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Late Adopters Prefer the Tried and True
smooth wombat writes "There is a fairly significant portion of the population which does not go out and grab the newest OS, gadget, web browser or any other technology related product. Why? It's not because they're luddites but rather, they are comfortable with what they know. Take the case of John Uribe, a 56-year old real estate agent who still uses AOL dial-up and only recently switched to Firefox after being prodded for weeks by an AOL message telling him that on March 1st, AOL would no longer support Netscape. Why did it take him so long to stop using Netscape and make the switch? From the article: 'It worked for me, so I stuck with it. Until there is really some reason to totally abandon it, I won't.'"
Which leads me to a motive I did not find in the article, the motive of the company I work for that employs several hundred thousand employees. There is no push to go to Vista or IE7 so they don't do it. They're late adopters in almost the same sense as no one's asking for it, Microsoft has not yet found a way to force the enterprise community into this pigeonhole and so none of them will do it. On an enterprise level, there's no such thing as 'early adopter' as companies are too busy taking financial and strategic risks to welcome technological risks or 1/10 of their employees failing to have a computer for a couple days.
My work here is dung.
A quick John Uribe search on Google turns up a man divorced twice.
So much for sticking with it, eh?
I'm sure his viewpoint will be thoroughly panned in these comments, but honestly, the computer and tech industries as a whole could do with more of this. Too often we're sold progress just for the sake of progress, without enough benefits to outweigh the cost of transition to a new [platform|framework|device|etc].
As someone who has been burned by new technology multiple times, I can certainly appreciate this approach. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Live by the sword, die by the sword.
Many people are just so stubborn, so set in their ways, that they are blind to innovation and practical change. It is this kind of purposeful ignorance that keeps people from learning, from growing intellectually. In my line of work, doing tech support, I run into this every single day. The older generations, 40+ have no concept of technology and most of them don't want to. There are people in this day and age who still do not own a computer. Not because they cannot afford it or do not have a use for it, but because they fear it or because they are too lazy to learn how to use it. This is often the case with new tech also. If it requires any sort of effort to learn, people try to pretend its not there and stick with what they have until it is no longer a viable option. This saddens me greatly.
All this doesn't mean I don't like new technology. However, all the years of work in IT and high-tech startups have taught me that the best innovation one can achieve is a more simplified interface. Technology with more features and thus more complex interface is thus not truly innovative in my book.
I work in an industrial environment and one thing you want is stability. Being an early adopter is the antithesis of this. So I may not work on the latest and greatest, but I know that what I do work on is rock solid and will keep running for an extended period of time.
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
Real Estate people and offices are KNOWN for being incredibly out-dated. Also Realtors tend to not be technologically savvy. The BEST Agent I ever met not only adopted technology with a furvor but took her time to learn it. She is selling homes at a good rate even now when you are insane to try and sell.
But the office there where I support them. It's a nightmare. W95 machines still in use! Old 14" monitors that are dark and almost yellow now running on Pentium 133 processors. They refuse to spend the money to upgrade because "these work, why replace it?"
The one machine I did convince them to replace with new I at least gave them XP and several people complained about it.
I also found that this is common in Lawyers offices and accounting offices as well. Incredibly outdated gear and software still in use. It's like they are afraid to spend money.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
In my experience with Realtors, they are very set in their ways computer wise. Of the four houses I've bought and sold in the last 15 years, I never cease to be amazed at all the pointless faxing rather than emailing. Sure there is almost a verifiable paper trail, but after the contract has been faxed 5 times, I could be signing a document to have my colon invaded weekly instead of my house sold.
Sheldon
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
It's certainly true that the "latest and greatest" often isn't really any better and even when it is may not be worth the transition costs. I know someone who had a thorough understanding of WordPerfect for DOS- every key combination, how to wizard things with Reveal Codes, some understanding of macros, etc- but have never gotten as comfortable with anything since then. Is he more productive because his department has spent money on every word processor upgrade since Word 97? Heck no.
I have opined for quite some time that this is the primary reason most people are inclined to stay with Windows. Other reasons include mission critical apps and what I refer to as tail-wind. Tail-wind would be the other users that get dragged into using a particular application and/or OS simply because associated or other users in the same field or industry use it. (For example, Apple and Mac OS X is used by graphics and design professionals NOT because it's better [the same hardware is used by PC clones] but because that's what everyone else uses.)
