Piper: Over 50 percent of teens expect to have an iPhone in the next six months

Right now Apple’s killing it on many levels and one of the reasons is because they own kids and teens. Some call it the Apple brainwash, others think it’s world-class marketing put to work. Whichever the case, it’s working out to Apple’s advantage, much to the horror of their rivals.

A Piper Jaffray survey of 4,500 kids in the US revealed that over 50 percent of teens could own an iPhone in the next six months – 17 percent already have one and 37 percent plan on buying the device in the next six months. Of course, what kids plan and what they get are likely not the same, especially if they don’t get good report cards. A couple of more water-cooler talking points…

Nearly one in five, or 22 percent teens surveyed, already owned a tablet or had one in the house. Seems like the iPad is a big hit with the youngsters as one in five want one – most likely an iPad considering an estimated 83 percent of tablets sold in 2010 were iPads. When it comes to music, Apple rules the landscape. The company’s share of the music player market in the US surged to 86 percent, an increase over 78 percent six months ago, and they’re well poised to capitalize on the iPod’s allure of coolness. Standalone music players like iPod are, however, taking a back seat to cellphones as 53 percent surveyed teens said they listened to music on their handsets.

About eighty percent have an MP3 player of some sort, down from ninety percent a year ago. Of those that have one, 86 percent own an iPod versus just three percent for Microsoft’s Zune. Unfortunately, two thirds of surveyed teens, or 65 percent, still go to file-trading services to obtain digital music files.