January 29, 2006
Firing up youthful creativity
Teenagers are making their own entertainment in ways never before possible. Alex Pell for Times Online discovers how they record their adventures, then share them with friends.
"The most chilling images of the past week showed a teenager callously holding a camphone to video her three mates while they beat up a passer-by. All four were jailed for a killing that resulted from another attack that night. The whole episode reveals a distressing aspect of the voyeur society that new technology facilitates. Not all young people are thugs, though. Indeed, many now apply cheaply available everyday gadgets to far more sociable ends.
... Alex Chin, 19, an A-level student from Windsor and his friends almost always video their skateboarding runs, either with a camcorder or, more likely, with their mobile phones. Alex explains that the person doing a difficult skateboard trick cannot see whatever “crazy stuff they’ve done, unless it’s being filmed. And wanting to nail a trick, on camera, encourages you to repeat it until you get it perfect”.
... Teenagers are able to share ideas in ways impossible to conceive a decade ago. There may be something disconcerting about their constant need to video each other, rather than going out to play for the sake of it. ... There is no denying that technology has changed their world. They no longer want to be the best on their street. For good or ill, they belong to a virtual gang, whether they chat, show off or play computer games online in teams, or clans, based all over the world."
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