Like some 300,000 others in recent weeks, they have logged on to a new website, Eons.com. The site is banking on a digital awakening among recreation-minded boomers and matures, a growing and increasingly active demographic - online and everywhere else.
While the numerical arguments are persuasive due to the amount of seniors coming online, their numbers belie the fact that older Americans search for information online, not social stimulation. And since the basis of social networking sites is having your friends on them, it doesn't seem likely that enough of any boomer's 'posse' would be on the site to make it worthwhile.
On the other hand, boomers and older Americans have two strong votes in their favor: a desire to meet new people with common interests, and the time to participate in online communities. In this respect, 'Empty nesters' are very similar to the children they just dropped off at college: Starting a new phase of their life and eager to meet friends, to spend their new-found free time with.
TIme will tell, but web publishers have found that older folks have different goals than younger ones online. They seek information, and tend to cluster around investment and health related sites. Perhaps most amusing:
And a feature called cRANKy is "the first age-relevant search engine," says Natansohn. When its research showed that senior users were frustrated by enormous, largely irrelevant yields found by major engines, Eons built in a vetting process that pulls down top sites based in part on its own editors' reviews and previous users' ratings.
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