Evidence of the "because I'm used to it" mentality can be shown in much public resistance I have witnessed from Office 2007. I have users that have tried it and hate the user interface. They would fight me if, for some reason, I wanted to switch to Office 2007.
So all those "this is the year of Linux on the Desktop" people (do people still say that?), this is what has to be over-come and it's just not something anyone but government and big business can actually take on. The change has to be forced on people.
Just stop expecting support from developers. If your old, non-compliant browser doesn't render new sites well, blame it on yourself for not upgrading. I've had this situation with people and their cars. I've known older people who think I'm insane for buying a new car and driving it till it's got 150K miles, and then dumping it. All they focus on is the depreciation when it rolls off the dealer's lot. But then, these same people will drive an older, used car that they can afford to replace until crazy things like the key won't flip on the ignition because the teeth are all worn down to the point of being useless. So I say it's nice that you're not an early adopter. Just be rational about replacing what you use.
In my youth, I jumped on new stuff more quickly, and I often regretted it. Often the only thing good about a new product is the marketing. It's often easier to use something that's outdated than to use something buggy. And even if my outdated product is also buggy, at least I know where the bugs are.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
Firearms are an area where this dynamic is often seen. There are lots of gee-whiz techno toys in that arena - caseless ammo, (that fucking stupid overhyped) MetalStorm (shit), etc. But when you really need reliability, like when you're relying on a piece of hardware to save your life, you tend to want the tried and true.
:-)
The best example I can think of? The Colt model of 1911 is still considered by lots of people to be the finest fighting sidearm ever. It certainly was in its day. That day lasted until the mid-1980s when the Glock came along. It's taken 20 years, but if you attend a *serious* personal defense class (not one of those "get your carry license in a day" things) where the students select and bring their own sidearm, you'll generally find something close to an even split between 1911s and Glocks. It's taken more than 20 years for a superior design to achieve acceptance by the cognescenti.
Old and obsolete often means tried and true. When I'm betting my life, I like the idea of tried and true. That attitude is often displayed by thoughtful folks in all areas of their life; we like what works and will change only when something demonstrably better is available and the inconvenience of using the old tech becomes sufficiently painful.
In other news, I'm considering switching to a digital camera any day now.
If there is no motive to change people wont change. The degree of the motives are different for each person.
Beta Adopters (Not really beta testers they just use Beta software and don't report bugs) their motive are normally based on being able to use a product when it is released without having to learn it, So by the time it comes out it is already the tride and true. So their motive to change is the fact that things are changing and they want to be start off running. Also they can honestly fill out on their resumes that they have 5 years of Vista Experience. (making them look like experts)
Early Adopters much like the beta adopters but they want to reduce the risk of blowing up their systems. But still once it moves from Fad to Normal they want to be the group who says I have it. And those people who apply for Jobs and actually say they do Have over 2 years experience with Vista.
Normal Adopters The technology came in the kinks have been worked out and all points show this is way things are going to be. So lets jump into the bandwagon and get back to work. Failure to change will cause them to get behind and become undesirable.
Late Adopters... This article.
Old Phogies... These people are not nessarly old in age but so resistant to change that they will come with any excuse to defend their position. USB Is Too Complex for a keyboard and mouse. Serial Connections are easier to program, also you can really bolt the device onto the system so it wont go anywhere. If the program can't run on 640k of RAM that it is unessarly bloated. The old system had components largeenough so you can replace a broken part where now you need to buy a new card. And Ignoring things like USB can handle many devices without having to internally expand you computer, The lack of thumb screws makes it easier to move the system and set it back up. The Time saved by making programs memory hogs allowed for cheaper software to be developed (today any CS Grad can program a program like Lotus 123 within a few weeks and its selling price if comerical would be like $10.00 vs Hundreds of Dollars back when Lotus was new.) The fact that the old parts would fail an average of once a year vs. an integrated card will run for years on end being a better value dollar wize... But that wont stop those guys. You can take my PDP 11 from my cold dead hands.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
From the fine article:
Actually, I suspect it may be more that "they are UNcomfortable with what they DO NOT know." People have a certain range of stimulation with which they feel comfortable. Below that, they feel bored. Above that, they feel overwhelmed. (Shut the *%&^* up!) And, that range of stimulus with which one person feels comfortable can be quite different from someone else's comfort zone.
