The Widening Tech-Savvy Gap

Despite the proliferation of tech toys and work devices in people's lives, the gap between the tech-savvy and the techno-confused keeps growing, a monumental failure of our arrogant and elitist tech industries. It's hard to recall any industry which has so abused, neglected and exploited its customers and survived. But it is interesting to track -- as a brand-new survey does -- just how wide the gap is, and how differently Americans cope with it, by age, ethnicity and geography. Why, for example, would midwesterners grasp technology so much better than northeasterners? We are still, at heart, a fix-it country, given the chance, something much of the tech world seems to have forgotten.

When things malfunction, the vast majority of Americans try to fix it themselves. (And no wonder. Tech Support is synonymous with anxiety and indifference). Almost half -- 47 percent -- say the first thing they do when a piece of equipment fails is try to repair it. Another 21 percent have a friend or family member look at it. Only nine percent take a broken purchase back to the place where they bought it. Then there are the 3 percent of Americans who say that when something breaks, they simply buy a new something. This last group may be rich, but it's also smart; its members are most likely tech veterans who've spend years struggling with customer service, poring through complex warranties, waiting on hold for support and assistance, an oxymoron if ever there was one.

The survey of nearly 3000 adults, commissioned by American Demographics magazine and published in its March issue, reveals other intriguing details. Though fewer than half of Americans with computers say they fully understand how to operate them and all their features, there are differences by region. Northeasterners are the most confused, Midwesterners the most computer-confident. When attempting to learn their way around a new purchase, 89 percent consult instruction manuals, poor saps.

Adults under 35 are, not surprisingly, more skilled at confronting tech problems. For example, 77 per cent of those surveyed age 18 to 34 are confident in their ability to operate their VCR, while 54 per cent of adults older than 35 said the same. Young adults are also more proficient, says the survey, when it comes to using cell phones, stereos, remote controls, microwaves and computers. Separated, divorced and widowed Americans are more involved with high-tech than other singles and married people. This may be because they have more time, or are perhaps more focused on using tech to connect with other people.

Television, meanwhile, continues its long reign as Americans' most beloved and comprehensible technology. In fact, for years TV has not gotten its due as one of the monumentally successful technologies of all time -- cheap, reliable, easy to use. More than 80 percent of respondents across the country understood how to work a TV better than a computer, something for the computer industry to ponder long and hard.

Asian-Americans use the Net more than any other group. On any given day, says American Demographics, more than half of all English-speaking Asians (53 percent) go online, compared to a third of all English-speaking whites (33 percent) and a sixth of all English-speaking blacks (17 per cent). On the other hand, 65 percent of African-Americans say they know and understand the features of their mobile phones, compared with only 42 percent of whites and 56 percent of Hispanics. One might have predicted, though, that women are more open to reading directions than men.

The survey is significant for several reasons. It shows that responses to tech are different among different age, geographic and ethnic groups. It confirms the idea that tech industries are peopled by smart geeks still too far removed from the ordinary concerns of average Americans. It reminds us that Tech Support is a scandal. It reinforces the notion of tech elites who alone understand how the new tools of the Info Age really work, while most people struggle to use them. New tech tools from computers to cell phones may seem ubiquitous, but in fact, they are not. Tech triggers different responses in different people, depending on where they live, how old they are, and even their race and ethnic origins.

Comments

I thought it was just the opposite

[Daimaou]

I thought the gap was narrowing thanks to the Dummies series.

Re:I thought it was just the opposite

[GreyPoopon]

This article could not possibly be more subjective.

I agree with you 100%. Usually I find at least a couple nuggets of "good stuff" in what Jon writes, but I feel he's way off the mark on this one.

It's hard to recall any industry which has so abused, neglected and exploited its customers and survived.

This problem is hardly attributable to the Tech industry alone. The problem is one common to most companies today. Any kind of customer support is lousy. It's an afterthought. Look at the amount of money companies spend on sales vs what they allocate to keeping the customer happy. It's pretty clear that if companies weren't forced to offer some kind of support in order to sell their products, they wouldn't bother.

Jon also describes TV as the one technology that almost everybody seems to be able to use, and then compares that to people's comfort level with newer technologies. Duh. An overwhelming majority of today's population grew up with TV. I don't have numbers to argue with, but I suspect the trend is that the longer technology is in society, the more understood and accepted it is. And if you grew up with something, you're more likely to be comfortable using it than somebody who didn't grow up with it.

Despite the proliferation of tech toys and work devices in people's lives, the gap between the tech-savvy and the techno-confused keeps growing, a monumental failure of our arrogant and elitist tech industries.

