Influx

As a teen growing up 10, 20, 30 or even 40 years ago, your were often identified and defined by the music you listened to, you built your personal style and lifestyle around the bands and the genre of music you liked. You were passionate about the music, the genre and the attitude that surrounded it.

Think Quadrophenia.

We are now at a time when genres are being busted apart; peer-to-peer sharing, MP3 players, iTunes and Napster have all contributed to encourage more diversity across musical tastes and styles. Many kids have hard drives of over 10,000 tracks, in old money, that’s about 750 albums, in the days of vinyl; there were few 14-year-old kids with a collection that large.

With that much music, how do they define themselves?

It’s now just part of the “piece together and use culture” and we are hearing it more in music with acts like DJ Dangermouse LCD Soundsystem and not forgetting, the now completely mainstream “mash-up”, a genre that was outed to the mainstream in this year’s Grammy awards.

This probably has broad ramifications for teens in general, as they have less and less stuff that’s truly their own to identify with, even the average age of the video gamer today is just under 30, and nowunder 5 kids can have their own punk clothes

Today, what does it even mean to be a teen and how do you stake out your own space with kids that are more like teens and adults who refuse to grow up?

Has it now become just “You Inc.” and is your tribe even relevant?

Have tribes just fragmented into micro-tribes?