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simPC - Your Grandparents' New Computer?
trs9000 writes "The Register has a blurb about simPC, an "idiot-proof" PC set to debut in May of this year. It seems like a step towards a thin-client world, though it is aimed primarily at the elderly. For about $400 for the box and a $13-per-month subscription, users get a box with a propietary OS and software preinstalled for online banking, spam filtering, virus detection and online storage. What users don't get is the ability to install software, burn CDs or download large files. Initial release is only for the Netherlands and Belgium."
Mac mini + simple Finder.
I dunno about updates, though. I know you could use Apple Remote Desktop/VNC, but it'd be nice if I could patch Granny's Mac over SSH.
By the way, maybe it was offered as a counterexample to the "crippled PC" marketing concept. Not only is it a toothbrush, it's also a sex toy! And it does both well, instead of one thing half as well like the computer.
You make a good point. The Sonicare's multifunctionality is what makes it useful!
Is a crippled PC even worth it?
Actually...for $400 and a subscription it better be a pretty decent PC, and the subscription better cover basic internet access.
E-machines used to be free with a two year MSN subscription. That seems like a better deal for idiots.
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
Simple interface. Mail program filters out most all the spam you get. No need for worrying about getting a virus.
Why would I want a PC if the Mac mini is available?
It's either on the beat or off the beat, it's that easy.
I moderate therefore I rule!
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All but one of those is a function of a webbrowser.
Or, a specialized client software such as Quicken, Eudora or iTunes.
You mac lunatics always
For the record, I don't own a Mac. I owned an Apple IIe in 1984. But I think they are perfectly decent computers.
Fine, what software would your grandpa use which isn't on a Mac?
94% of Repubs and 21% of Dems voted to renew the Patriot Act
The Sonicare is about $70 and just has the bristly head as well as you have to restart it every 2 minutes... not a good thing for orgasmic pleasure.
Just pony up the extra $30 and get one that doesn't need to be recharged AND actually works... for that purpose, that is.
[ Doctor sits next to Babs on the couch ]
Doctor: I won't beat around the bush, Babs.
Babs: Is it bad?
Doctor: In a nutshell, your uvula is on the fritz. Which reminds me of a little joke. Knock knock!
Babs: Who's there?
Doctor: Babs' uvula.
Babs: Babs' uvula who?
Doctor: I don't know, Babs. But I do know this - you've really let your uvula go to the dogs.
Babs: Yes.. I have..
Sister: I'd like to share this with you, Sis. [ opens a greeting card ] "To Babs: It'll behoove ya', to care for your uvula! Love, Sis."
Babs: Boy, do I hear ya', Sis! From now on, it's strictly good, clean fun. For me and my uvula!
Actually they're only buying a computer because you never write to them. Plus they would like to keep in touch with all their friends who haven't died yet.
So what would a computer designed for the elderly with money be like?
Do you think that they went out and actually asked anyone over 70 years old what they would want in a computer? Not likely. Probably just had a few focus groups of five or six 20-somethings with coffee and doughnuts throwing stupid suggestions at each other. Like "Let's make it real easy to use!" (meaning: "Let's make it real easy to buy!").
If I were really old then my body would be not functioning well, and I would not be happy about it. So what would I want in a computer?
Well, since no young people like to live the old and the middle aged people are too busy and have enough money to get away from them, the elderly tend to live alone and lonely. They have fragile bones and if they fall down they tend to stay down a lot longer than they would forty years ago.
So how about a PC with a microphone that will dial (the number that connects any telephone line to the authorities in the USA) and pre-recorded message requesting help to come to their address when they yell a specific phrase from the floor? A phrase like "Help! I've fallen and I can't move!". Or, "Help! I'm having a heart attack".
How about if the PC could interface with the medical equipment that they have bought with your inheritance money? So they could just buy the sensor part and have this $400 PC do all the digital work that all expensive microprocessors inside each piece of expensive home medical equipment is now doing?
How about an autodialer for the phone so that they can just say "Mildred? Are you home?" at the PC and have the PC dial Mildred and act like a telephone instead of having painful arthritic fingers trying to stab at little buttons that they can't see anyway on a cheap plastic phone that doesn't work well because it's been dropped so many times because it's so hard for an old person to hold?