I prefer a lower level stimulation than average. If I go shopping at a mall, I can last an hour, maybe two. Then all of the music, bright lights, shiny ads, conversations, and general din get to be too much. If everyone perceived it that way, then it would scare away shoppers, and they'd "fix" it. So, I accept that and make it a point to take a break for a few minutes of quiet time and then I'm good to go for another hour or two. I don't really mind, I've come to realize that this same sensitivity has benefits, too... I've had a great career in software quality assurance.
My point is that these "late adopters" may be already close to saturation on stimulus, and as much better as the new stuff may be, accepting and adopting that change could be the straw that [at least in their perception] breaks the camel's back. It's easier to deal with the incremental challenges of an old technology, than it is to take a chance on a big change. Or so it seems to them.
So in summary the article is "humans found to be averse to risk and change"? Hasn't that been known by psychologists for ages? Humans (as a species) are happy with what they know and don't like the unknown. New technology is, to many, an unknown, ergo they don't like it and avoid it for as long as possible.
Besides, who needs half of this flashy trash anyway? iPhone? Pah, I'd still have a Nokia 3310 if it wasn't about as cheap to buy a 3510 as it was to get a replacement battery for the 3310, and I'm 23.
Better is the enemy of good enough.
Sadly, I see that now. :-) Stupid proxy!
People like this man should not breed and be removed from the gene pool to ensure the survival of our species.
You don't understand evolution very well, do you? My friend Linda's not the sharpest knife in the drawer but she's had fourteen kids and so far only one of then has died. I only have two (that I know of) and they're both thriving, but Linda beats me in the evolution game 13-2.
It's not about intelligence, it's about procreation. You only have to stay alive long anough to breed. Didn't TFA say the guy was 56? If he hasn't bred yet he's not likely to, and if he has then killing him won't change anything.
So by your own logic you should put a bullet in your own head to ensure the survival of the species. You're probably still a virgin, considering your apparent personality.
BTW, most mental retardation isn't hereditary but is usually caused by brain injury. But go ahead and kill yourself anyway and rid the species of the "hatefulness" gene.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Quality thinking is rare enough that it should be rewarded.
I proudly announce 2 weeks ago I bought my first video cassette recorder. For $10.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
Please see the definition of Luddite and try to think more clearly in future.
Rich And Stupid is not so bad as Working For Rich And Stupid.
That's what a colleague of mine in a huge CPA firm believes in: trailing edge. No debugging. Everything's fixed by the time he gets there. Users probably already know about the apps and all. Parts are easy to find, maybe on eBay or CL. Lots of books and docs and howtos are easily available. All the service packs are out. Interoperability problems have been solved. Goose it with faster hardware and things work the first time out with little fear of reliability or interoperability.
Is he crazy? No, just so financially conservative that I've seen holes clean through the bottom of his shoes. And he leads a very uneventful life. There might be some wisdom in that. Consider not having to constantly patch stuff through the first half of its life cycle. Or that everything you've deployed has a chance of still working with everything you've deployed without a lot of drama.
He won't jump out of an airplane with a parachute. But I will. And I'll get the latest stuff. And I'll aggressively integrate it and denigrate the vendors whose stuff isn't baked when it arrives in a 'production' version. Is he wiser? Perhaps. Duller, too.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
Seriously, am I expected to be jumping for every latest advancement? I can't be expected to buy every new damned piece of technology out there, software included. Sure, I like gadgets, some are useful and some are just fun, but this sure as hell doesn't mean I can afford all of them, and I refuse to get into debt just to satisfy some sort of technolust.
It's an obvious point, but people seem content to ruin their bank balances just to stay on top of this shit.
Frankly, I really wish that developers would work on actually fixing the bugs in the old software, instead of dumping it all for the next "upgrade" with a completely different set of user interfaces to learn, and new gee-whiz features that almost work, or at least would work, except that everybody else isn't compatible (but will work really shiny when everybody gets on the wagon, really!).
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
One of my big reasons for dislike of Microsoft and others with market muscle is the forced adoption cycle, just for reasons of marketing and bottom line.
In the case of operating systems, increasing bloat means that a lot of hardware goes into landfill and a lot more energy is used, each time. Even when the hardware doesn't go into landfill, it's recycled (more often than necessary) using and distributing toxic chemicals.
As another poster said, 'if it ain't broke don't fix it' that used to be one basis for good engineering and it's certainly got ecological consequences.
On y va, qui mal y pense!
Well the stats at W3Schools delisted Netscape in 2007, but they're still showing a percent and a half for Netscape.
