Don’t blame the people, they often cant get a mobile and tablet and computer… blame the awful corporations who made everything an app and pushed locked down mobile and tablets environments
Then get a laptop and a phone. No one needs a tablet.
Then they get a chromium based laptop because those were the most affordable ones they can get.
Appification was generalized and its not ppls fault for growing up in that environment, especially if their parents were not big into computers and couldn’t tell the difference.
The key concept they’re missing a lot of the time is that software sits within the file system and not the other way around.
This is largely because apps hide this and data is generally stored in one place on your phone (the downloads folder).
Best way to fix it - have 1–2 lessons entirely devoted to finding shit on their computer. My favourite activity is “ok, save your word file, close word, you now have 10 mins to find that file without opening word”.
I’d at least start them with something simple like Paint or Notepad. Once they have that down, then you can throw the disaster that is the MS Office file save dialog at them.
I’m an older zoomer but still a zoomer. Its a crazy dynamic seeing people my age and younger just not getting IT stuff. There’s a high ratio of older to younger people where I’ve worked in IT too.
The challenges thst existed to use technology no longer exist, so there is no longer a reason to look under the hood for most people. It’s like how a lot of generations after boomers don’t know about how to change a tyre or spark plugs etc, cars got more reliable and industries created services to stop you needing to worry about that stuff.
As a kid I remember WANTING to play games with a friend on PC, he knew we needed a null modem cable and we went to pc shop 2 towns over got one and tried to figure out how to play together using it. Then when the Internet came out and we had to fight against Internet connection sharing so one computer could share Internet with friends pc. Trying to use no-cd patches just so we didn’t need to keep grabbing cds to play games etc.
There were so many things you learnt back then but it was because we had no alternative, I get why tech knowledge has vanished and I don’t blame them, they have had no need to solve the same problems and haven’t grown with technology, it’s been already established and they have had no need to concern themselves with it.
Problem is the working world still heavily needs PC skills and basic analytical ability so there needs to be more focus on those old “computer driving license” style courses so people can certify they know how to find a file and end task when something hangs.
The paradigm has changed. The rift between PC and smart phone. Is it really a surprise? My 18yr step kid can at least type on a keyboard with proficiency. Beyond that and installing games in steam, he’s lost outside of that. Both I and his mom work in IT. We try to shore up the gaps, but it seems the ‘kid’ actively refuses to learn.
My favorite:
“Where did you save the file?”
“I saved it in Excel”
People are going to start asking AI to rotate PDFs for them, just like people started asking ChatGPT to do math; it’s a terrible idea but will probably work 80% of the time, and that’ll be good enough for most people.
Yep I’ve noticed that too. I get questions like “what is the difference between downloading and installing” from people that are over 18 years old and under 30.
Messing around with your old WinXP/95 computer and then fixing that mess before your parents come home and scold you does wonders to one’s troubleshooting skills. People of this generation never got to hear that scary XP error sound, and it shows.
Fun fact: Windows XP had cool day 0 loophole that saved my my ass. Once I decided to explore new options and I stumbled upon new and cool feature: setting a password. The only issue with it was that I’ve forgotten it half an hour later. I already knew ‘admin’ word so I used it in hackerman style and I logged in and I was able to reverse old password. This loophole was patched with first service pack but I still giggle when I remind myself of that.
Damn! This is some real hackerman shit.
Windows XP’s error sound wasn’t scary. Windows 95 and 98’s were. That natural alarming chime, combined with the angry faces when our parents find out the non-functioning operating system…
Turns out the one I was thinking of was the critical stop sound and the error sound was less threatening. Learnt something new…
just want to add, it’s not the zoomer’s fault. they were intentionally raised in ignorance because its apparently profitable
fuck the corporations who’ve deliberately turned our living computers into soulless commercial brainwashing surveillance machines
It’s their parents fault for not using GNU/Linux
Also schools that thought just seeing the tech used would give you innate knowledge on how to use a computer.
I’m a zoomer and ngl I cannot relate to this
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An unfortunate consequence of developers playing to the lowest common denominator of users for the last twenty years. Everything has been designed to be as easy and intuitive as possible for mobile, and troubleshooting skills have suffered as a result.
Not to mention that phones are crazy powerful and can do virtually everything these days, so fewer and fewer people are buying PCs.
If the general population is indeed “going backwards” in regards to tech literacy, it seems like demand for IT services is going to spike in the coming years. Good thing to keep in mind for young people choosing a career path!
I would point out that while general computer use has gotten easier, doing anything advanced has gotten much harder.
I’m glad my grandma can send memes, but I can’t figure out where an app is saving my files because everything is a walled garden!
Lifelong Android user here. I don’t know where an app saves its files (not to personal folders, but app-private folder) even it’s rooted. I’m glad this protects me from malwares but it also forbids me to put my device in full control.
I almost added this as a point in my original comment, but you’re absolutely right, and its happening in other industries too (auto, for example). Its really tough to troubleshoot things you lack the permissions to fix.
My most recent job hunt has me thinking the same. I used to be a dime a dozen, and young folks were real and serious competition in the job market, but I’ve been in IT since before the .com crash and now my skills are once again becoming unique.
I’ve been raising my kids, warning them about the shit state of IT. Maybe I should have been nerding them harder.
I will say, I would not want to be a software developer right now, but systems support is generally pretty stable (and less likely to be replaced by AI any time soon)
Yeah, I’m a fancy bricklayer these days…
Developers don’t decide that. Blame UX folk for making things simple.
As a UX person often my job is to implement somebody else’s vision rather than being able to design something that makes sense.
As long as you treat yourself as a pixel pusher, this is a side effect. When you understand that you are a mirror for ideas, you will empower yourself.