How about a good fast flatbed scanner interface so that they can put a paper or letter on the scanner surface and actually be able to read it on PC screen in big, big letters that can be seen with eighty-year-old eyes?
If you are seriously trying to make a PC that old people will buy, then make a PC that is seriously helpful to older people.
In the glory days of the dotcom boom, FreePC gave away 10,000 computers, free, nada, goose-egg. No shipping, no contracts, no obligations EXCEPT you had to run their advertising overlay when you were browsing the Web.
I know because I got one. I still couldn't believe it when the UPS man showed up with the boxes. It may be that there are VERY FEW things in life that are free, but this was one of them.
They were cheapie little Compaqs with a Cyrix M-II CPU but at least you could brag that the price/performance ratio was extraordinarily high. Actually, they ran fine, certainly good enough for browsing...especially after you wiped off the disk and put a fresh install of Windows on it. (My mom still uses that machine to this day.)
When I hear "new proprietary operating system", I think "Linux, but they're violating the license."
And not only that, but I'm thinking that there's an inherent flaw in treating users like idiots and designing a product "for idiots".
This arrogance in the computer industry is getting on my nerves already, and I _am_ a programmer. The whole "if you get bitten by our bugs or piss-poor design, you're an idiot luser" attitude.
The fact is, since everyone just has to compare computers to cars, computers and especially software nowadays are at the point where cars were in 1900. They were a fragile, shoddy contraption that needed you to be an experienced mechanic just to keep it working. (Or rich enough to afford getting a mechanic to keep repairing it for you.)
That's exactly the point where computers are today. Each time grandma calls that her computer crawls to a halt, imagine her with a rickety 1900 car that broke down again. On flat ground. For no obvious reason, other than piss-poor primitive construction.
Yes, there probably is some invisible reason, such as that on the PC she clicked on the wrong link, or with the 1900 car she took a too tight curve. Guess what? In both cases the user shouldn't have to deal with that crap.
Except that wereas the car industry went and improved their product, the computer industry is content to call everyone an idiot. Cars eventually stopped breaking down each time you pushed the gas pedal too hard or drove over a small stone you didn't see, but computers didn't. The computers still break down for as little as a malformed packet. (See the buffer overflows.)
And instead of fixing their own damn deffective product, the computer industry keeps blaming the user. "Noo, our product is perfect. It's those idiots who broke it. Let's give them a crippled locked-down PC they can't break." It's an idiocy of the calibre of "let's give them a car which only goes in a straight line, so they don't break it by taking tight curves."
And IMHO those are the _real_ idiots. Not the users.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
they tried to take over my windoze completely in order make my online life more simple and secure. Going from AOL 4 to 5 to...I got off the merry-go-round at 7, I found AOL insinuated itself into all the functions it could, supplanted or ignored whatever windows features it could...
so here comes a product that, by going it alone, succeeds completely at what AOL had attempted. And guess what? Its going to be so lame and limited even grandma is going to say "WTF!?" Besides, the usual deal with AOL was a big box retailer selling a cheapo PC and saying "we'll knock the price down to $400 IF YOU SIGN UP TO TAKE AOL FOR 2 YEARS" How is this a better deal? That way at least I got a PC with a widely supported [and targeted] if mediocre OS.
I don't think grandma is goin to use a computer until it dawns on her that there is something she really wants and it can be done on the computer. Grandma is 60 years old and long ago decided she knows what she wants...I'm not stupid, arrogant or hopeful enough to think I could change her mind.
Having tried to set my aged mother up with a PC that would not help theives to her bank account, I know elderly newbies deal poorly with passwords and generally regard even the most common security steps for computer use as an impediment and an affront. Does this $400 box come with surreptitious biometric lock-outs? If not, sales will be as lame as the product.
SLASHDOT: news for people who can't concentrate on work or have no life at all and got tired of yelling back at the TV.
Ho, the opposite also holds, I'm 29 and my dad is 54. Every time I need to use his PC, I am horrified to see he disabled virus scanners, ad-aware tools etc, and installed 'interesting' tools to connect to time servers on the internet etc. Worst of all, he's an engineer too, but doesn't seem to care too much (though he knows about these things). Mid-life crisis, I guess. His way of 'living on the edge'...
Z