So it's a good bet.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
I personally tend to be a mix. I wait until I see bleeding edge technology that I *MUST* have, and use it to build a machine that is extremely powerful and top of the line. That machine will then last me 5-8 years, or more so long as I take care of it and keep it properly maintained. For me, bleeding edge turns into old school tech that works "good enough" for a good long time.
:: Marge: Grandpa, this flag only has 49 stars on it
:: Grandpa: I'll be deep in the cold, cold ground before I recognize Missourah!
But seriously, they're saying he's a late adopter when it comes to upgrading his browser, but that's to be expected for his demographic. You could turn the same kind of thinking around on a younger demographic by pointing out that 20 year olds are _much_ slower to adopt the newest treatments for atherosclerosis; talk about late adopters, thirty years behind, and by then the treatments will be completely different. "They'll be so terribly behind the times, how will they catch up?" you say. But anyway.
A 20 year old with atherosclerosis would be an exceptional case, so taking pharmaceuticals to treat that condition wouldn't be early adoption. Likewise, the idea of calling an 81-year old AOL user a late adopter is moving outside the usual bounds of discussion when it comes to software/technology--it's exceptional that he's using it, apparently as an architect e-mailing maps and photographs. Actually, he should be retired. Off to the Near Death Star!
Most people update computers when they stop working usually from malware or Windows dieing. It is easier and some times cheaper to buy a new PC than to do a nuke and pave. A PIII is really good enough for a lot of what people do. In your example a Pentium 133 is good enough for them to do what they need to do.
Changing Accounting systems is a HUGE pain. If your current system is still supported and works why change? If your old PC is still running why change? I can see the logic of getting a new LCD screen for the power savings but in businesses it often is wise to keep what works until there is a benefit to changing.
Heck for the average office worker keeping them on a PIII and skipping the hyper hot and power hungry P4 probably would have been a brilliant move.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
I crunched my 98 VW last year and bought another of the same model/year/trim because I already have a ton of parts, tools and knowledge about that car. I can R&R the cylinder head in like 3 hours, and I know all the weak points and what to look for.
120k miles and going strong. Just need to replace the timing gear tensioners some day.
Blar.
I count my family among them. My wife has learned a few simple tasks, one way and any deviation from that no matter how slight is a catastrophe. You know the mail window in Netscape/Seamonkey? You know how you can have multiple folders? Yeah well if the topline gets clicked to collapse the view my wife starts screaming that someone 'broke' her computer. In fact she's never even started the browser from an icon. All she knows how to do is open the mail client and start the browser from that. Every document is on the desktop because she won't put anything in a folder else it 'gets lost'. Hell, I just recently after years and years convinced her to use DIFFERENT documents in Word. Till then she had almost everything in one gigantic document that had everything in a long trail of hundreds and hundreds and hundreds pages and to find a particular 'document' she'd just scroll through until she found the right page.
So in the end, whether it's some kind of brain defect, or a passive aggressive martyr complex, some people are just untrainable and you're wasting your time trying.
I'm wondering the demographics of this study. I've found that those 25ish and younger have a much easier time adopting and transitioning to newer technology than the older folk. Probably on account of it is what we have been doing our entire lives.
I'll admit, it was rugged, but inaccurate as all get out. Basically, a .45 caliber belly gun. Any decent revolver was a better sidearm for self defense. And nothing beats a 12 gauge shotty for close in household defense.
Best Slashdot Co
I've always said there are two types of people. Those that produce most of the work tend to stick with what works, and those that innovate tend to always try the newest things at the cost of production. Both types of people are needed. If it were for the lower producing innovators we'd still be living in caves, after all, they worked great for our needs. So one group doesn't change that fast but gets the drudgery done, the other group doesn't get as much done, but keeps us moving forward.
how is a business supposed to get ROI if they have to constantly have to upgrade and pay for retraining, testing, and upgrade blackmail (errr..... ummmm... I mean 'licenses).
There is a reason why there is still a lot of cobol out there, ROI. Why switch when it works? Switching is risky and costly, as anybody who was sucked into an ERP project has learned.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
W3Schools server traffic is not a good representative sample of web traffic. According to NetApplications Netscape is used more than IE 5.
