Last Saturday, as I have done for many years, I paid my usual visit to my grandparents. If I had to describe them, “modern” would not really fit. Even so, they have always worked hard and overcome every hardship life threw at them. So when they got a tablet through a promotion from a prestigious newspaper, the door opened to a new world they had never imagined. Never even dreamed of.
Now they have a Facebook profile.
According to the Pew Internet & American Life Project, 73% of all internet users over 18 in the United States use a social network. The main reason they log in is to interact with their children, grandchildren and other relatives.
The doorbell rings! It’s Paco, a small farmer from a nearby village who, with good advice, reinvented his business and now sells his farm produce online. It turns out my grandparents already shop online while I waste my time in lines and with shopping carts.
While making dinner, I turn on the radio (a relic of times gone by). It is estimated that around 10% of older people use the internet. Loneliness and memories are apparent reasons why an older person might go online, but they are not the only ones. Browsing helps them move away from a sedentary life, as it encourages learning new skills.
The European Union (EU) predicts that in 6 years, by 2020, around 25% of the European population will be around 65. By 2040, for the first time in history, there will be more older people than children.
image source: http://veugentgran.blogspot.com.es/
Will seniors be the social network’s main market niche in the near future? Will they be the ones to save Facebook from imminent death, as some experts predict? Recent studies highlight that people over 65 are the fastest-growing group on Facebook in recent months. Meanwhile, younger audiences have diversified their activity across social networks.
There is a maxim that anyone (Facebook currently has more than 1.2 billion monthly active users) who spreads an idea will sooner or later lose interest in it and stop sharing it. Perhaps Facebook will simply disappear and another social network will take its place.
What seems unlikely right now is that the needs and satisfactions that social networks, and Facebook in particular, fulfill will disappear completely.
Do you know anyone like my grandparents? What does the future hold?