This is just pure hogwash. There are plenty of self-study materials available, not to mention adult education courses. The big problem is that as adults, we don't have time to spend learning these things. We're too busy doing a job that will ultimately be obsolete. The reason that gap keeps widening is because technology keeps advancing. Today's youth is fully immersed in all of the latest technology. They have the time to play with and learn all of the new stuff. For crying out loud, they even study it in school. Older adults, on the other hand, have spent the last thirty-some years of their life raising their children and working to put food on the table. They get about an hour of free time per evening. And guess where they'd rather be spending it? In front of the TV. They haven't had the gobs of time to spend on learning technology. Most likely, they weren't using new technology at work, so it's not likely that the knowledge to use it is just going to pop itself into their heads.

Young adults are also more proficient, says the survey, when it comes to using cell phones, stereos, remote controls, microwaves and computers.

These are all things that young adults have grown up with. Why would their proficiency be so surprising?

Separated, divorced and widowed Americans are more involved with high-tech than other singles and married people. This may be because they have more time, or are perhaps more focused on using tech to connect with other people.

This just goes to prove what I was saying. The time factor. I'd like to see the study narrow down a bit to take into account the "child" factor. My guess is that single people with children fared far worse in the study because they have even less time than a married person to spend with technology, unless they use it at work.

It confirms the idea that tech industries are peopled by smart geeks still too far removed from the ordinary concerns of average Americans.

I'd like to see the survey. Did anybody find a reference to it on the link Jon provided? I really want to see where he pulls this idea from. Sure, technology is developed by the "smart" people. But don't forget that product development, marketing and sales aren't made up of the same breed of people. They are smart in their own ways, but not normally as technology savvy.

It reminds us that Tech Support is a scandal.

I agree with this, but as I said before, this applies to other customer service areas, too. Did you ever have a problem with a vacuum cleaner and try calling their support line? It's every bit as bad as a Tech support line. And they pull the same crap, like charging more to fix a simple problem than it would cost to just buy a new vacuum cleaner.

I'm sorry, but I don't think this survey was very well thought out. Maybe it's just Jon's take on it, but it appears that the survey was written specifically to support a theory. I'm sure there are some interesting things in there. For example, the ethnic differences are interesting. One might wonder, for example, what the family background of different ethnic groups are. For example, how many generations in the US. What their education levels are. What their family is interested in. Whether they have relatives in other countries that they still need to communicate with.

Less is more.

[DeadBugs]

"Why, for example, would midwesterners grasp technology so much better than northeasterners?"

We drink less coffee and more beer. It allows for paitence

AMISH VIRUS!!!

[Alan_Thicke]

You have just received the Amish Virus!
Since we do not have electricity or computers,
you are on the HONOR SYSTEM!
Please delete ALL of your files....




Thank Thee.

Duh!

[jpaulson]

Television, meanwhile, continues its long reign as Americans' most beloved and comprehensible technology. In fact, for years TV has not gotten its due as one of the monumentally successful technologies of all time -- cheap, reliable, easy to use. More than 80 percent of respondents across the country understood how to work a TV better than a computer, something for the computer industry to ponder long and hard.

Well no shit. The TV has ~5 options (power on/off, channel up, channel down, volume up, volume down) as compared to the computer which is designed to be versitile and has more options than I can enumerate. You increase an objects complexity and fewer people understand it. Why is this even worth mentioning?

Re:Duh!

[Anonymous Coward]

Well no shit. The TV has ~5 options

You clearly don't remember what TVs looked like in the 1960s and 1970s. Remember tubes? Remember those wonderful things like horizontal and vertical hold controls? Remember color adjustments? How about "do it yourself tube replacements?"

TV used to be a geek dream. Now it's ordinary. Likewise cars were the domain of the "automobilist" few. And don't forget the old profession of telegrapher.

Every generation has had its technical literati. Why should this one be any different? Katz, you ought to be a bit more circumspect about this stuff.

Silly article based on an opinion poll

[cowboy junkie]

Katz asks 'why would midwesterners grasp technology so much better than northeasterners?', but in fact, since this is based on an opinion poll in which the respondents evaluated their own expertise, the real question would be 'why do midwesterners think they grasp technology so much better than northeasterners do?'

Re:Silly article based on an opinion poll

[mjh]

Perhaps a better way to ask it would be, "Why do midwesterners feel more comfortable with technology than northeasterners?"

I think Katz made too big of a leap when going from a person's opinion of themselves to their actual skills. However, I suspect that if you think you know technology, you probably have a leg up on someone who thinks they don't know technology. Someone in the latter group is not going to be driven to solve a problem. They're going to first think that they don't understand the constraints of the problem thus they can't possibly solve it. But someone who thinks that they know technology and experiences a problem with it, at the very least, is not going to be able to dismiss the problem as outside of the scope of their knowledge.

So for example, I'm not even going to know where to begin solving a problem that might occur on a 747 jet liner. I don't understand the systems involved. But I do understand how my 9-cell sabre 150 parachute works, and I can at least begin to troubleshoot any problems that I experience. Even if I don't really understand how to build one.

The point is that comfort with a system allows for people to become knowledgable about that system. So, you're right that comfort doesn't imply knowledge, but discomfort might imply lack of knowledge.

