Digital Native 2.0

As I mentioned in my post on Rural Broadband I've been doing the rounds internally and externally talking about Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants. I'm naturally a person that learns from people around him and through discussion, it's probably why I've built a team of incredibly smart people around me in Worldline, I'm not really an academic so I'm not pre-disposed to reading and absorbing long documents (especially if there is a test to take), if you don't believe me then ask my school teachers that probably could not wait to get me out of the system :)

I've known about the concept of Natives vs Immigrants for some time, I've just never really delved into the low level detail until this year, perhaps there is a budding academic in me after all and it's been suffocating for about 40-years. The most likely scenario though is that I find the topic incredibly interesting, especially if you take it from theory and start to apply into real life (social, work, leisure etc).

I've now given the talk a number of times and recognise that I need new material, there's only so many times you can say the same thing before I get bored never mind the audience. So it got me thinking, what is the evolution from what I've been talking about ?

In my presentations I talk about Digital Natives having a digital DNA, essentially due to the world around them their DNA is imprinted with Digital and it drives how the act, react and how they expect the world to be. If you start to look into DNA via Google you'd find a few things:

1. DNA changes over time (essentially as we age DNA changes, sometimes for better most times for worse sadly)
2. DNA mutates in reaction to the world around it (seen most notably in medicine and the fight against bugs and super bugs)

So I started to investigate a little deeper and I found this text about DNA mutation:

A mutation is a change in DNA, the hereditary material of life. An organism's DNA affects how it looks, how it behaves, and its physiology. So a change in an organism's DNA can cause changes in all aspects of its life. Mutations are essential to evolution; they are the raw material of genetic variation

I'm no scientist but I like to believe I think more scientifically (ie show me method and proof), this text for me supports the Digital world very well.

If we've already accepted that the Digital world has been a challenge for Immigrants (to a greater or lesser degree depending on their desires) as they aren't a natural fit in the Digital Native world then its fair to say that the Digital DNA is born with the Natives and the Immigrants are faced with changing their DNA to adapt to the environment. Most Immigrants will not reach the maturity of their Digital DNA to meet and compete with the Digital Natives but some will (I'm going to claim success in this area of course). So I think the first point above is a good definition for the Immigrant moving into the Native world.

So now to the second point. What I've noted in my presentations is two sets of body language in the room, all my presentations have had a wide range of ages (20-60) so I have a good breadth of Immigrants and Natives.... plus of course the odd Digital Ignorant. What I've observed is:

• The Natives are open and happy to be part of the Digital revolution and feel proud to be deemed a Native. I was going to say smug but that's probably not fair :)
• The Immigrants are a little closed at times and a little defensive but I'd say more over there is a pang of regret that it's a challenge to adapt to this new world. 

Clearly the above is a generalisation but you get what I'm saying. Football analogy time : If you support Real Madrid you are pretty happy as champions of Europe and a little smug I'd say, as Manchester United you realise you were once great but you're not now and you desperately want to be able to compete again but the world is harder and harder to succeed in. Dear Jose, please take note that we want to topple Real Madrid please !

At the end of each of my presentations though I've always left the Natives with a little throw away line. I've said that the Natives of today are the Immigrants of tomorrow but I've not really gone on to define what I really mean. I've known it in my head but only now am I really putting it to "virtual" paper. What I think I mean is that the Digital world won't stay static, it will evolve and the next generation could be seen as Digital Natives 2.0. It will be the evolution of the Digital world and that will be driven by a mutation of the Digital DNA.

Digital Immigrant   >   Digital Native   >   Digital Native 2.0

I think its fair to say that right now there is an evolution in technology around wearables, IoT, AI, robotics and more. Essentially all things we'd term to be leading edge. So things that are at the leading edge today will start out as immature technology, will adapt to the environment and grow to the point where they become a part of your life (same way smart phones & tablets have). This will drive a change in how people interact and will likely once again evolve the Digital world. Those coming to their teens now then are likely to be the Natives 2.0 as they may even bypass some types of social media and technology interaction in favour of the evolving leading edge technology. I'd call it "Tomorrow's World" but then I'd really be showing my age.

So the evolution of leading edge technology drives Digital DNA mutation in the following generations and this will mean today's Digital Natives have to become Immigrants to the 2.0 world. Can they leave behind their attachment to Snapchat, Facebook and their other favoured interactions in the same way todays' Immigrants are doing from paper ? I guess it depends how wide the chasm is to cross and how easy it is to bridge between the two worlds.

So Natives, the challenge is coming, will you freely embrace the challenge of a new generation of Natives that thinks on an evolved and mutated DNA basis or will you claim Ignorance to the Digital Native 2.0 world ?