Yesterday I got a Snapchat tutorial from a 10 year old

[STLGusty]

I don't download apps (except Cartwheel - gotta get those discounts)!  I guess I should say I don't download any additional social media based apps...  Although I probably should.  One of the classes I teach is Social Media Marketing.  I'm anticipating my kids will be teaching me the social medias as we move on to new units

[Hervoyel]

To each their own, though I feel obligated to defend myself a bit.

This ofcorse is IMHO and what ive actually experienced.

No need to defend yourself, as you say to each their own and all that. 

I will say though that most of the kids I see don't have expensive plans - they usually have basic ones or even no service at all (those phones can still make emergency calls and can be used with wi-fi or offline for games or calculator and translation apps). I'm sure some parents are paying for extensive coverage of course, but that's a choice, not a necessity that goes along with having the phone.

And sure, before cell phones you could use a landline, but the calls were expensive, and if there's a language barrier it's that much harder to communicate.  I grew up having cousins (and aunts/uncles/grandparents) who I saw maybe once every couple of years, and didn't communicate with otherwise because it would have been expensive and complicated to work out. But now my nieces and nephews can keep in touch with me, and with their other aunts/uncles/cousins/grandparents all over the world using smartphones and tablets that let them chat by photo or video for free as long as they're connected to wi-fi. 

I'm in awe of the way that makes the world so much more connected for them. And that's what I think is brilliant.

[Shileah]

For all I know (no kids yet), it's pretty common here that children have prepaid phones. That way, parents can easily control the monthly costs and if the prepaid amount is used up, it's used up. No "accidental" overcharging possible. It therefore makes it pretty safe to give them a smartphone. And to be fair, there are a few selected good apps for children even that young.

Done right, a smartphone can be a good (or at least not that bad) thing even for a younger child. It takes some extra attention from the parents though, as they have to be tech-savy enough that the child cannot outsmart them.

[Sukey]

I really don't get the point of snapchat- maybe I'm old.

I look for the landline to eventually become obsolete, except maybe for businesses. I lived almost 3 years in an apartment with just our cell phones and it was wonderful. Unfortunately now I live in area that doesn't have cell service and we are forced to have a landline and a long distance plan Most of the time it doesn't even work and we have to have the phone company repair it every few months... That gets old.