$.02

Technophobes for sure

[maddogsparky]

I've been trying to get my wife to learn how to check her messages on her cell phone. The instructions in the manual are easy, but she just wants to be shown anyway and won't read the manual.

I don't know how many times I've heard "Just show me what I need to know; I don't want to learn all that other stuff" from any number of technophobes.

But I used the "ADVANCED" Start Menu setup!

[tiltowait]

... you mean 90% of people aren't actually the above average drivers they think they are?!

Let's examine this a bit shall we?

[AstynaxX]

Katz asks why the tech industry has continued to trundle along (not entirely prosper, but mostly so) when we 'abuse' our users. Tell me, would he ask the same uestion about a gap between the 'medically savvy' and the 'medically confused'? Modern computer systems (and by systems I mean -everything, hardware and software) are very nearly as complex as biological organisms (at least as we currently understand them. The more we learn about biology, the more there seems to be, but that's another topic). Is it -really- hard to figure out why most folks aren't computer experts?

Let me spell it out then: The problem is too complex for most people to bother spending the required amount of time to learn its answer. Just like medicine, some of the more esoteric bits of automobiles, and other inherently complex topics.

Re:Let's examine this a bit shall we?

[AhNewBis]

It's not just that.

I do software beta testing as well as technical support. The people that call me want help; I want to help them fix their problem. But when John Q Public starts cussing me out, not following directions, doing extra steps without telling me, and flat out LYING (Really, I DIDN'T install anything recently!)...I can't help them.

If people want to learn, I'll teach them. If people don't want to take the time or effort, screw em. I don't need to hear people bitching me out on the phones because they have a 2MB S3 ViRGE and they wonder why DirectX won't work with their system. I explain it to them in simple terms: the program -- all pictures, documents, and data -- needs the equivalent of 8 square feet of space for all if its workload. But your video card -- the desk -- only has 2 square feet. And then they yell at me: WHY DIDN'T IT SAY SO? ... turn the box over. Read. I DON'T KNOW WHAT I HAVE IN HERE, HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO KNOW? So I have to walk them through getting their system specs, etc. That's why computers have large red stickers all over that say what is inside. As well as an invoice sheet (Dell/Gateway/et al).

Mechanics are in a very similar situation. They fix machines for an hourly wage. Some do it for fun, some do it for work, some do it to learn. But if a customer comes in raging and fuming, mechanics aren't going to take any crap. And neither will I.

THAT is where the 'elitist computer world' comes from: arrogant, pissy customers who call you up for help, but then refuse to let you help them. As one of the 'elitist computer' people, getting called twice a day for friends' and family's problems gets REALLY annoying, real fast. If you try and teach them, and they refuse to learn, it's their own fault.

Don't blame us techs for people's ignorance. It's just like blaming teachers for the educational system -- there may be some bad teachers, but learning is a two-way street.

And Katz: I used to like your articles. But truly, I think YOU are detached a bit from the tech world. I challenge you to do a month of tech support. Even a week would do. See it from our eyes. Pushed calls, 2 15-minute breaks during a day, call notes, a forced 90% utilization and more. Deal with customers who call you up for all sorts of issues that have NOTHING to do with the product supported. Deal with customers that will not be happy until they talk to a manager, even though it is their first call. Deal with unbelievable scrutiny on every single phone call, email, call note, and resolution. Deal with logging in, and seeing the phone software display 90+ calls in the queue with 50 minute hold times. Deal with all of those customers, from late December through mid-February. Deal with being on a 2 hour call that starts 5 minutes before your work day ends. Deal with a 4 hour Windows 95/98 rebuild talking to someone that doesn't know a colon from a semicolon, or a forwardslash from a backslash. And do it all for $10/hour.

Do that, then come talk to us.

You should've also looked at a few other statistics: The turnover rate for tech support. The average amount of training before being put on phones. Before you go spouting about the 'computer elite,' see how often those 'elite' end up changing jobs because of unbelievable stress.

I hope the gap is as wide as possible.

[HanzoSan]

That way we will all be as valueable as an astronaught, instead of be as valueable as an office clerk.

The more esoteric that our jobs are, the more difficult it will be for common joe blow to steal our jobs, the more money we will make.

As much as I'd like everyone in the world to be computer savvy, in a capitalist world,
people get paid for their knowledge, their skill, and their ability to apply it.

By giving the common man your knowledge, all they have to do is have skill and apply it, this means you'll be without a job when you are fired and replaced by joe blow.

Your salary will be 30k a year because YOU taught everyone how to do what you do making your job as valueable and making you as important as an office clerk or mc donalds burger flipper.

Re:I hope the gap is as wide as possible.

[dcweaver]

Keep in mind that the first person to successfully teach computer stuff to Joe Blow will likely make a giant amount of money. So this is a classic instance of the Prisoner's Dilemma, where the reward for defecting (i.e., giving our skills to the common man) is much greater than for cooperating and keeping computer knowledge secret. I would submit that we can't keep the gap wide by simply not teaching our skills to anyone.