What a fool believes, he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.
shhhh don't tell anyone .... but there are still people running COBOL......
yeh yeh I know you wouldn't believe and neither did I until I saw it with my own eyes.... ported and running in a VM at least... and lets face it theres nothing sexier to a geek than running a VM system with in a VM environment... OK so it's a IBM VM system from the 80's running under emulation on a modern *inx system but still
they say "it still runs the pay role system just like we need it and staff still get paid on time" man, I thought my bank account smelt a little old and musty on pay day. but you know what? in the 10 years I've been working here the only time we got payed late was when the bank's modern system screwed up so maybe, just maybe they're on to something.
so do fascists
i don't see those with firearms as protecting me from fascists and criminals. i see those who crave guns as the spirit of the will to power via force that is the genesis of criminality and fascism. what part of your mind do guns appeal to? not your noble part, that's for sure
the very people that guns are supposed to protect us from crave these tools. they appeal to those who wish to undermine civil society, not be a part of it, or protect it
if one uses a gun, one does so with great sober reserve, as a last resort. not as a first line. that is why i view with great suspicion those who champion guns in civil life. these people are the soldiers of fascism and crime, not our saviors from it. carry around a gun, have a gun in your house, and a gun replaces dialog in moments of confusion and passion, moments that no one, no one is immune from. a gun in your house does not promote peace, it promotes tragedy
and i see in those running to and embracing and worshipping guns in their lives the same genesis of fascist thinking and criminal thinking: "i must make my point via force of arms, rather than via my force of thought." people with such a fetish therefore undermine civil society, not protect it
for every act of crime that guns save us from, another 9 situations occur where the gun is the creator of the crime
guns are a dimwit's and a fool's and an evil man's tool. not the protector of civil society. an underminer of it
when i encounter someone who evangelicises the positive role of guns in their lives, i see a fascist, and i see a criminal. a real noble man goes to deadly force with great reserve and sober and grim last resort. they don't put a smile on their face and show it around as their public face to the world. this betrays a lack of character
to depend upon deadly force, rather than the force of your mind and your word, is the sign of an evil man, a dumb man, and an insecure man
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Paper and pens have yet to crash, require patching or accidentally reveal any credit-card information on anyone (Netcraft confirms this); why not take it even further?
throw new NoSignatureException();
It might keep you rich but it will never put you in the position to beat out the competition... cause they also have access to the tried and true and probably have as much expertise at it.
Obviously each industry has different tools that they need to be on the cutting edge with for competition... but there are efficiencies to be had by adopting new tools in non-core areas. IT is one of these areas for ANY industry.
It certainly is an opportunity cost scenario. If you are a 3 man operation and don't need an IT infrastructure to improve communications, then new IT tech doesn't make sense UNLESS you want to grow beyond a 3 man operation.
The biggest problem with sticking to tried and true is that you don't know what you're missing out on. you have no idea what opportunities new tech or new methods will bring to your business. You are ignorant, possibly blissfully so but still ignorant. This means you have no room for growth as an individual as a professional or as a member of your community... and that means we all lose out on your potential. You could be the person who introduces incredible new innovations in productivity or quality of service but we'll never know since you ignored the opportunity to find out.
In conclusion... you'll never get rich by being ignorant of new ways to become rich (financially and culturally and professionally). Too bad, I was looking forward to reading about your various breakthroughs and further enriching my own life by hearing of your accomplishments and being inspired to achieve my own.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
I live on the trailing edge. It's easier, more comfortable, cheaper (how's that HD-DVD purchase looking now?) and makes much more sense. You don't end up buying into much that disappears quickly. You don't end up with teething problems. You don't end up wasting money on vast amounts of testing because other people do that for you. You don't end up worrying about that next big upgrade which is "vital" because one bit of software demands it. You just wait until EVERYTHING demands it or, more likely, nothing demands it and the project dies a death.
I do network management for schools and this is the only sensible way to go about things. You cannot upgrade every single bit of software to the latest version as soon as it's released. Too much breaks. Even Windows Update throws default printers, etc. onto a clean machine and that's the easy stuff to detect and clean up.
For instance, last year one school went from Office 2000 to Office 2003 (Yep, that was our upgrade last year - and that was forced on us by the "people above" because 2000 is such an old number, basically. Nothing to do with practicality, compatibility or anything else and we'd already installed the filters that let you open newer Word docs etc. so there wasn't a simple complaint when other schools switched to XP/2003/2007 and started sending us their files). That simple upgrade broke everything - printer allocations, all our Office GPO settings, basically every PowerPoint file in the school, some software called Mindjet Manager that just so happened to be on the desktop of all the top-dogs in the schools, you name it.
The Mindjet problem wasn't even documented, we found it out the hard way (some sort of DLL conflict to do with the order of installation that just crashed the program without error - sysinternals utilities saved the day again!). Upgrading breaks more than it fixes about 75% of the time.
