) (CNET)
- Cool comic from Converse (about how to deal with a bully. Be in a constant state of photography, wear a bear suit - you know, the regular...thanks Chet!)
CosmoGIRL! tries a new cover look with new fonts, understated colors, and a more sophisticated celebrity shot. Lauren Conrad, who has now been on reality TV for more than five years, gives a behind-the-scenes look (although, with reality TV, isn't everything behind-the-scenes?) at her life as a fashion designer and savvy businesswomen. The magazine also interviews Avril Lavigne who, like Lauren, is dabbling in designing clothes. Inspiring readers to explore their interests, the mag features five girls who pursue passions "outside of the mainstream." Just in time for the movie release, Project 2024 - a internship scholarship program that encourages girls to follow their dreams - focuses on The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants' author Ann Brashares. Plus, CosmoGIRL's annual best-in-beauty awards and the requisite back-to-school fashion.
Bound to be a bestseller, Seventeen's cover girl Miley Cyrus talks candidly about falling in love with Nick Jonas and "the extreme lengths she went to heal from her heartbreak." Heavy stuff! This is Seventeen's big back-to-school issue, so they have loads of fall fashion -- 926 tips, if you're counting. Adding a cool spin, they have included several pages of coupons and online shopping codes, with a percentage of the sales donated to charity. Because 72% of teen girls believe that their appearance is being judged daily at school, body image expert Jessica Weiner explains how to handle mean remarks from classmates. Plus, Seventeen explores how playing sports can change girls' lives (see highlights from their survey with the WNBA in yesterday's post).
Cover girl Vanessa Hudgens is coy about her boyfriend, but touches on edgy upcoming projects and tells how much her faithful fans mean to her. Teen Vogue catches up with Hannah Bailey from "American Teen," Kira Plastinina from "American Mall," and punk rock princess Beth Ditto from The Gossip. In addition to setting the facts straight about the upcoming election (economy, health care, environment, and Iraq), they reveal recent research about stress in the lives of teen girls (one-third feel overstressed). Covering all of the bases, the A to Z back-to-school fashion guide includes everything from grunger Doc Martens to queen bee headbands.
The SXSW Panel Picker has launched -- for those of you unfamiliar with the event and its programming process, the Panel Picker is a nifty app that lets folks vote on which panels they would like to be included at the SXSW Interactive Festival, which runs concurrently with the SXSW Film Festival. I have been attending and speaking at SXSW for the past three years and have to say, it's one of my favorite conferences. It's an opportunity to network with some of the brightest minds in the technology space, learn about new sites and have fun since a big aspect of the event is the party scene at night.
Last year I moderated a very successful teen panel focused on how teens are using the Web and cell phones, what companies get right and where they can improve. I have proposed a similar panel for this year's fest and hope you can help me make it happen. The registration is quick and painless in order to vote, so please take a minute to show your support. Vote for the panel here.
Also, we threw a Ypulse all ages event in '08 with a teen band and spoken word poets - you can see the photos here. If any companies in the youth space who are attending this year want to partner with us to throw an even bigger event, let me know.
It's Friday, and Alli has some Ypulse Books goodness that includes a round up of titles that have been filling up her snail mail box -- definitely a vampire theme happening. And in today's Ypulse Book Essentials, follow the links to why '1984' is usually number 1 on top 100 lists, how Alloy is packaging its books for TV and movies, how libraries may now be competing with paid downloads, and of course, much more.
Disney knows what boys like... (their own channel. The L.A. Times, reg. required, on the relaunch Toon Disney as Disney XD, for tween boys - the image is of Kelly Blatz who will star in Disney XD's "Aaron Stone." Plus Disney "leading Hollywood to the video game Holy Grail." And guess who's been reaching teen boys for like forever? Weird Al!) (Portfolio via Wired) (The Telegraph)
- 'Mama I'm coming home' ("This year, 77 percent of college grads moved back home with their parents after graduation, up from 73 percent last year and 67 percent the year before." And out of all the "generations at work," a new survey finds Gen Y is the least engaged. Plus corporations now widely adopting video games as training tools for those hard to engage Millennials) (Silicon Valley Business Journal) (Forbes)
I was never a jock. I briefly wanted to be and tried out for varsity soccer in 9th grade at the all girls school I attended in Nashville, TN. Let's just say I didn't have the lung capacity (last one on the field running laps...could have been the cigs). I settled for class clown instead. Still I always envied the girls who played -- especially their camaraderie.
Seventeen and the WNBA put out a press release highlighting the results from their new study on girls and sports. I'm not sure how they defined sports, but they found a whopping 83 percent of girls play sports (I'm guessing sports was broadly defined to include individual sports). The research also found:
- Basketball ranked as the number one participatory sport
- The top reason girls say they play sports is to exercise (68.4%)
- Other top reasons included forming friendships, competing and representing their schools
Challenges that young female sports enthusiasts endure...
- 33% of girls who don't play sports say it's because they're worried that they wouldn't be good at it
- 35% of girls also say their teams don't get as much equipment or field time as the boys' teams
- 35% of girls have heard their peers make homophobic remarks about female athletes
- The survey also revealed that 66% of teen girls believe that cheerleading is a sport, not some sideline event
- 71% think female cheerleaders should cheer at girls' sports events
Fear of my peers thinking I might be a lesbian never crossed my mind in choosing not to participate in sports -- just my inability to run for long periods of time (and lack of drive to really work on that one). I wish I had -- it might have kept me out of trouble. Evidently, homophobia is alive and well in high schools, not only affecting LGBT students but may be impacting some girls' decisions on whether or not to play sports...