However, I would also submit that the gap will always be widening, even if we try to stop it. Many people look at computer software that is designed to "dumb down" the machine for the average user, and say that computers are getting simpler every day. Really, of course, this simplicity is only a sandbox, and the back end is getting more and more complex. This, not a conspiracy of technocrats, is what will keep computer gurus in their jobs. Not to worry.

Re:I hope the gap is as wide as possible.

[Keith Russell]

Thank you so much for providing that textbook example of elitism in action. (/me shovels some more troll food in the trough.)

If you're only pulling down $30K because world+dog is now savvy enough to crank out Java code, it's your own damn fault. Not because you taught them your trade, but because you didn't learn another trade yourself. It's called complacency. Look it up.

Re:I hope the gap is as wide as possible.

[HanzoSan]

Maybe some people dont want to have to learn a new trade every 4 years!

I'm not going to educate the world so i'm forced to move up from helpdesk to a much more difficult job like biotech engineer or AI programmer and make the same money i'd make in helpdesk because everyone in helpDesk now will be movin up with me.

it defeats the whole point of moving up if everyone moves up with you.

I want to be one of the only few people who can do a certain job, so i can make millions and retire early.

Its about elitism yes, but thats what its all about, making as much money as you can and the only way to make it, is to make sure everyone else isnt taking your money from you.

Random Thoughts

[Matey-O]

I've got more disposable income now than I ever had before...but I've PURCHASED all of the consumer techno-gadgets to be had. I last felt that 'smell of the hunt' feeling when I bought a RUG Shampooer fer chrissakes.

It puts me in a serious funk to walk into Circuit City/Best Buy/Soundtrack and realise that there ARE NO consumer electronics left for me to purchase. My pda's perking along fine, as is my cellphone, Digital Camera, computer, Xbox, home theatre, TV, blender, coffee maker, LAN, lawnmower, car lift, electric toothbrush...you get the point.

At the same time that I've got everything I want, I've got a ton of functionality I don't use. I've got an X10 touchpanel that's programmable, interrupt driven, and can literally control everything in my house. It's technically not beyond my abilities to program it. Why does it only turn on and off the Stereo tuner and control it's volume? Because I can't be _bothered_ to figure it out.

That may be the more telling issure here: Are these people stupid, or is it just not a high enough priority to learn? (OR do us midwesterners just have more dark cold winter to futz with stuff?)

Hey, my phone's a two way pager...it can surf the net, it's got an IR port to connect my pda to the internet. How many people CARE that it does more than 'look cool' and doesn't drop calls?

We've gotten to the point where more features can be crammed into a device than can be used. It it bad that I don't use EVERY feature?

Adapt and survive

[JohnBE]

The only way that anyone from a vending machine cleaner to a managing director stays current is through re-training. Re-training doesn't always mean college or university, often people don't pop to their local library and pick up a 'Windows for Dummies' or even learn the basics of what a computer actually is. I'm not saying that there are not mitigating factors and I'm not saying that there isn't an excuse. But the fact is from the industrial revolution to today people have had to shift skill sets and move with the market.

It's the nature of things, one door closes and another opens. My 83 year old grandmother has learnt how to email and use the net so its possible up to a quite considerable age. Who is the oldest computer/internet/slashdot user?

Re:Duct tape and bailing wire

[jgerman]

Nah duct tape and WD40 are all you need, duct tape to make things stop, WD40 to make 'em go.

contradictions a la Katz

[garyrich]

"Why, for example, would midwesterners grasp technology so much better than northeasterners?"

It doesn't even seem to say that. It says that midwesterners are more CONFIDENT in their abilities with technologies. Their confidence may be totally unfounded.

Like the old one

[MosesJones]

Take a load of not so bright people ask them to evaluate themselves
Take a load of brigh people ask them to evaluate themselves.

The average rating for the not so bright will be from above average to excellent

The average rating for the bright people will be from average to above average

Put them together in a room to talk about the ratings...

Not so bright group don't change their opinions, bright group now average Excellent.

A common study on perception on reality that most psyhc students have looked at.

Unskilled and unaware

[pos]

Stats don't always say what you think they are reporting. Especially when done in the form of a survey.

For a good breakdown of how people understand their own skill level take a look at this journal article. It does a good job of graphing people's self assessments against their actual performances.

The point is that just because a population is not confident about their skills as a computer user, does not mean that they are lacking those skills. Conversely, it is the confidant ones who lack the knowledge to be able to rate their own performance.

-pos

Good vs. Good Enough

[regen]

It's hard to recall any industry which has so abused, neglected and exploited its customers and survived.

This seems to me to be a modern trend in business. Businesses in all sectors have discovered that you don't have to be good or provide a good product or service, you just have to be good enough. In fact it seems that businesses can maximize profits by being subpar. Consumers will often buy a cheap product that does 90% of what they want rather than an expensive product that does 100%.

