Social Media study: which one is winning with teens?

So, do you Facebook? Instagram? Tweet? Snapchat? Telephone? Write letters?

Well, kudos for you if it’s the last one, it’s almost a lost art, but today we’re talking more social than artistic media and the popularity contest that is after the trendsetting teenager vote.

Piper Jaffray recently conducted a survey of how important various social media companies are in teenagers lives.

Facebook is not doing so well with the kids these days, but Instagram? They’re on fleek. (Did we use that right?)

The company surveyed an (admittedly rather small) sample of 6200 teenagers with the average age of 16. 25% of the respondents worked part time. This was all part of the “Taking stock with Teens survey” which is conducted twice a year focusing on teen spending and brand preference, and which is used by high up executives to know what’s cool and what’s not, and by investors to know what’s worthwhile investing in- and what’s not (anymore).

Piper Jaffray / Via piperjaffray.com

Even though Facebook looks like it’s slumping – it’s not all bad news for the OG. According to another study released last week by the Pew Research center, among people aged 13-17, 71% use Facebook, 52% use Instagram and 41% use Snapchat.

Facebook Privacy Change is a comin’

This is going to be a quick one, guys, because going on and on and on about Facebook privacy changes is important but kinda boring, and no doubt you’ll see it repeated many times on your newsfeed.

But just in case you don’t we felt you better know!

Facebook is getting rid of a privacy feature that let users limit who can find them on the social network.

With an announcement on Thursday, Facebook announced that you will no longer have control over whether users can find you when they try to search for you.  The feature is called “Who can look up your timeline by name?”

For those who didn’t have this setting enabled would have, with their eagle eyes, seen it disappear last December, but those who have had it enabled will start to see removal notices in the coming weeks.

According to the Facebook guys, only a single digit percentage of the almost 1.2 Billion people on it’s network used the setting, so they’ve decided to take it away as a privacy option.

So if you had the tick box that let you hide from search enabled, uh, sorry? Now people will be able to see that you have a Facebook account. But keep in mind these words from Michael Richter, Facebook’s Chief Privacy Officer.

“The best way to control what people can find about you on Facebook is to choose who can see the individual things you share.”

It’s important to remember that if you care about your privacy in relation to the information you share on you Facebook Profile, you should check and update your privacy settings often.

The ‘Friend’s Only’ option is your… friend. Friend.

Image courtesy of Facebook & Seattle Wolf.