Mobile Me & You- Instant Messaging apps: Northern Europe edition(part 8)
We live in a society where mobile phones have won a permanent place in our lives. Nowadays, they seem to have become a necessity for most people and especially for millennials. Thus, it has been a very interesting task for us to explore the “relationship” that young people have with their mobile phones, in the framework of New Consuming Trends course of Panteion University, taught by our professor Mrs Betty Tsakarestou. During this course our team participated on a research project called Mobile Me and You concerning mobile collaborative consumption and sharing economy that are now on the rise. My team specifically chose to focus our part of the research on the use of instant messaging apps.
During our project, we conducted interviews with people from Europe and America, but in this article we are going to indicate the insights that we collected from Northern Europe. So, let’s explore the mobile life of three students from Finland and Ireland.
Tamsin Martin is a 21 year old girl from Ireland who studies French and German literature. She claims that she uses her phone a lot during the day, 5 hours more or less, mainly before she goes to sleep. If we took away her phone she would realize that she doesn’t need it that much, so she said that “It’s going to be a good thing but I would feel weird at first”. Moreover she uses apps to schedule her day, like reminders and notes in her iPhone.
For college she uses Google Drive, Microsoft one-drive and camera to take photos of books and notes. She also uses her phone to look up something quickly and to find some necessary videos on YouTube. She listens to music and watches series through her phone and that makes her one of the few that prefer mobile over their laptops.
Tamsin shares many stuff with others and she loves sending photos and videos through Whatsapp and Facebook Messenger. Snapchat is also a really useful app for her ,because she can catch up with her friends. Although she claims that she doesn’t use her phone while with others, she adds that sometimes she might use it to show something to her friends.
She also claims that her phone makes her feel connected in terms of social media and being able to communicate through them. On the other hand, she feels disconnected from the real world. She uses platforms like Airbnb, but she needs to be sure about her security at first. She is not interested in any influencer and loves online shopping mainly through her laptop.
When it comes to instant messaging apps her favorites are Messenger and WhatsApp, because they are the most popular and are helping her keep in touch with her friends all over the world. She also creates many group chats, because they’re helping her in organizing. In addition, she separates instant messaging apps from email, because she thinks that the first one is for her private life and the second one is more professional.
Watch Tamsin’s interview here.
Our second interviewee was Jani Suoranta a 24 years old guy from Finland who studies Information Technology. He spends 1,5 hours per day with his phone and for him the worst part of losing his phone is losing contact with his friends. He uses calendar and alarm clock for scheduling and note apps for university. He prefers laptop for university and work but he prefers his phone for reading texts. He claims that his phone makes him feel disconnected that’s why he never uses it when he is with friends and he has separate numbers for work and for friends. He follows only a few influencers on twitter and he trusts platforms like Airbnb.
Although he uses bank and mobile payment apps, he’s not into online shopping. His favorite apps are WhatsApp and Telegram, because they help him connect with people that he never met. When it comes on messaging, he prefers texting and voice messages. He makes group chats but he erases them after. It’s also crucial to say that he hates Snapchat and Instagram, as he finds them “useless”.
Ilona Haltunnen is a Finish girl, who studies languages and she is 24 years old. Normally she spends 5 hours per day with her phone and for her, losing it, means losing contact of her employer and her friends. To begin with, she doesn’t use any apps for scheduling but she has apps for her work, like “office 365” and email. When it comes to work, she prefers her computer, but for communication and social media she uses her phone. On the one hand, she has Instagram for public content and Snapchat for more private. She feels really connected when she has her phone, mainly when it comes to work, but she never uses it when she is with friends.
Watch Jani and Ilona’s interview here.
She trusts platforms like Airbnb, but she uses her pc for staff like that. She doesn’t use her phone for online shopping, or mobile payments, she prefers her pc, instead. Also, she follows some influencers and she uses her apps in the same way her friends do. She claims that “Facebook dies and Instagram is the new trend”. Her favorite instant messaging apps are WhatsApp because “it’s cheap and easy” and Snapchat for “funny content”. She’s into text messaging, voice messaging, photos and memes. About group chats she uses them a lot but she thinks they are distracting.
To sum up we can say that millennials in Northern Europe use the same apps more or less and they are sharing quite about the same ideas for them. Mobile is a really useful tool in their lives and makes them easier.
These interviews were only two of the ten that we conducted for this project. If you found them interesting you can continue your reading on the other articles of myself or the ones of my teammates Athena Styllou and Konstantina Nikolopoulou on the links below.
