I’m sitting at Kaveh Kane’s waiting for the rush hour traffic to die down. I have my laptop here (free WiFi!), but there are public computers on the counter for anyone to use. (I’m telling you, this place rocks!)
A customer, probably in his 20s or 30s, just asked the guy behind the counter, “How do I get to Yahoo?”
I froze. I mean, seriously? He doesn’t know how to get to Yahoo? Really? Am I just being crazy thinking that anyone should be able to get there?
Then he asked if he had to go through AOL. That might explain something.
Then he asked how to do an underscore. Ok, if you know what the underline-thingie is called, shouldn’t you know how to do it?
Wow. I … I don’t know. I’m just speechless. He had to be shown how to get to Yahoo. Wow. I wonder if he knows how to Google? Probably not. Just amazing…
12 replies on “Has He Been Living on Mars?”
Hehe, I’m surprised that someone who looked that young would be that clueless, but I’m not at all surprised. I’ve worked with people who are literally not sure what happened when they minimize a window. (“Oh my god, my document disappeared!”)
My grandfather (and I know this is a big generation gap) needed me to carefully explain the difference between a click and a double click. I love the guy, but it’s sometimes exasperating explaining some concepts to him. 🙂 (The most memorable was spending almost 20 minutes trying to explain why he would *want* to save a file. (Not a specific file – just saving in general.) That’s why, when I think usability nowadays, I think “Can my grandad use this without an explanation?” 🙂
Isn’t Yahoo three blocks down from Kaveh Kane’s? 😉
It is strange that someone that young wouldn’t know how to Yahoo. But then again, sounds like he’s used to using AOL, and those folks, well…they don’t know how to do anything.
AOHell sucks, but I have to stand up for AOL users here and say we’re not all idiots, ya know. Some of us are just crazy, not stupid. 😉 hehe.
I used to run a help desk. Nothing surprises me.
This is even one step below the people who type a URL into Google (or Yahoo) so they can click the link on the search result.
quick note: as for the people using google totype in urls & then click… I fall victim to an offspring of that: typing an address into the search of my google toolbar, mostly just to circumvent the ‘open new window’ step as it by default pop up a new screen upon a search! thankfully, it is also smart enough to just un on ahead to the actual site vs. making me click again!
anywho, on to my original thought
as for the underscore comment… he may very well have had someone dictate their email addy to him… whenst upon they said “so&so’underscore’12@yapoo.net” he made mental note of it… not ever really knowing what it was!?
perhaps?
No, that wouldn’t work – he was trying to log in to his own Yahoo account – so he had used and underscore when he set it up, he just couldn’t remember where it was to log in.
Considering he needed help to get to Yahoo, it’s not surprising at all…
not all young people are as computer savvy as you think. My neighbors (18 and 20) don’t understand what google is. Things that need to be single clicked (like links) get double clicked. But, at least they know how to get to yahoo.
I had a friend with an underscore in her email. Someone, rather than using _ inserted the word underscore into the name.
That is so wrong. I can understand if ur like 45 or older… but 18 and 20??? Shouldn’t the school they were in enforced the use of computers?
It boggles my mind, that people are out there who don’t know how to do the basics on a computer… wow! I’m still shocked! 🙂
I can probably top that bit of “ignorance”. I work in a public library. One evening a lady came up to me for help because the computer wouldn’t take her credit card and she wanted to shop on-line. It turned out that she was inserting her credit card into the disk drive, then pulling it back out! Scary, huh? How many of these people are out walking around loose.