TikTok Kids Don't Have Email

One day I received an email from PTPTN saying that they have banked-in student loan to my account. That's very strange as I've graduated and never took any loan.

Browsing through the subsequent emails from PTPTN it seems that a young chap with a name similar to mine had simply put his name and added @gmail.com in the form. Recently I also received email regarding payment to Celcom but they payment date didn't match mine. Most likely, it's the same chap again.

For younger generations, email are not compulsory to access web services. Many popular platforms allow registration by phone number. Another way round is they had registered for social media account using phone number and later on use the said account to register for other services.

They use internet with a different paradigm as compared to the generation before. Those who come before them usually have a family PC and everybody access their particular accounts using email & password. Only their parents have mobile phones so registering using a phone number doesn't make any sense.

Fast forward today, many youngsters have their own smartphone so they just access and register for web services using their phone number. They don't have and don't need an email account.

That was the issue I brought up to a friend who wanted to do a website to help students self-study. He plan to do simple sign sign up form and deliver lessons via email. I said that's not going to work, the form must feed to a system that can deliver lessons via WhatsApp as they only have their phone number.

Anyway, that's my observation on the Internet usage pattern of younger generation. I plan to write a few more blog posts regarding this issue.