This seems to be especially true with customer service. Providing the level of customer service to help the average user (oh, I have to plug it in?) and not providing the level of service desired by the "tech savvy" saves a lot of money for these companies.

It comes down to cheap, fast, good, chose any two. The population typcially goes for cheap and fast, and not good.

Computers are not made by the tech industry

[Error27]

They are almost exclusively made by Microsoft.

It's true that the overwhelming majority of Americans prefer to fix their computers than to buy new. If I made computers I would empower users to do just that. But I'm don't and Microsoft does...

When my friends have computer problems I'm powerless to help them. How do I get rid of lurking programs that pop up advertisements? How do fix there computer if something screwed up their registry? Sometimes I am able to find help online but most of the time I'm not.

Microsoft software is fragile, undocumented, unpredictable and unfixable. It's not just end users who are frustrated using Microsoft products; techincal people get frustrated and angry too.

Re:US Centric and Bollocks anyway...

[NerdSlayer]

Can't think of a group of people who care less about their customers ?

Tobacco and Gun companies, lob in the Defence industry, lawyers etc etc etc.

What a troll. Though I'm not going to try to defend the tobacco companies here, the gun, defense and legal industries do not set out specifically to harm their customers.

This is flawed logic at it's worst. Are you telling me the defense industry doesn't care about the American people? That's it whole fucking purpose, is to defend morons like you.

Leaving the decisions of politcal leaders out of it, without Colt firearms and Beoing bomber aircraft, you'd be tossing Hitlers salad along with everybody else. Every war or military action may not be justified, but there are certainly times when they are.

Also, although society has become a bit litigious, don't forgot those downtrodden defense lawyers who got your sorry ass Miranda rights. Lawyers for big companies do try to take away alot of rights from people, but other lawyers got you a lot of rights to begin with. It's a give and take... good and bad.

Anyways, you're allowed to be a dirty hippie pinko if you want, but I'm still gonna eat steak, smoke Marlboros, drink Jack Daniels, own a Glock, and live in a troubled but still free fucking country.

Sometimes a song says it better than Katz...

[RobinH]

Check out this song: "Every OS Sucks" by Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie
It's probably more insightful than whatever drivel Katz is spewing today.

Cell Phone Losers

[mudder]

One of my favorite examples of a poor grasp of technology was observed when I was in a cell phone store. The sales guy was setting up an account for me when this lady walks in. She told the guy her phone wasn't working, and she thought it was because she had left it on the dashboard in the sun (not a totally unreasonable idea). The guy looks at the phone and pushes the power button. When the phone comes on, the lady is quite surprised and asks how he did it. He then explains to her all about the power button, and how it works. She was surprised and hadn't realized that you could turn the phone on and off. Apparently, she had let the battery fully discharge and then when she plugged it in and charged it up, it didn't turn on automatically and she didn't know what to do.

It's funny how people's brains seem to turn off when they get near something high-tech, or really even something unfamiliar (e.g. people are constantly confused as to where they parked at ski resorts, yet they have no problems finding their parking spot at the mall/stadium/wherever).

Technophobes?

[wytcld]

One area of technology where really good repair manuals exist is automobiles. Any standard repair on a standard car is documented right down to the exact foot pounds to apply to the wrench. But do the mechanics who love cars work from the manuals? Mostly, no.

It has not much to do with loving or hating a technology; it's about cognitive mode. Most of us do reasonably well learning by seeing; only a minority handle manuals well. The current generation of computers - despite the GUIs - favor those who do well with manuals. Much of the strength of Linux is in the succinct quality of the INSTALL and README docs in most program tars. RTFM is the mantra of a technological niche built by-and-for those who do well by manuals.

But that particular sort of verbal (supplemented by diagrams) intelligence isn't the only smarts people have; it's not even the only sort of smarts that might serve a tech-lover well. For instance, do you want your high-tech battle system manned by nerds-with-manuals or by those with a good seat-of-the-pants feel for the system and quick reflexes? Some folks have both, but for the most part those good with manuals are in the ground crews, and the kid in the cockpit is smart about - and loves - tech in a different way.
___

The beauty of Open Source

[Ogerman]

..The gap between the tech-savvy and the techno-confused keeps growing, a monumental failure of our arrogant and elitist tech industries. It's hard to recall any industry which has so abused, neglected and exploited its customers and survived.

Open Source software is often lambasted for being harder to use than its proprietary Windows equivalents. On the other hand, it simultaneously has far better user support available. Proprietary software, being a product-based industry, cares more about shipping out new products than it does supporting what already exists. This comes naturally with the business model. They don't make money on support so it's very tempting to slack off. Open Source based business, in contrast, is purely a service industry. By very nature it results in far closer communication between users and developers. Open Source breaks down arrogance and elitism quickly as the development community expands. A customer cannot be neglected if it is also a co-developer. As the use of OSS continues to spread and more consulting firms spring up to meet the service need, I believe we'll see a flourishing of consumer friendly technology both on and off the desktop PC.

