"This is a personal, non-sponsored post by a member of BuzzFeed's ad content team."

Um, so it's an ad for SnapChat that SnapChat didn't pay for...or not an ad by a guy on the "ad content team"? If it's the latter why mention it at all (or simply say "this is not an advertisement"). The convoluted language makes me think it is an ad. Anyway...

Yes, tweens are very prolific social media users...they're practically born with the skills in their blood. Ten-year olds are skilfully filming, producing and editing videos, and uploading them to YouTube, that leave people in their 30s and up speechless.

The generations that came of age before about 1998 to 2000ish, when the Internet and digital technology started becoming ubiquitous and taught in schools, are still somewhat baffled by even basic technology. Example...during a dinner in 2014 that included my sister and her boyfriend (who are both in their mid-30s) he notices the customized icon arrangement and screen flip effects on my phone (iPhone, jailbroken) and asks if he can do that on his phone. I ask him if he'd bought an iPhone (I remembered him having a Windows phone) and he says no, pulls out his Lumia and starts fiddling with it. After a moment he asks "so what do I have to do to get that effect?" and I say "that's a Windows phone, isn't it?"..."I think so, but I can jailbreak it, right?"..."jailbreaking is an iPhone thing, I don't think there's a Windows phone equivalent..."oh, it won't work if it's Windows?"..."um, no, you need an iPhone but if you have an Android device you can root it and install customs ROMs which is sort of like jailbreaking"...."cool so I can install Android on this phone (Lumia), right?"... facepalm

Later that evening my sister (who is much more tech savvy than her boyfriend and an advanced social media user) notices that my headphones are cordless. "I never noticed those headphones before, I hate tangled cords etc. "..."yeah Bluetooth is pretty handy"..."is it included with your plan?"..."is what included?"..."the Bluetooth service"..."it's built into the device and...wait, you thought there was an extra charge for using Bluetooth?" "no, um, I was just wondering" facepalm

They are both educated, fairly worldly, middle-class. She has a Masters (arts) and worked at a law firm and he was finishing his PhD (arts). Oh, and they were both surprised to learn they can listen to mp3s on their Windows and Android devices.

I've met other "older" people who are absolutely clueless about basic features and options on their computers and devices (e.g. getting rid of the annoying bloatware that comes pre-installed on off-the-shelf Windows machines, blocking browser ads, connecting and configuring peripherals) but their level of ignorance really surprised me.

I've since noticed a sharp contrast in tech literacy between people who graduated or left high school before the Internet exploded and those who were introduced to it in school. For so-called digital natives like the author's sister, and my 14 year-old cousin, the line between what used to be called real life and social media has dissolved and fully integrating social media into their day-to-day lives comes almost naturally. It's not a new thing...it just is and they use it at an intuitive level...and expect new platforms to emerge and features to continually evolve.

Interesting times for the human animal...