They were born into an iWorld.
And so — within seconds of learning Steve Jobs had died — a nation of kids Wednesday night put down their homework and turned to their iMacs, iPhones, iPads and iPods to lament the news.
Social-networking sites lit up with messages from the preteen and teenage set, mourning the loss of the man whose innovation and imagination made him part Thomas Edison, part Willy Wonka.
“My iPhone is crying,” posted one teenager, while another responded, “:( LEGEND.”
“RIP Steve Jobs. You changed the face of technology and you’re a figure who’ll never be forgotten,” a 13-year-old posted.
“Steve Jobs will be missed but always remembered!!’’ added another.
Meanwhile, outside Apple’s SoHo store yesterday, 7-year-old twin boys left a note, adorned with superhero stickers, that read: “RIP Steve from Ethan and Lucas.”
Dr. Harold Koplewicz, of the Child Mind Institute, isn’t surprised by the immediate outpouring from kids and teens.
“Steve Jobs was such an incredible force,” Koplewicz said. “He was the creator of the devices that all young people use and that they associate with coming of age, in grade school or as teenagers.”
“The iPod, the iPhone, the Mac — he gave them things that are so closely tied to how they define themselves, through their music, and their friends.”
And the media-savvy Jobs was no faceless corporate suit.
“They felt like they knew him,” Koplewicz said. “His story was larger than life. They realize we have lost a really great mind.”
Ironically, Koplewicz noted, “just seconds after Jobs’ family announced the death, everybody knew about it because it was passed along by the very things he invented.”
Unlike with the deaths of John F. Kennedy or even Kurt Cobain, the news of Jobs’ passing went out “instantaneously, and without adult mediation … There was no time to absorb it in a soft way,” Kopelwicz said.