There's a reason for that.

[SCHecklerX]

Instead of learning how to use a computer or device, these days, it's all being hidden from the end users. I remember my first computer, the TRS-80 color computer, came with a book on how to PROGRAM it. Same goes for electronics. It used to be you could buy a kit, build something yourself, and learn something in the process. Today you just buy something.

You can't simply blame the users for not knowing how things work. You also have to blame the people creating the technology for not encouraging them to understand the stuff in the first place (M$ constantly trying to hide the file system from users is a good example of this). Any piece of equipment that could be tweaked, configured, or modified SHOULD come with books on how to do so.

Another excellent example that just sprang to mind is printers. When I purchased my first printer (A radio shack dmp130 dot matrix) it came with a book describing EXACTLY how to talk to it to use fonts, or address graphics. In other words, everything needed to write a printer driver (not really such a thing back then, but) came with the printer. You simply don't see these manuals and specs being shipped with modern day stuff, so even those who are curious about things don't have their curiosity encouraged by the manufacturers.

TV vs Computers

[WeaselGod]

"More than 80 percent of respondents across the country understood how to work a TV better than a computer, something for the computer industry to ponder long and hard. "

Gee, you don't say. Maybe thats because a TV has limited functionality when compared to a computer. Here is is another amazing fact "99.9% of the people surveyed understand how to work a toaster better then a Nuclear Reactor". Obviously the Nuclear reactor industry has something to learn from the toaster industry.

Not Tech's Fault

[Ephemeriis]

A lot of the blame here seems to be aimed at the tech. industry.... People seem to think that the tech. industry isn't doing enough to explain things to your average user, or make them simple enough, or produce products that fit the average user's needs. Well, I'll certainly agree that this is all true to a certain degree, but I don't think that is where the majority of the problem lies. The majority of the problem lies not with the tech. industry for failing to educate the masses, but with the masses for failing to do anything to educate themselves.

I work at the local EB, and you'd be amazed at some of the customers we have in here. There are people who know absolutely nothing about the computer that they just purchased - don't know the RAM, speed, HDD space, nothing! This is on a machine that was just purchased a day ago...and all that information is available right on the box! Most people, when they go out to purchase a car, take a look at some basic information...type of transmission, MPG, airbags, ABS, number of seats...you get the idea. Most people (from what I've seen at EB) do not do the same thing with technology.

How much can you expect the tech. industry to educate/provide for the masses when they're not even willing to read the label on a package?

yrs,
Ephemeriis

Interesting piece

[I_redwolf]

I disagree with mostly all of it but whatever. Surveying 3000 adults for a study like this isn't enough. A more comprehensive study needs to be done. For instance, I'm African-American, Black or whatever the fucking PC term is. I'm 22 and tend to think I know a little about computers at least enough to not be totally ignorant. That said blackplanet.com has a shit load of African-American's online every single day. I've never seen it go under the 20,000 mark and mind you this is just one website. I don't use it everyday or even every month but everytime I do go there (maybe every 2 months) there is always a large number of people on. As for others i'd be hard pressed to know anything but from my view of the world conducting a study/survey like this tends to be futile. Technology is just the modern day equivalent of the cavemans sharpened rock for an axe. They are just tools, except these aren't for survival; better communication, yes. Some will know how to use them and others won't. However if a study/survey is to be done 3,000 people isn't enough, if you could get at least 5,000 from every state you'd probably get better numbers.

Ok lemme stop rambling.

NE isn't technologically savvy? Huh?

[Hoi Polloi]

So why is the NE (along with the Bay Area) such a concentration of high tech if it is so techno-dumb? I don't see high tech companies flocking to the mid west. Also, what about all those little schools like Harvard, MIT, BU, NE, etc that are in the NE?

Who did they survey, the illiterate?

Did it ever occur to you Mr. Katz?

[TheAwfulTruth]

That as people grow older they want to put up with constantly changing technology less and less? And it doesn't matter if it's cell phones in this century or automobiles in the last. Eventually technology always passes by a persons WANT to keep up with it.

Comparing TVs to the internet is also completely meaningless. TVs require virtually NO internevtion to operate it's by it's nature a passive activity. The net by it's nature is an active activity. A person does not choose one BECAUSE of the other. They choose one because of what they WANT out of it. Even if you had a computer that was 100% functional without flaws all the time, getting anything out of the net reqires one to pay more attention. It's work. Hell even 100 channels of TV are too much for some people to want to wade through.

And I'm not talking about ignorance or stupidity. I'm talking about WANT. Some people don't WANT to deal with technology on any level no matter how flawless or "easy" you make it.

YOU'RE the one whos elitest. This entire article is one giant freudian slip! You actually think that everyone on the planet HAS to be completely up to date with the latest and greatest. That's bullshit and that's your elitism showing.