Lisa from China Youthology (a company that works on consumer insights for marketing, communication, and product design targeting the youth in China market) emailed to let me know about a series of blog posts they are planning that will focus on "the views of Chinese youth on the Olympic games, nation, and sports, their media behavior of watching the games, and their reaction to the great deal of Olympic related marketing and PR activities." They kicked off the series with an interesting background post focusing on fundamental changes in the beliefs and values of Chinese youth including: higher national pride and growing awareness of social responsibility. I found the dramatic role of the recent devastating earthquake in her background post particularly interesting as it related to higher national pride:
A new impression about government: since of time of Mao, perhaps China first time sees the affection of youth in their government leaders during the earthquake. 'Take good care of yourself, dear Grandpa Wen (Wen Jiabao, Premier)' gained extrodinary popularity on the online forums, facebook walls, etc.
And growing awareness of social responsibility:
Gaining awareness of the social responsibility of corporate: the success of the earthquake PR of Wang Laoji (a local ready-to-drink beverage, donated RMB 100 millions), youth's dissatisfaction with some giant international brands in their indifference in the China's big disaster...
MySpace star Kate Voegele (is being sponsored by the University of Phoenix for her first tour....she is also attending the University of Phoenix while on tour. Plus MySpace is the official web partner of The Commission on Presidential Debates and will be offering ways for users to interact during the debates here)
- 'The Secret World of Sam King' (latest branded webisodes to launch on Bebo - "in conjunction with Universal Records UK. The series revolves around Sam, a junior employee in the Universal Music mailroom, who rallies the Bebo community to help him recruit new artists to the label - in fact, the first episode will feature a cameo of the Jonas Brothers...")
- Become a guitar hero (cool new video site Guitarinstructor.com launches to help teach us all to play guitar. And speaking of new sites, check out OPENSports, which is sports coverage + fantasy sports but more social. And vh1 gets into the gossip game with Scandalist. And more on Rocketon [in private alpha] which allows users to surf the web with their avatars) (Digital Journal)
Let's kick this one off with Forbes list of top tween earners -- although it should be more like top earners popular with tweens since Miley Cyrus is tied with "Harry Potter's" Daniel Radcliffe for number one (each earning $25 million last year). Next up, according to the Baltimore Sun, the Jonas Bros. aren't just popular with tweens [and teens and evidently college students], but with moms. The Wall Street Journal weighs in on Traveling Pants 2 echoing that it's all about the girls vs. the pants this time around.
New research covered in today's Media Post (reg. required) says tweens like to shop online before they have mom and dad buy for them. For example, "61% of respondents said that they had involved search in the purchase or recommendation process for electronics like video game systems, mp3 players and digital cameras."
And The N launches a mobile site while the L.A. Times reluctantly disses on the new Sesame website comparing it to corporate competitors like Disney and Nickelodeon. Finally, one theme I've noticed in reviewing all the Ypulse Youth Advisory Board apps is how many tweens and teens love to cook. Seems like Jr. Chefs of America knows this, too.
Just in time for the start of the summer Olympics in Beijing, Harris Interactive (a Ypulse Research sponsor), sent over some fun research they did on what aspect of the games teens and tweens are most likely to tune into. Here's what they found:
- Just under half of 13 -18 year olds in the U.S. express an interest (46%) in the upcoming Olympics
- Only one quarter (27%) who say they are extremely or very interested (oof)
- Older teen boys (ages 16-18) show the greatest interest and represent the only age group where over half of youth are interested in the sporting event
- Teens overall are a larger audience for the Olympics than tweens (ages 8-12) who report only a 28% interest
- Overall, teens say they are most interested in following swimming (40%), gymnastics (38%) and track and field (33%)
- The top three Olympic sports that teen boys are interested in watching or reading about are track and field (35%), swimming (34%), and basketball (34%)
- Gymnastics, on the other hand, holds the attention of teen girls, with over half (56%) most interested in following this sport, followed by swimming (46%), and diving (35%)
- Six in ten (59%) say that they plan to watch Olympics sporting events on TV
- A far smaller number of teens are interested in reading about (22%) or watching (14%) Olympic sporting events online
- Almost two-thirds (62%) agree that the Olympics help to build a better and more peaceful world, four times the amount who disagree (16%) with this statement
- Teens who say they are interested in the Olympics are even more likely to agree that the Games are about more than merely medals and marketing (71%)
In other interesting TV-related research, Youth Trends lets us in on what young TV junkies are buzzing about when it comes to the fall TV season (hint: It's not the new "90210"): "Fringe" on FOX (J.J. Abrams), HBO's "True Blood," and Joss Whedon's "Dollhouse" also on FOX. They're also excited about NBC's latest import "Kath and Kim" and ""My Own Worst Enemy" starring Christian Slater. For returning shows...it's all about "The Hills."
Hi-tech dorm digs (universities are tricking out dorms to make them more appealing to millennials) (Engadget)
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