Tobias Olsson

Inspired by the theoretical notion of media repertoires, this article analyses what online repertoires Swedish senior citizens construct in everyday life. It answers two research questions: What online repertoires do elderly users have? How do elderly users’ online repertoires vary depending on their access to material, discursive and social resources? The article draws on data from a large, representative Swedish survey (n = 1264, response rate 63%), and uses correlations and multiple regression analysis to identify and analyse online repertoires with reference to elderly users’ access to resources such as income, infrastructure, level of education and social networks. The analysis reveals a significant element of selectivity in the online repertoires of elderly users. It also shows strong connections between different Internet activities. In addition, it offers substantial evidence in support of the proposition that individuals who are resource rich have broader repertoires and higher frequency of usage than other users.

Drawing on data derived from a nationwide postal survey (n = 1264) with a simple random sample of Swedes between ages 65 and 85 (response rate: 63%), the article analyses the general patterns of: (a) degrees of information and communication (ICT) access and (b) ICT-literacy among Swedish senior citizens. The overall patterns of access and literacy are analysed in light of senior citizens’ assets – conceptualized as material, discursive and social resources – and their age and gender. The analysis reveals a positive correlation between levels of material (e.g., income), discursive (e.g., English skills) and social (e.g., social networks) resources and access to ICT. With greater resources, the average number of devices increases. The analysis also reveals a positive correlation between discursive and social resources and ICT-literacy. Gender has no bearing on access to devices, but might have some effect on ICT-literacy. The correlation between age, access and literacy is negative. With increasing age, both access and literacy decreases. In this respect, the study reveals a generational effect. However, since all three resources tend to decrease over the life cycle, the results are also discussed in terms of an age effect. These data and our analyses are contextualized by a critical discussion that reflects on the implications of these general patterns: What do they mean for senior citizens’ abilities to be included and participate in a continuously digitalizing society?

Social plugins for sharing news through Facebook and Twitter have become increasingly salient features on news sites. Together with the user comment feature, social plugins are the most common way for users to contribute. The wide use of multiple features has opened new areas to comprehensively study users’ participatory practices. However, how do these opportunities to participate vary between the participatory spaces that news sites affiliated with local, national broadsheet and tabloid news constitute? How are these opportunities appropriated by users in terms of participatory practices such as commenting and sharing news through Facebook and Twitter? In addition, what differences are there between news sites in these respects? To answer these questions, a quantitative content analysis has been conducted on 3,444 articles from nine Swedish online newspapers. Local newspapers are more likely to allow users to comment on articles than are national newspapers. Tweeting news is appropriated only on news sites affiliated with evening tabloids and national morning newspapers. Sharing news through Facebook is 20 times more common than tweeting news or commenting. The majority of news items do not attract any user interaction.

The article departs from an overarching research question: How does young people's engagement in different Internet spaces affect the development of their public orientation during adolescence? It analyses longitudinal panel data in order to explore how young people's public orientation develops during a phase in life (13–20) which is critical for political socialization. Data are derived from three waves of data collection among young people who were 13–17 years old at the time for the first data collection. The concept public orientation is measured by three indicators: young people's values, interests and everyday peer talk. These indicators are analysed with reference to respondents' Internet orientations, which we conceptualize as four separate but inter-related spaces (a news space, a space for social interaction, a game space and a creative space). The results primarily emphasize the importance of orientations towards news space and space for social interaction. Overall, the findings strongly suggest that orientations towards these spaces are related to adolescents' public orientation. The findings confirm the centrality of news and information in political socialization, but they also challenge the idea that social media facilities – such as Facebook, Twitter and blogging – enable forms of social interaction and creative production that have an overall positive impact on young people's public orientation.

Is contemporary media ecology an ecology that offers unprecedented freedom for producing participators, the “prod-users,” or could it also be understood as an ecology in which various forms of user participation are in fact conditioned, or manufactured, by professional producers? Considering the increasing research attention paid to various notions of user participation, these questions become important. This article critically discusses the theorising of mediated participation by illustrating and analysing ways in which users’ participatory practices in fact can be both conditioned and formatted by producers making strategic use of participatory opportunities. By drawing on an ethnographically inspired case study of a web company, Moderskeppet, this analysis reveals how the actual possibilities for participation thoroughly are conditioned by producers. The paper also analyses strategies and techniques applied by the producers to create a sense of participation among users.