This looks to me like an attempt to enable commentators to use the rest of the alphabet, but perhaps it helps us understand the characteristics of this generation a little better.
Just recently the Pew Research Center, talking about the "Millenials" defined recent generations as
- The Silent Generation - born before 1946
- The Baby Boomers born 1946-1964, a population spike that end when the birth control pill went onto the market
- Generation X - born 1965 - 1980 - at first they were known as the "Baby Bust"
- The Millenials - born 1981 - 2000, the first generation to come of age in the new millenium
Other definitions that have been used
- Generation X - 1965 - 1980
- Generation Y - 1970s - early 2000s , also known as the Millenials, the Next Generation, or Generation Next
- Generation Z - born late 1990s - late 2000s (perhaps to 2012), typically the children of Generation X
The wikipedia article says that Generation Z is
highly connected, many having had lifelong use of communications and media technologies such as the World Wide Web, instant messaging, text messaging, MP3 players, mobile phones and YouTube, earning them the nickname "digital natives". No longer limited to the home computer, the Internet is now increasingly carried in their pockets on mobile Internet devices such as mobile phones. A marked difference between Generation Y and Generation Z, is that older members of the former remember life before the takeoff of mass technology, while the latter have been born completely within it. Generation Z members are described as impatient and instant minded, and tending to lack the ambition of previous generations. They appear to be an introverted and aloof generation, since most prefer not to spend much time with real people. Psychologists are claiming an "acquired Attention Deficit Disorder" or "acquired Autistic Spectrum Disorder" since their dependency on technology is high and attention span is much lower, as opposed to previous generations who read books and other printed material, along with watching live television.
Now we are seeing a new term for those who will "come of age" in approximately 2020 - Generation C. It is a term that seems to be gaining quite a high level of currency already, although I have only just come across it. Today I found it here.
In the course of the next 10 years, a new generation—Generation C—will emerge. Born after 1990, these "digital natives," just now beginning to attend university and enter the work- force, will transform the world as we know it. Their interests will help drive massive change in how people around the world socialize, work, and live their passions—and in the information and communication technologies they use to do so.
Trendwatch says the C stands for "consumer generated content", Australia's itNews says they are really the internet generation and that the C stands for "content, connectivity, creativity, collaboration and communication". Confusingly there's also a claim in that article that they will be middle aged in 2020 (are you middle-aged at 30?)
Some are using it as another term for the "digital natives", and extending their date of birth back to about 1986.
And here's another term that you may not have come across, but it certainly defines many of us: the sandwich generation: simultaneously caring for parents and for children.
Whatever we call them, the generation that are in our schools and universities now will force change in our education systems, both in the pedagogy, and in the physical environments. The schools and universities they teach in should be very different to the ones they are in now as students.