We Get Old So Fast

Over at Wired Workplace, Brittany notes that folks are already starting to analyze the generation beyond mine, dubbing them Generation Z (enough with the letters already, I think). This makes me feel ancient. But I do think there's going to be one key difference between Millenials and the workers who come next: I'm an older Millenial, I guess, but I do remember what it was like to get the internet at home. I remember the pokey, blue-screen DOS-operated computers we had at school. I remember the pokiness of America Online, the primitive chatrooms, and venturing beyond them into the web. Those memories make me feel like someone's grandma next to my younger brother, who had a fantasy baseball team online at a younger age than I even had an email address. And I think that growing up with the internet in a fairly mature form is going to mean that the generation behind me is going to have much less tolerance for outdated technology, antiquated computers, and slow-moving information. Whether that will affect their styles in other areas, I'm not sure. But it means as agencies update their technology and their means of communication, they need to think two generations down the road, not just one.