Time Magazine Article on Millenials

@Wulf: Yeah I agree, it seems like "Millenials" are the biggest generation. I mean Generation X is pretty clearly people born from the 60s to the early 70s, the Baby Boomers are those born between World War II and the late 50s, but I've seen Millenials cover people born from 1977-2000 (or later sometimes, they haven't decided what to call people born post 2000 I don't think).

From what I've heard, Gen X is 1960-1970, Gen Y is 1970-1980, and Millennial is 1980-2000.

Why a period of twenty years for Millenials when the others get 10? In my opinion it should be 90s kids only. We're the first ones that are using smartphones and social networking in large numbers. We're also becoming young adults in the recession and post recession eras. Those are bound to make us different from those that grew up in the eighties.

edited 14th May '13 6:28:27 PM by Kostya

I thought Gen X was late 60s to mid 80s. (say, '68-'84 or so)

Keep in mind there is no set date for Gen Y/Millinnials. Same for Gen X.

Gen X can stretch from the 60's into the Early 80's. Gen Y can stretch from Late 70's to 2000.

Generation X

Generat Y/Millennial

Both span about 20 years.+/- 2 years.

Okay, I went and looked it up.

According to Wikipedia, "Generation X, commonly abbreviated to Gen X, is the generation born after the Western post-World War II baby boom. Demographers, historians and commentators use beginning birth dates from the early 1960s to the early 1980s."

and "Generation Y, also known as the Millennial Generation,[1] is the demographic cohort following Generation X. There are no precise dates for when Generation Y starts and ends. Commentators use beginning birth dates from the latter 1970s, or from the early 1980s to the early 2000s."

You ninja you.

edited 14th May '13 6:41:07 PM by DrunkGirlfriend

I've never heard people born in the early 80s referred to as Gen X. Anyway, all this generational stuff is stupid, since, as Jon Stewart pointed out, they did the exact same article for Gen X back in the 90s.

Too big a gap in my mind. There's a world of difference between me(18, 90s kid) and someone that was born ten years before me(mid eighties). They'd be getting out of high school while the war on terror starts and wouldn't know what smartphones or Facebook are. I'm getting out in the post recession world where those things are commonplace.

edited 14th May '13 6:44:07 PM by Kostya

Not so much dude. I'm 26, and I know what Facebook and smartphones are. Hell, Drunkscriblerian is 34, and he knows what Facebook and smartphones are. If anything, I think we have a more complete view of that sort of technology, because we got to watch it develop.

I think he meant that they wouldn't have know what such things were when they got out of school (due to such things not existing). Though I actually agree with you, the difference between me and the guy born in the 80s isn't that big (though neither is the one between me and the kid born in the noughties).

When I said you wouldn't know what they are I meant your young adult self. Basically the world you entered after high school was a lot different than mine because those things either didn't exist or weren't as integrated into society. The economic and political climate of the country is also far different.

For me these sorts of things have just always been there but you can remember a time when they weren't. I'd think that would change a person's outlook.

I did.

edited 14th May '13 6:58:56 PM by Kostya

Yeah, it's still a bit weird to think back to the time when I wasn't regularly using the Internet to chat to people and have conversations. I was about 14-15 when I started foruming seriously, so it's weird to think back to those days.

In part because I must have had so much free time.

edited 14th May '13 7:01:56 PM by Silasw

Same. I barely resemble my 14 year old self mentally. I admit that's normal for a kid but my views on politics and such changed in the ways they did because I made friends with people in other countries. Without the internet I wouldn't have done that. I can't say for certain how that would have affected me but I have a feeling I'd be much less open to new ideas.

I had a fair bit less of that due to my school being international but it's still strange to look back. I renumber about a year ago I was looking for a shop in London and when I'd gone to it before there had been no such thing as smartphones, so about halfway though looking the old fashioned way I thought to get out my phone and use Goggle Maps (thus I ended up in the Themes).

edited 14th May '13 7:20:25 PM by Silasw

The thing about smartphones is...are... whatever, that even though someone who's 26 now wouldn't have had them fresh out of high school, they're more connected than, say, a 40 year old. They may not have had touchscreens, but cell phones resembled their current selves by 2000, and the Internet had been growing steadily since like '96. Someone who was born in say, '84 still got to experience that rapid expansion of technology while they were teenagers so they're still more than capable of adapting to the new stuff.

edited 14th May '13 7:32:53 PM by Wulf

Also I think the end of the Cold War is a thing, that's something that this generation didn't experience at all. The generation before at least have a few memories of it, we've got nothing (well unless you were born in like 82 and paid a lot of attention to the new from a nearly age).

edited 14th May '13 7:40:12 PM by Silasw

The roughly 20 year spans actually makes sense. It is the basic time frame it takes for someone to go from 0-18 and be considered an adult with a year or two for wiggle room.

Cold war was considered for the most part done in 1991.

edited 14th May '13 7:44:46 PM by TuefelHundenIV

True, but how many 10 year olds (and that's the high end of the generation) would have fully formed memories of the Cold War? I was 7 at the millennium, 8 on 9/11 and 12 on 7/7 but I don't really have proper memories of any of those events. I have a sort of memories of 7/7 but that's because I discussed it with my mother when I phoned her about something else and she thought I was calling about 7/7.

edited 14th May '13 7:59:36 PM by Silasw

Quite a few would have some form of memories about the cold war if you were born in the early first half the Gen Y block. I was 10 when the Cold War ended. Also I remember the fall of the Berlin Wall. I remember both from the news and how school made it out to be a big deal and they explained it for us.

Yeah, I think you're selling kids a bit short there, Silas. I was 10 at Y2K and on 9/11 and remember them well enough. 7/7, I'd actually forgotten all about, but I suspect that's because it happened in London and not the US.

I guess I'm just applying my own terrible memory standard to everyone. Still, that's memories of the Cold War ending, the end of the Cold War was very different from when people were regularly afraid of nuclear armageddon.

I was less than 5 years old when the Wall came down; no memory of the event or its significance at the time. I was in high school when 9/11 happened, though, and I remember the news of that vividly.

I was in elementary school when the Oklahoma City Bombing happened, and I remember that quite vividly, but that might just be because I was living in OKC.

I think I can somewhat remember the OKC bombing, or at least the trail afterwards, and 9/11 is something I remember very vividly. (I was 10 at the time, I'll never forget seeing that massive smoke trail over my neighborhood.)

Maybe the real problem is when companies go out of business because they publish articles that alienate the next generation they need buying their stuff. Our job market would look at least one company better if they didn't do that.

edited 14th May '13 10:48:30 PM by Pykrete