Among Germans, the formal “you” (Sie) is spoken less and less:
Foreigners are well advised to begin with Sie, but they should not be surprised at how quickly Germans may now switch to du. Just after my first lunch with the press spokesman for a big German company, for example, I was surprised to hear, as we said goodbye, “by the way, my name is Thomas.” We’ve been du ever since.
Robert Lane Greene sees Sie going the way of “thou”:
This spreading informality has been slower in Asian languages (which often have more elaborate systems of pronouns and honorifics than the mere formal “you”). But in Europe, the change may be unstoppable. This is a result of the breakdown in respect for traditional authority (elders, the upper classes, the church, etc), which began in the 1960s. But also it is probably accelerated by the more recent breakdown in the distinction between private and public. In age of share-everything social media, when everyone has hundreds of “friends,” it’s little surprise that formality is falling from fashion.
The Dish 