“Listen boss, I know you wanted me to create it in a certain way, but I am not a pixel pusher alright?! I am a mirror of ideas, so I made something completely different from what you pay me for, what do you mean I’m fired?”
If you say it that way, then yes, even the nicest person will call you a cunt and fire you. If you ask questions, as a user, and showing patterns that support your thesis, this becomes a conversation, rather than a “do it that way”.
edit: People are not all knowing. Once you start asking the right questions, you’ll see that - “Ok, and what happens when the user presses this? And what happens if they delete that?” It’s obviously a very abstract example, but if their ideas can’t stand a single user test, then they shouldn’t be surprised if the feature flops.
I agree in principle but when I’m building something I’m normally 3 - 5 people removed from the people who want it. It’s hard to push your ideas back through project managers, project engineers, program managers, presale engineers, contract managers, feed managers and then onto the actual company that asked you to implement the “solution”.
That’s a problem, I agree. I feel privileged then, because I actually get to research, and interview, and split test. It was a long battle, I’ve been trying to build that culture for a good 5+ years. Once the features started flopping, I started by doing 2 prototypes - one, based on the PRD from the product team and another, based on my personal research. I had to work 12, sometimes 15 hours a day, but when, instead of showing problems, I was showing solutions, without the “i-told-you-so”s, and when I made it clear that I care about the product’s health alone, that’s when I became the mirror. I reckon it’s not an industry term, but it’s what I like to call it - product presents their idea, you reflect it, and more often than not they do not like what they see. That’s when the real work starts.
I meant it a more general sense as anyone involved with the software development life cycle, but I see your point, good catch
i think its more complex than this.
people wont know what to do/wont bother if a simple google search doesnt inmediatly has what they want in the first link.
We are all working class.
The working class should hold the bulk of the wealth.
“Should” is doing all the work in that sentence
More work than the 1% will ever do.
Gen Z here, in college.
Some of these people are braindead when it comes to tech.
Like, I get if you’re not used to technology because you’re poor/had a lack of access to it, as many people might not have a home computer. So there were kids who were absolutely hopeless when it came to using windows at my tech school because they were broke, and the school only gives out Chromebooks (cause they’re shitty and cheap).
But outside of not knowing a UI and different file formats, you should absolutely know how to use anything on the web, unless you literally lived in an area with absolutely no internet and electricity.
Some people at my college STILL don’t know how to share Google documents correctly, and it’s the most insane and frustrating thing to me. Literally any device with an Internet connection can use it. Windows, apple, Chromebook, Linux, you name it. HOW DO YOU NOT KNOW HOW TO WORK GOOGLE DRIVE?!?!?!
Like many comments have said, devs have dumbed down a lot of shit in the name of protecting users, and people expect stuff to just work without any issues/effort, which I get, but damn, you’ve never simply done a 5 mins search on Google or YouTube for a quick fix?
My hand-me-down phone journey started with a Samsung G Note 4 as a kid, then a old iPhone (don’t remember which), moved to a Moto G Play 7 (I adore that thing today), moved to iPhone X, and now I’m at a Pixel 8a cause I put GrapheneOS on it. My mom got me it as a grad gift cause I hated my iPhone so much for all the shit I couldn’t do while I was on it. I’ve always just liked Android and Windows more for the freedom to fuck up (which I never did), instead of Apple’s shitty walled garden. And now I’m on Fedora, because I know I don’t have to subject myself to a shit user experience on Windows just for simplicity.
But other people my gen who aren’t willing to be adventurous for a bit and even try will never do that. Hell, you get shamed in school for not loving the Apple overlords and wanting Apple deciding everything in your life (green bubble shaming is real, I hated middle and early high school…). We want quick and easy, and we got it, but at what cost?
Google drive is absolutely horrible to use for any real purpose. Organizing things is awful, search sucks, sharing permissions are dumb in terms of their specific behaviors. Its not particularly hard to use for basic things where you’ve got like 10 files in there, but it’s a terrible example of usable software. Like… SharePoint is better, and I didn’t think it was possible to be worse than SharePoint.
I’ve used both for work and I’m having a hard time understanding what you could possibly find better about SharePoint. It’s consistently the most frustrating sharing and navigation experience I’ve ever had to endure.
Yep, have used both Google Drive and SharePoint for work. SharePoint is an abomination
Mate just my 2 cents ignore overlords and enjoy using other stuff and getting a more global knowledge. Didn’t know the situation was getting this bad, let me guess: they know every single thing that has been posted on tiktok, but nothing else?
That’s no different from boomers and millenials really. Boomers only know the 6 o’clock news and either the front or back page of the paper. Millennial only know 90s cartoons and how to complain; I should know as i am one.
Some people at my college STILL don’t know how to share Google documents correctl
They emulate a “files” menu (like any native office software has), where you can download/export it to a standardized format. Right?
Well, for the download/export stuff, yeah, you just go to the “File” tab and click the download drop down tab, and you can save it to the computer or Google Drive. Which some people still didn’t know about somehow but… (Some people never touch the tabs I guess)
But when I mean file sharing, I’m talking like sharing stuff to another person’s drive, or simply just letting them have access to it by clicking a link. To be fair, sometimes the sharing is wonky or really dumb, but it’s basically, give access to specific emails/accounts, give access to anyone within your organization with the link, or give access to anyone who has the link. You can specify if this access link should be viewer, commenter, or editor.
The amount of people who have shared a document with incorrect access rights where teachers can’t see their work and have to ask them to resubmit, or trying to do group projects with people who claim that it’s not working, is fucking insane. I get some of them are just being lazy and probably lying about it not working to get more time to procrastinate, but dead serious, some people just have no idea how to share files correctly. My public speaking class was full of these blunders, especially when sharing a presentation done with Canva, and we’d always have to waste like 3 minutes waiting for them to fix it…