The only reason to upgrade is if you get something out of it. That's how companies sell upgrades - "look what you can do NOW". If you don't need that thing, or can already do it somehow, then why upgrade? Just keep plodding along with your perfectly working software with all the latest security updates that does everything you could possibly want.
Even Becta (the UK schools IT bods) recognise this - they specifically recommend not to move to Vista or the new Office until EVERYTHING has been checked out thoroughly, i.e. give it a few years yet. Better the devil you know and all that. This is why MS is having a hard time selling Vista - it's only the "we must have it because it's got a shiny new version number" crowd that are the ones actually pushing for it and unfortunately sometimes they are in charge.
What happens in a modern office that is totally impossible with a old office suite? Not a lot. And most of it is power-user features that most places won't even touch. Even I never use 5% of the functionality of Excel, Word, etc. when I'm doing budgets with pretty graphs in and the kids are basically doing DTP using Word (against my advice, but hey, Word works and we have it so why spend money on something else?) and they aren't using 5% of it anyway. Where's the incentive?
And you don't get bitten anywhere near as often. Schools go through fads - we had interactive whiteboards and flatscreens and the new ones are "Virtual Learning Environments", electronic signage (a big telly with an advert on it) and wireless classroom trolleys filled with laptops. Every single fad starts up, fails miserably in a number of schools (usually because they have copied it straight from the commercial sector and are thinking along the business-consumer lines rather than "THIS IS A SCHOOL. It might not work like a business does.") and THEN the suppliers learn what the schools want/need and bring out the really useful gear that the following schools can then actually use - for instance:
Soft whiteboards got vandalised by the older kids. So they changed to hard.
Hard whiteboards weren't tactile enough for
I would love to know where that number comes from. I could certainly believe that 1-2 million people in the US carry guns for defensive purposes. But I would be shocked to see evidence supporting that 1-2 million actually used their guns defensively.
Carrying a gun and using a gun are two very, very, different things. Just because you have it doesn't mean that you are inherently safer because of it.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
Do you live in a geodesic dome? Do you have an electric car? How about your mower, does it hover or run on wheels? Do you have a roomba, or a plain old vacuum cleaner? We all have areas we're interested in and areas we don't care much about, and select the technology we use appropriately.
Some old people are scared of change. My father is 87 and just switched to an iMac. I think the fact that I switched had something to do with it, and I'm way over 50.
I'm still running Windows 2000 and Word 97. The later Microsoft OSs are worse. windows 2000 was the last Microsoft product where the user was in charge. After that, they're all slaves to the mothership in Redmond, with a steady stream of updates being pushed at you, some of them hostile.
Actually, this is because I'm not developing for the Windows desktop. My real work in the last few years has either been on Linux servers or real-time QNX machines. So the desktop machine just doesn't matter that much. I have a current Firefox, OpenOffice, Python, Java, etc. I just don't see any need to buy any of Microsoft's products.
The article mentions David Gans and the WELL as a late-adopter person and institution, respectively. Gans is host of the syndicated "Grateful Dead Hour", and of course the WELL has its roots in '60s counterculture.
They couldn't have picked better examples of late adopters, and interestingly ones that aren't just that way because of psychological inertia, but because they clearly know what they want and what works, and they know that it's not the latest shiny cutting-edge stuff.
Ok, there's also "late adopters don't like spending money" or "late adopters aren't that interested in gadgets", or "late adopters don't adopt early", but this seems a little obvious to me.
You may have a point. Until then, sometimes reasonable people will need tools to deal with the criminal actions of unreasonable people. Look at police response time to 911 calls, and what can happen before police show up. Or even notice that societies still need police.
After all, it takes every member of a group to decide to get along, but only one person to decide they want conflict.
A Human Right
Let's see, I'm typing this on my main PC, which I literally found in someone else's trash four years ago (and its two 40GB hard disk were used freebies from the office). Though I never use it, there's a VFAT partition on one of the disks with Windows 98SE on it. I finally got a DVD drive for it last year.
My laptop, with a 133Mhz Pentium, 48MB RAM, and an 800 x 600 screen, was bought used 10 years ago from a friend who was in grad school (and thus on a tight budget herself). I've been using it quite a bit recently, to learn Lisp programming on (X + IceWM + Emacs).
The internet connection is 100MBps optical fiber, but I just plug my PC in directly for PPPoE -- no wireless router or anything like that.
