Gen X outspends younger buyers online
In the last week, 65-year-old Joe Cesario of Arlington Heights downloaded the movie “Wall Street” onto his home computer. He's also downloaded thousands of songs onto his MP3 player.
Barbara Binns, 61, of Arlington Heights, bought music from iTunes and downloaded a few free e-books.
“Once I get my reader (wireless reading device), I'll do it a lot more,” said Binns, a local author. “A 500-page book, to have it in a reader and carry it around? It's nice. Especially for travel.”
It's not just teenagers and twentysomethings downloading music, books and software. A new report by the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project shows 30- to 49-year olds spend money on downloads more than any other age group, and the 50-plus age group does its share of downloading, too.
While it's no surprise that the survey found the 18-29 age group spent more money downloading games and ringtones, it also found Internet users ages 30 to 49 bought more kinds of content – including music, software, apps, e-books and photos. Additionally, 22 percent of the respondents over the age of 65 downloaded software, and 18 percent downloaded news stories.
Jim Jansen, author of the Pew study, said he was surprised to find that 65 percent of Internet users paid for content online, with the average expense being roughly $10 a month for things like subscriptions or music purchases. Higher income and education levels tended to spend more, the survey showed.
Jansen said this is an important trend that many industries will be pleased to hear. Just 10 years ago, there were concerns about whether anyone would pay for downloadable content, which are basically intangible products. However, some industries – such as the music and entertainment industries – have found the right combination of technology and price point that have led to a viable business model.
So while Internet users might have balked at first over paying for things like movies or TV shows, there's been a shift in attitude. Now there's a greater acceptance about paying for online content, Jansen said.
“You can buy a song for 99 cents. It's almost more trouble to try and go find it for free. It's less than a soda. And for $6, you can watch all the movies you want on Netflix,” he said. “This aspect that ‘I've got to find it for free' online is changing.”
Seniors were the least likely to pay for online content, the survey found.
Visitors to the Arlington Heights Memorial Library inside the Arlington Heights Senior Center agree with that. Some come to use the free premium online subscriptions that the library pays for, or they like to use the computer lab to download and print out coupons. But one senior was in the library this week figuring out how to buy and download books on the Kindle electronic reader she got for Christmas.
“Older people are still far behind with technology,” Cesario said. “A lot of them get help from the next generation down, and that helps.”