This article says loads more about yourself than any other point you tried to being up.

it's not just the tech industry

[CrudPuppy]

forget about VCR's and digital cameras, the tech gap is EVERYWHERE!

I believe one of the most fundamental differences between a tech-savvy person and a non-techie (all other things being equal) is that at the core the tech-savvy person isn't afraid of the technology.

Put a 10 year-old in front of a computer and watch them go wild, trying everything out, then put a 50 year-old in front of the same computer and marvel at their fear of breaking the thing by pressing a mouse button.

To address the gap specifically, look at cars. 30 years ago, new cars could all be worked on by most auto-savvy people. now we look around and find that there are more than a couple makers that won't allow you to turn off the check-engine light until you come in for your $5000 dealer oil change (exageration intended).

Most people accept this because cars of today have engines half the size producing twice the power and a fraction of the emissions as those from 30 years ago. It's a compromise.

Now let's apply this to the computer industry, and we can see the parallel is indeed there. The compromise lies in the fact that computers today can do quiteliterally THOUSANDS of things the Apple II could not. 40 years ago, it truly was possible for someone with motivation to be a master in the realm of computing -- now a person considers himself lucky to truly master one tiny specialised field in 5 years.

It's not abusing the consumer, it's giving people more of what they want at the expense of them not understanding *everything*.

Both sides of the spectrum are full of crap.

[quag7]

Having worked in retail selling PCs and then having worked for a large ISP doing tech support and writing technical support content, my opinion of the matter, whatever it is worth, is that no one has realized the basic fact that support works only when both sides meet at the middle.

First of all, companies spend too much on supporting the least profitable customers. There are, unfortunately, some people who are just too stupid to use certain technologies. That may not fit in with the idealism of the present age, but it is a fact. At the same time, savvy users are often denied the online resources / self help data which is cheap to provide. No one should ever have to dig, for example, for IP, DNS, etc. setttings for their ISP. The ISP I use doesn't have a single page written with the basic numbers that I need to configure a PC, but they'll spend countless hours writing "How to use e-mail" documents and supporting users who delete their WINNT directory "because they're using Windows 2000."

Learning to use technology requires the affirmative and volitional use of brainpower. The worst disservice you can do to support a person is to tell them what keys to press, and in what order, without telling them why. This may be a short term fix to get a customer off of the phones, but it results in countless followup calls which make hold times longer, support more expensive, and therefore services for expensive. A little user education goes a long way. Consumers should be expected to open up their minds and learn about the technologies they use. If a 3 year old can use a PC - and many, many do, there is no reason why a full-grown person cannot spend a little time in the evenings educating themselves in whatever way they are most comfortable with.

"I don't have the time." What this means is, the individual would rather watch Survivor than spend 30 minutes in their evenings learning a little bit about the technology they use. Well, that's *their* problem. In the end, the decreased productivity they experience, all of the time saving measures they cannot avail themselves of, etc. far exceeds the simple initial investment of RTFM. How often I've watched people in my own office lay out little bulletins and brochures using scotch tape and scissors when they could have done it in a fraction of the time using only the most basic functions of Word. It's not as if you have to be a computer geek, just a reasonably educated computer user. Anyone who has ever put the time in ought to know that the investment pays off, frees up time, money, and resources.

Paranoia about support boundaries. Several companies I've worked for have paranoia about supporting products beyond the most rudimentary tasks. An example of this is setting up a Linux system to work with an ISP. Write the damn documentation, put it online, and then put a disclaimer on it saying, "Use this information at your own risk. We don't support it and are not responsible for anything that happens to you including spontaneous combustion if it all goes awry." Whatever the company's legal department is happy with. Some companies do this now and it makes life easier and saves a phone call, which costs companies so much money.

So much time has been spent catering to the user's ignorance that consumers are not expected to take some effort to learn about the products they buy. Every time something is dumbed down to the point a monkey can use it, inevitably two things happen:

• Power is or may be diminished in the product (Windows is one example).
• An expectation is set, and now every company which comes later must spend the support resources necessary to support people who won't crack open a manual.

Ideally, ample online/self-help resources ought to be provided by every company that manufactures a product, because it is cheap; in fact it costs almost nothing. You spend the time hiring some technical writers or knowledge engineers to put together a knowledge base or support web, then just have a few maintainers on. Agents can then use this information for support, and so forth. This is infinitely cheaper than doing phone support.

Then, there ought to be tiered pricing for support, depending on the issue. Phone support ought not necessarily be free. People who expect companies to bend over backwards for them have no conception of revenue models. Support is *expensive*. There is no reason, for example, a company should be forced to support someone who will not crack open a manual. What this does is drive up wait times, resulting either in customer dissatisfaction, or the company has to hire more tech support people, which costs money, cuts into profits, resulting in the expense being passed onto the consumer.

