Online privacy? For young people, that's old-school - USATODAY.com: Reared on reality TV, paparazzi, cellphone cameras and the insatiable maw of the World Wide Web, it's no wonder teens and adults in their 20s think a little differently when it comes to privacy.

"I am constantly broadcasting who I am," says Indigo Rael, 22, of Lake Dallas, Texas. "The Internet is just a way for me to reach more people with who I am. It's the age of information; I'm used to giving and receiving tons."

To the Internet generation, reaching out and touching a few hundred of their closest friends -- especially through social-networking sites MySpace and Facebook -- is as natural as brushing their teeth.

"They're dealing with privacy differently than any of us over 35 ever have," says Steve Jones, communications professor at the University of Illinois-Chicago.

In the old days of their parents' and grandparents' generations when teens wanted to talk to each other, they'd pick up the phone. Sometimes, they'd have to resort to actual face-to-face conversations.

Today's teens and adults in their 20s are a lot more likely to reach for a computer keyboard to convey something as fleeting as a mood or as traumatic as a breakup -- even if it's only to a list of trusted friends.

"They are growing up in an environment, in a culture where you get constant feedback from others on yourself in ways that we never did," says psychologist Linda R. Young, who teaches at Seattle University and writes about teens and technology.

"The private self and public self become intertwined in a way that we (older folks) can't possibly understand," Young says. "So they're not embarrassed about some of the things that we think they should be embarrassed about because it's an extension of the self that they're used to having viewed."

The trend toward online self-disclosure "really started with reality television and the confessional nature of that form of entertainment," says Anastasia Goodstein, author of Totally Wired: What Teens and Tweens Are Really Doing Online. "And that began to permeate our culture."

So when sites such as MySpace, Facebook and Xanga, where people can post everything from the mundane details of their days to their innermost thoughts, began gaining popularity, teens were ready to jump right in.

"Because they've grown up with the Internet and the ability to put that stuff online, it's just become more comfortable for them," Goodstein says.

'A generation thing'

It's so comfortable that some worry that teens are inadvertently broadcasting to a wider audience than they intend.

Elli Langford, 19, a sophomore at Auburn University in Alabama, says that while she guards her own privacy by being selective about sharing information online, she has seen others display more than they should.

"I guess my generation really puts a lot less stock into privacy," Langford says. "I mean, every other celebrity couple is letting movie cameras into their houses. And you've got shows like The Hills and Laguna Beach (both on MTV) where they're in high school, but they're letting cameras follow them around and putting their lives on TV. I guess it's just like a generation thing."

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