Teens stay connected with voice over IM
July 17, 2007 on 1:18 pm | In News | 16 Comments
Forrester Research released a report last week detailing teen usage of voice over IM (VoIM). Unlike voice over IP (VoIP) studies, this looks specifically at how teens are using the voice features in their instant messaging programs to communicate with friends.
In this report, 13% of the more than 5,000 teens surveyed use VoIM to calls friends or family. Among the popular IM applications, 37% of them are using Yahoo! Messenger to make calls, 32% are using Windows Live Messenger, and coming in third is Skype with 18%. AIM and Google Talk follow after that with 17% and 14%, respectively. iChat, ICQ and others make up the remaining usage.
Not surprisingly, the teens that are using VoIM have large networks of friends (well, not large by MySpace standards, but large nonetheless). 47% of those that use VoIM have 11-50 friends on their IM contact list. However, when asked how many of those they communicate with at least once a week, the majority response was “About half”. Similar trends are seen on social networking sites like MySpace where teens may have hundreds, even thousands of friends, but only communicate consistently with a small fraction of them.
Speaking of MySpace…the Forrester study also asked about the respondents’ usage of social networks. Of those that use voice features, 46% agreed with the statement “Most of the time when I’m online it’s socially related (emailing, IM’ing, MySpace)”. In addition, they’re “usually the first to tell [their] friends about new things” and they’re forging relationships that are completely digital: 32% said they have many friends online that they have never met.
I was with some teens a few weekends ago and was astonished at their amount of daily e-consumption. Texting on their phones, leaving the room to jump on the computer… it was a miracle I was able to have any sort of conversation with them at all. Maybe in their next study Forrester can find out what these teens are doing when they’re not online.
Sarah Bacon
Product Manager
I’m not surprised by this trend. Teens really are changing the modern culture because of things like IMing, VoIP, and social community websites like Yahoo! 360 and Myspace.
BTW, since it is Messenger related, there is a new Yahoo! Messenger build out, which is v8.1.0 Build 413.
http://download.yahoo.com/ycs/msg/dl/msgr8/us/ymsgr810_413_us.exe
Comment by Michael King [Venom] — July 17, 2007 #
haha, the comments show the obvious
. True..true. i was simply..duH o_o when we didn`t have internet installed yet in our college room and heard one dude from my university say: “Man i can`t wait to get that internet installed.. gonna get all these chick`s messenger ids”. Maaan these chicks in front of you and you`re waiting to get your Mess`On to talk to them. How LAME
i use messenger alot too, but feel it`s real utilty when i talk to relatives outside of country or real special people also far away. rest is blah blah that others really seem to enjoy and live on it
Comment by SlicK — July 17, 2007 #
I love Yahoo Phone Out and In service. It’s a great way to give out a phone number to your friends to call and call out from instead of using the conference method. We can walk away from the computer and still chat with a blue tooth headset or compatible usb phone.
I also think the popularity will rise once Yahoo expands on its voice services over IM. Teens and adults will flock in droves if Yahoo could get 3 way calling on the voice service for even an additional fee.
Keep up the good work!
Comment by Scott — July 17, 2007 #
I am glad Yahoo have updated something new!!!!!!!!!!
Comment by Sokhom — July 17, 2007 #
[...] Research ha publicado los resultados de un estudio sobre el uso que los adolescentes hacen de la voz en los servicios de mensajería [...]
Pingback by Cuanta gente habla por Messenger — July 18, 2007 #
Any chance we’ll see voice encryption and conference calls between PC-Phone and PC-PC calls.
Comment by Muzammil — July 18, 2007 #
A voice test answering machine type service like Skype would really really help us paying Yahoo! Voice customers too.
Comment by Muzammil — July 18, 2007 #
well i think yahoo IMing is a great way to chat with people u cant see that often or dont see at all. All of the upgrades that have been made are great and easyer to get where u want on IM. Internet chat is a great thing to have if we didnt have it we would have no way to chat with people we dont see
Comment by serina — July 18, 2007 #
hello everybody i just joined yahoo and i LOVE it
Comment by Rebecca — July 18, 2007 #
Very good to know this blog
Comment by ian — July 18, 2007 #
teens love to chat just like me!!!!!
Comment by haley — July 19, 2007 #
Hello, I know that it is better to write a comment that is related to this post. But I think that here is the only place to ask my question. I hope that you`ll answer it.
Please tell me why there is no way for Yahoo! members to delete their Yahoo! IDs? Because after about 10 years, many of short names that can be appropriate to use as an ID, have gotten unavaliable.
I`d be glad if you don`t remove my comment and answer my question here.
* * *
I hope that Yahoo! never plan to limit its services for Iranian. (like Google)
Thanks.
Comment by Arash — July 20, 2007 #
[...] por Messenger Por:OJObuscador | En: Empresas | 23 Julio 2007 Forrester Research ha publicado los resultados de un estudio sobre el uso que los adolescentes hacen de la voz en los servicios de mensajería [...]
Pingback by Cuanta gente “habla” por Messenger en messenger.es, todo sobre la mensajería instantanea — July 23, 2007 #
Well, not on a Mac though.
Comment by Danijel — July 25, 2007 #
[...] Research ha publicado los resultados de un estudio sobre el uso que los adolescentes hacen de la voz en los servicios de mensajer?a [...]
Pingback by Blog Estilo » Archive » Cuanta gente?habla? por Messenger — July 29, 2007 #
Every time I open Yahoo messenger there are a bunch of porn IM’s popping up. Who in their right minds would let their kids use Yahoo chat until they fix that???
Comment by paddler — August 17, 2007 #