Got an iPod last year - a 512MB Shuffle which was a hand-me-down from my girlfriend. Until then, my portable music player was a Sony MiniDisc-Walkman, which I still use for live recordings.
My cell phone is seven years old, and it cost nothing when I got it.
Stereo is a 15-year-old Nakamichi receiver, still in good condition -- better than the flaky Sony DVD player I bought four years ago.
OK, maybe I'm just a cheapskate. But really, I can't think of anything that I'd really want to go out and buy - that sort of thing happens only about once a year. (And I could well afford any such thing if I wanted it.) Basically, everything still works, and until it stops working, I feel it's a waste to replace it.
...and with thanks to the Firesign Theater:
;-)
"Big light slated to appear in eastern sky. Sonic booms scare minority groups in Sector B. And there's hamburger all over the highway in Mystic, Connecticut..."
And if someone who's actually IN Mystic can confirm that, I'm sure we'd all be grateful.
Keep the peace(es).
Bruce Lane, KC7GR,
Blue Feather Technologies
There is such a thing as a late adopter with a cause. Shoot, I'm a late adopter of Windows because the new releases always have glitches and always overwork the current generation of hardware. The thing is this example of the guy with dial-up AOL and Netscape is the perfect example of someone who is stubborn and stupid. They are stubborn because they won't change until they HAVE to and they are stupid because they ignore the benefit of change. This guy is using Dial-Up and paying a price which is twice the going rate for dial-up. Plus if he got DSL or another type of broadband for seemingly the same price he could talk on the phone at the same time. Lastly, Netscape has been defunct for some time while Firefox is updated constantly. If that's not enough reason to switch then I don't know what is. So this guy isn't a late adopter; he is stubborn and stupid.
The Army doesn't believe that the pistol has any purpose other than to shoot someone who gets in your face - beyond hand-hand range, you have a rifle. What a pistol has to do is be rugged as all hell - when you need to shoot one, you REALLY need it to work without fail, and it has to make the guy you shoot lay down and stop bothering you. Which is why the .45 was invented - the older .38's didn't get too many one-shot stops in the Philippines.
Civilian 1911's tend to be very accurate (far more than you need for self-defense - you don't do self-defence at 50 yards, unless you like prison time) and very reliable. And when you shoot someone with one, they tend to lay down and stop bothering you....
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Try reading the arguments made by Nicholas Carr in the article "IT Doesn't Matter". The article is a bit dated for the high-tech world (published in May 2003), but the arguments are still valid. Argument with respect to this topic is that early adopters take huge risks and rarely receive the returns they expect. More often than not end up losing. Same applies for companies that invest early in emerging economies. Wait for the early adopters to work out all the bug/kinks and find best practices. Jump in once they do.
Let me put this in a way that a fellow geek would understand.
This guy not upgrading to latest and greatest OS, Browser, etc. is just like how geeks buy a piece of clothing and wear the same thing until it literally disintegrates and then buy the cheapest, least hip clothing available to replace it.
Unlike the hipsters who are in-the-know with the latest fashion trends, scouts latest runway shows and buys the $2,000 shiny Prada pants and replaces it when it goes out of fashion the following year.
It is pretty much the same thing.
What version of Netscape was he running? If it was 4.01, or 6, I'd have to laugh at the guy. But it was Netscape 8, that browser was just a branded repackaging of Firefox, so in a way he would have been fairly up-to-date with 8, and barely switched browsers by going to Firefox. Even if he was on Netscape 7 he would have had a fairly modern version of the Gecko rendering engine that both Netscape and Firefox share. This article makes it sound like he installed Navigator 4 in the mid-90s and never upgraded. I have a hard time believing that, judging from his nice metallic flat screen display.
I'm usually the latest adopter of my circle. My PC is usually a generation or two behind everyone else's (Athlon XP 2500+ barton core, just built back in December), my video cards can be even further behind (I just "upgraded" to a Geforce 6200 from a Geforce 2MX, but still have a TNT2 and Matrox G450 in service). I bought my first MP3 player back in June and it's a cheapie Sansa model. It took me years to stop using Mandrake 7.2 because it just worked and each new distro had issues I didn't want to deal with and and didn't have to deal with with the old trusty one. The only reason I use WinXP is because of a single application I need: Digidesign's ProTools. If if wasn't for that, I'd still be running Windows 2000 and Cubase 5.1 to compose music (I finally upgraded to Cubase SX3 earlier this year). I still use FL Studio 6 even though FL8 is on the verge of release and it took me quite a while to even upgrade from FL5.