But consumers want everything dirt cheap. That's Capitalism. What they don't want is the very basic reality that you get what you pay for. Take low-margin industries like PC retail. Sure you can buy a bargain basement clone with who-knows-what in it, but somehow when it works like crap, the indignant dissastisfied-customer attitude doesn't impress me. Support and quality ought to come at a premium. If customers didn't buy technology like they buy clothes pins, like "they're all the same," maybe they wouldn't be bitten so hard by poor support and low quality.

Inevitably every customer I've dealt with has some "10 year old whiz kid" in the family who *thinks* he knows everything about computers. Occasionally this is the case, but more often my experience has been that for some perverse reason it has become *fashionable* to be a computer nerd, and so a lot of people who know how to mouse around in Windows call themselves experts for the supposed status it brings (I went to school in the 1980s and the opposite could not have been more true). All technology is not build the same. All companies are not built the same. Sometimes, yeah, you get what you pay for. Deal with it.

Learn to read manuals and use the library and especially online resources. Or else get someone to teach you. Or pay for the support that you require that so few others, who have the ability to learn on their own, do.

I had no one to teach me about computers or technology, or how to work my VCR. I had to sit down and learn it, and it didn't take up all of my free time; I didn't have to dedicate my life to figure out how to stop the damn blinking 12:00 on my VCR. It took 5 minutes. 5 minutes people are not willing to spend. And in 90% of the cases not because they are working 24/7 and don't have a single second to figure it out, but because they are lazy and would rather indulge themselves in whatever banalities pass for entertainment in the world these days. I am not sympathetic. There are so many resources available to people, and the time required to learn the basics of anything so considerably small compared to the time-saving benefits and payoffs, that I don't see why I should care about this gap.

Somewhere in America there is an idiot whining about the fact that he has to learn to cursor around the menu system on his VCR, while an 8 year old is installing FreeBSD in his free time.

Welcome to the 2000s. This is life. I wonder if people whined about having to learn to read following the invention of the printing press and the onset of the Enlightenment, and eventually the industrial revolution.

Carry your own weight, or get out of the road, maggots.

Because the digital computer was invented in Iowa?

[Paul Fernhout]

I don't deny the substance of your point about opinion polls, but Midwesterners do have reason to be proud.

http://www.cs.iastate.edu/jva/jva-archive.shtml

From that page:

The Atanasoff-Berry Computer was the world's first electronic digital computer. It was built by John Vincent Atanasoff and Clifford Berry at Iowa State University during 1937-42. It incorporated several major innovations in computing including the use of binary arithmetic, regenerative memory, parallel processing, and separation of memory and computing functions.

On October 19, 1973, US Federal Judge Earl R. Larson signed his decision following a lengthy court trial which declared the ENIAC patent of Mauchly and Eckert invalid and named Atanasoff the inventor of the electronic digital computer -- the Atanasoff-Berry Computer or the ABC.

Where the gap begins...

[cr0sh]

Personally, I think it starts somewhere in grade school (and perhaps even before):

There are kids who only do what they are told to, there are kids who extrapolate on what they are told to do, then there are kids who get the other kids to do what they were told to do to do it for them (whew!)...

Anyhow, most people fall into the first and last categories. They are trapped there, by their own ignorance and apathy. Call them the Sheep and the Lazy.

In reality, they are one and the same. Whether it is how to program a VCR, work a computer, or fix a leaky faucet - not a single one of them will take the time to learn to do it themselves (which is probably a good thing - it keeps those who are in the second category gainfully employed).

Those in the middle? They are the artists, the thinkers, the tinkerers, the inventors, the mechanics, the programmers - they are the people who ask the questions, find the answers, and then apply those answers toward the search for the truth (which inevitably leads to more questions, more answers, etc).

I don't think I will ever understand completely why there are individuals without curiosity and drive to expand their knowledge about the world around them. With time on this planet so limited, it should almost be an instinct to want to know more. The travesty for anyone who does exhibit curiosity about the world around them is that they also know that one day, in what is really only a blink of time, that the quest will end - whether they want it to or not.

Computers are not "Magic TVs"

[Vortran]

Why should the tech industry think "long and hard" about how most folks can use a TV more easily than they can a computer?

One part of me thinks that bringing computers out of the garages and labs was a BIG mistake. This part of me says, "Computers are for techies, not for the general masses." Sometimes I wonder if we wouldn't be further ahead if we hadn't sold out?

..but then I supposed I wouldn't have my Palm Pilot. I dunno. It just seems a bit unrealistic to expect everyone everywhere to understand computers. They are NOT "magic TVs".

Furthermore, I do not want my computer to become a "magic TV." I want my computers to continue to be my own jumbles of circuit cards and twisted wires and strange humming noises that my wife points at and says the word "that".

I don't want to be coddled by layers and layers of metaphor and "cuteness". I want my machines to be powerful tools that I can use for work, study and pastime. I don't want them "dumbed down".

Then again, I sure like my GPS and digital camera. I don't think I'd have these toys if I still had to buy wire-wrap sockets and ICs to fix my Altair 8800. So, once again, I'm not sure.

Did we sell out?