As a 20 (almost 21!) year old member of the YN community, living in the Midwest, a lot of recent changes to the site, its partners and its direction have caused me to feel a lesser member of the site.

YN boasts that it has members from all over the world, even posting a map entitled "NOISEmakers Around the World" on its "About" page. (I personally make noise from the lovely state of Michigan.) At the same time, the organization launches the "Right to Learn" campaign for people who attend public schools in California...and after years of talking about how much we want a YN endorsed gathering, we find out about the YN Summits...available mostly in California with a couple of other cities thrown in. I know we regularly have international youth find the site, and they always ask if this is just a site for American youth.
Isn't the international nature of the site part of its power? I understand budget constraints may make it easier to host certain activities locally…but that doesn’t justify campaigns which benefit only one out of fifty states in the US…one of a few hundred countries in the world.

According to the "About YN" section of the site, "About YouthNoise
YN is a social networking site for people under the age of 27 who like to connect based on deeper interests than Paris Hilton's wardrobe and want to get engaged within a cause. Find a cause, search for friends, and get involved. Want to free Tibet? Passionate about human rights?

Whatever your cause, network it here."

Why then, with members ranging from 13 (the minimum age for membership) and 27 (YN’s own self-proclaimed limit), would YN press issues which only affect a small percentage of the age range? (We won’t even go into the teeny bopper look and feel of the site…) Many YNers, myself included, have been actively involved with the YouthNOISE organization for 5+ years, and it has become near and dear to our hearts. By making decisions to attract young members to the site, YN essentially dismisses the needs of their members who have supported the site through thick and thin (and even the brief period of pea green message boards!).

It seems like YN has become a place where young adults must struggle for a voice when all signs point to shutting up…and doesn’t the world have enough of that already?

P.S. What ever happened to the YAB? I always thought that was the best tool to ensure youth were "heard" by the staff...

P.P.S. Thanks to Ikki for her titular contribution.

I’ve been thinking a lot this afternoon about YN’s latest two campaigns (Play City not included as it’s too new) and wondering if there is a way to encompass all youth. For starters, as has been pointed out, dating violence is prominent among those aged 14-24. With the BOM campaign, only half of those are being targeted with preventive measures and, as has been explained, that is due to the fact that high schoolers and those in college are at different stages in there life, which is generally true. However, even with that reasoning, YN still leaves out half their base who are also at risk for experiencing dating violence. With that being said, is there anyway to do a campaign within a campaign that targets college-aged youth who may not have a support system and may be getting in over their heads away from home and just need help? It would not only be able to help people out like BOM is purported to do, but it would solve the issue of completely neglecting one at risk-group for the sake of concentrating on another.

I completely understand targeting people with their first relationships, but being at college often causes people to experience their first relationships without constant parental supervision, which can lead to situations that people do not want to happen. From first hand experience, I know what it’s like to experience trauma/Hell away from home with no support system and, due to that, believe that creating a more grown-up version of the BOM campaign could be the solution to getting awareness of abusive relationships out there, as well as helping people spot the risks and just giving people a virtual place to go if they need help. That’s my biggest beef with the BOM campaign. All of us are at risk—why not run two mini-campaigns to help all of us out?

Secondly, I’d like to talk about the Right To Learn Campaign. I’m glad you want to spread it out past California, as I support good education and find it failing in many locations throughout the U.S. To incorporate more YNers, I was wondering if you could do a RTL college style thing, where college students meet up—virtually or in real life—and discuss ways in which to get the sky-rocketing tuitions down. Nowadays, a high school diploma only is worthless for most jobs and college diplomas (or tech school diplomas) are needed to ensure a livable quality of life. However, with the economy in a recession and people losing their loans (I’ve had friends at school who either lost their loans due to the economy or had family who lost jobs and almost had to quit school due to not being able to afford it) along with constantly increasing tuition, room, and board prices, it is hard for those worthy of a college education to get one. For the people who rely on their education to better themselves in life, not being able to pay for school and have to leave can be devastating as some of them know that if they leave now, they’ll never come back. In my opinion, this is along the terms of the RTL campaign and, if possible, incorporating something like it into the campaign would help appeal to a wider base of YN.

I saw these things because, over the past few weeks of browsing, there are a lot of new users who think this is a teen-oriented, teen-only site. For those of us who are out of our teens but still living off of our parents while we attend school, reading things like that and seeing the latest campaigns do make us feel a bit left out, like just because we have a diploma and a right to vote automatically means we have been granted a voice in society and don’t need to demand one. That is by no means true and to even just consider finding ways to incorporate all of YNs base would make us feel as though we do matter in the whole scheme of things and that we do still have a voice.

And somewhat off topic, but whatever happened with all of the applications that people put in to re-launch YAB? It felt as though that just fell through without telling anyone. If you have a chance, you should try YAB out again as maybe with people who want a say in the site, there will be more regular attendance at the meetings.

quote:

Originally posted by Ikki14Reed:
I do find it surprising that you want to aim the site towards the older members, but your recent campaigns have been aimed at the younger members. Why can't there be a campaign (like the sex one) aimed at everyone? Why limit yourself?

I don't think you're being fair here. Right to Learn is the only one with any ties to CA. BOM is for all youth, anywhere, of any age. All YouthNoise campaigns are open to anyone.

I again take issue with the idea that having these campaigns on the site is somehow bad for older users. Although these last two particular campaigns may have a younger base, other campaigns in the past and future (particularly Nike) focus on college students as well as youth in general.

quote:

You also noted a huge issue we are wrestling with – the age dating of the site. We will be working over the coming months to age-up the site – make the whole feel more sophisticated and geared towards the older members of our range.

I do find it surprising that you want to aim the site towards the older members, but your recent campaigns have been aimed at the younger members. Why can't there be a campaign (like the sex one) aimed at everyone? Why limit yourself?

From Ginger:

Dear Meagan,

This past year YouthNoise did undertake a huge campaign in California to rally young people here around their education. Public Education in California has fallen from 1st in the nation to 43rd. Education was such a hot topic in our surveys and in research others had done, we felt confident an Education program was a valuable undertaking. Our belief was that if we began the program in California we would roll it out, armed with the wisdom of experience, to other states as soon as our impact could be measured and our objectives met. We are still working on this program and will do so until January 2009. Meanwhile we have maintained the other elements of the site. We also undertook a short term campaign with a group named ISIS around the “Boss Of Me” campaign. That again was a California Pilot in anticipation of a broader national effort. And most recently we launched Play City, a Sport for Good effort that will roll out across the US and around the globe between now and 2010. Clearly the concentration on California for these campaigns was a temporary change in site focus and user experience. But we have continued to do our best maintaining the rest of the site while managing these other major campaigns.

You also noted a huge issue we are wrestling with – the age dating of the site. We will be working over the coming months to age-up the site – make the whole feel more sophisticated and geared towards the older members of our range. Too few people attended the YAB meetings to make them productive. We will be launching a new Advisory Board in the fall, so I hope you’ll join and participate then.

We always welcome your feedback. Feel free to send it directly to me or to Karoline Neville, our Web Director who runs the web site.

Many thanks for your comments,

Ginger Thomson