If it works, why change??? In the case of upgrading my PC, I was able to do my work and play the games I liked, so there was no need to upgrade. I only upgrade when it's absolutely necessary, as was the case of a new plugin I got for Cubase (NI's FM8). Back in 2005, that forced me to finally get off of the P3-850 I had been using for years and upgrade to a 1.3GHz Athlon Thunderbird.
In most cases, there's no REAL reason to upgrade. There's people out there right now still using Win98SE, Office 97 or 2000, and IE6 on a P2-333 and they're quite happy with that setup. To be 100% honest, I would believe that the majority of the PC using public would be just fine on such a machine (I happen to have one such machine at home, it's the one with the Matrox G450 in it). We're told we NEED the latest, greatest whatever but in reality don't need it. If you're a gamer, yeah I see a need to upgrade constantly. Hell, I just downloaded the Crysis demo and, while it does run on my PC, I know it's not running well, it's got me considering a video card upgrade. But how many people still use a PC for small tasks like email, IM, occasional web surfing, word processing, and their taxes? Quite a few. Do you really need a Quad core pc with 4GB of RAM and Vista64 to do these things??? Nope. Just about any old pc can do it just fine.
Fifty watts per channel, baby cakes.
From the article: "Yahoo updated its popular Web e-mail service last year, but tens of millions of its customers stuck with the company's "classic" e-mail."
The real reason I HAD to stay with the "classic" interface is because although I'm running Seamonkey 1.1.7, Yahoo claims my browser is incompatible with their new interface. I even tried faking the user agent to IE and FF, and it still wouldn't work.
I agree, and his remarks about tuneups are hilarious if you understand what's under the hood. New cars still require regular maintenance, but they don't require tuneups! Old cars needed tuneups because the springs in the distributor would wear out, throwing the timing off, and the jets in the carburetors would get clogged with fuel varnish, messing with the fuel-air ratio. Modern cars don't have distributors because their dwell and timing are controlled by a computer using a toothed gear attached directly to the cam or crankshaft, no springs to wear out or contacts to erode. Assuming the gear doesn't break off completely, timing will be exactly the same at 300,000 miles as it was when the car rolled off the line, no adjustment or tweaking required. The fuel-air ratio is measured out more precisely than a carburetor, again using a computer to inject fuel based on engine load and RPM. That same computer will even retard timing if the engine knocks, or shut off your engine if the temperature gets too high to prevent you from destroying your car accidentally. This makes cars more efficient AND more reliable than they used to be.
'It worked for me, so I stuck with it. Until there is really some reason to totally abandon it, I won't.'
... it's just that he doesn't understand them, or simply isn't aware of them. And that, I'm afraid, is the reason that AOL still exists as an ISP.
There are plenty of excellent reason to abandon AOL
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
I'm still running Windows 98SE.
Turns out that in a virtualization environment like VMware Server, it's reliable and stable and behind a Linux firewall, it's moderately safe. And on a Athlon 64/4200 dual core box with 356M memory allocated, it's pretty fast.
I may move to XP eventually on the VM, but since the purpose of running Windows in any form of this box is to run Windows legacy apps and I haven't installed a new major Windows app on this thing in years (haven't needed to)... what's the rush?
Not to say I'm a total luddite, my base OS is Debian testing/unstable.
Tech Public Policy stuff
Based on skewed world view, which is that the only reason not to buy the latest gadget it because you're stupid, lazy or hopelessly stuck in your ways. I'm an early adopter at work because I need to be and they pay me to deal with all the problems of new technology. At home I want to relax not fiddle with all my gadgets (Yes, I'm a slashdot heritic). I also don't want to pay top dollar for untested technology that will be available next year for half the price, thank you.
Obvious strawman rebuttal
--- Here we have this vague someone DELIBERATE repeat offender getting whatever they deserve --- (see how righteous PC is and I am for advocating it!)
You continue to avoid seeing the proverbial "Bigger Picture" and focus only on simple nebulous classifiable strawman cases. It is this blind unquestioning allegiance to a self-affirming one-sided set of rules that is scary. Where is it written that people have a right NOT to be offended? I get offended all the time when some PC type blathers on about how they need to enforce speech codes for the "Oppressed" (which they sanctimoniously get to define). Do you see where this is going? Double Standard at its worst. You only acknowledge my assertion with your response. That is truly the sad state of PC.