Posted by admin on August 7th, 2009 in Hot Topics, Parenting

Most of the time I talk about teenagers and their use of technology.  Today, I’d like to discuss our use.  While I was at Blogher, I visited the T-Mobile booth.   There weren’t many technology-based products at the conference – I would have liked to see more.   No offense to Tide but there’s only so much to know about soap.**   So, I really enjoyed playing with the  new My Touch 3G (introduced on August 5) .  I own a Blackberry but I’m having yearnings to follow the siren song over to the IPhone side.

T-Mobile’s  product launch  in San Francisco was quite spectacular.  Check out some of the pictures at GeekSugar.    They produced an aerial spectacle in the sky over San Francisco. At noon, 100 skydivers, each dressed as unique personalities to reflect the individuality of the MyTouch experience,  colorfully parachuted in synchronized formations over the city.  I wish I had seen it.  I wish I had the phone.

They Took a Survey

The T-Mobile folks did something productive at their exhibit (besides pitch their products) – they took a survey of how people used technology.  A blogging conference is a pretty good place to gather information about cell phone and technology use.  They were savvy enough afterwards, to share the results with us so we can  share amongst ourselves and perhaps come up with an opinion or two.  Without further ado… here’s the results:

T-Mobile Survey Results:  BlogHer ’09 Conference – Chicago, IL

Respondents: 491

Have you dropped your landline at home to save money?

·         32% – Yes

·         55% – No

·         (13% – No Response)

If you needed to save money on your mobile phone bill, what would you do? (Circle all that apply)

·         30% – Reduce the number of monthly plan minutes

·         21% – Cut back on text/picture messages

·         18% – Eliminate your data plan/access to the web

·         11% – Switch to prepaid

·         36% – Switch to a family plan

If you were to buy yourself a new cell phone, what would be the #1 purchasing factor?

·         9% – Design/color

·         15% – Ability to download applications

·         54% – Multimedia capabilities (camera, video record/playback, music player)

·         3% – Cool accessories

·         13% – Touch screen

·         17% – Other­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­

What social networking sites do you access from your mobile phone? (Circle all that apply)

·         68% – Facebook

·         6% – MySpace

·         75% – Twitter

·         26% – Flickr

·         16% – None

·         7% – Other ­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­

At what age should children have a mobile phone for the first time?

·         11% – Grade school

·         48% – Middle school

·         37% – High school

·         3% – Never, only adults should have cell phones

Of survey respondents that are parents, which do you do most? *

·         52% – Text with your child on their cell phone

·         46% – Call your child on their cell phone

·         2% – Do both equally

Of survey respondents that are parents, have you ever given your toddler, or a friend’s toddler, your cell phone to keep them busy? *

·         60% – Yes

·         40% – No

*Note: These questions were primarily answered by respondents that were parents, which represented approximately 38% of the overall survey respondents (189 people).

**Mea Culpa to Tide. I should have listened more closely to the Tide representative because when I got home to use the new Bounce product they gave me…well let’s just say it deserves another post.