They'll be worse, as qe abstract computer code more and more, less people actually have any idea how they work.

As a millennial who grew up with the early internet and a home computer, I think we'll be fine until we're not.

When the Chinese hackers find a way to patch our wiping robots with software that sodomizes you while humming Yìyǒngjūn Jìnxíngqǔ, I think we may struggle a bit.

I don't think so. I do think there will be a decline as we get older, but the overall level of aptitude will be higher than the generations before and after. It's the younger generations I'm worried about. Other commenters have already mentioned it, they've grown up with already well-polished UX to the point that they don't need to understand how a device works to use it. Most of us here have a high level understanding of how computers work, the app or browser you're reading this from, because we had to understand how they worked if we wanted to be able to use them when we were younger.

What new tech arrived after smartphones anyway?

As long as the core of new tech is still largely based on what we have now, I don’t think so. Might be a little slower to adapt, but millenials will be able to if they wanted to. If it’s an entirely new invented or discovered technology, then maybe we’ll become like boomers.

I'm an elder millennial. While I'm good on my computer use, cars are starting to get too advanced for me to repair myself. Eventually, I'll have an electric car and be entirely dependent on a mechanic to repair the vehicle.

My experience is the more things “just work” the worse people are with the tech.

Those who grew up with computers in the 80s are typically the best at problem solving / hacking / debugging.

My kids literally don’t have a fucking clue, sadly. I thought they were going to grow up super geniuses with the amazing technology they inherited.

They already are.

I recall seeing studies posted back on Reddit basically stating that since modern tech is (usually) easy to use and highly polished, young people simply don't understand how the underlying tech really works. On the flip side, those of us who grew up having to set up comm ports and allocating extended RAM and set dip switches on computers kind of had to learn how all this worked or else none of our stuff would function. If you understand the basics then it is easier to deal with stuff when it goes wrong - it doesn't become an unsolvable box of mystery.

I have much more faith in getting a problem resolved nowadays by a younger Boomer or Gen X'er who tinkered with some of the early computer tech from the 80s & 90s, than a Zoomer or Millennial who has only ever used iPhones and modern Macs.

The way some of my older millenial and x-er friends are reacting to AI I sort of wonder if that'll be the dividing line between generations. Someone in their 40-50s can probably afford to ignore AI in the coming years but a zoomer ignores it at their own peril. I bet there'll be millenials in a couple decades complaining about how it's crazy the youths have 'AI friends'.

They already are. I have a teenager. She is technologically illiterate as are most of her friends. Oh, she has an iPhone, iPad, laptop, etc. But when it comes to doing anything more than using her favorite apps on it, it's like she's completely lost.

We lose some of our capacity to learn as we age but I think we also kind of get to a place where our plate is pretty much full and you just let a lot of things go that aren't important to you. I feel that way about certain things sometimes. Hell, I work with technology for a living but there's so much that changes so fast. There's a lot of stuff that sounds interesting but I'm not going to spend a bunch of time learning about it because I don't have time and don't care. Unless it has an impact on me getting paid of course.

I will. I’m eldest Gen Z (+ a software developer) and I’m already noticing that I’ve just stopped engaging with new tech. I know that one day 30 years down the line I’m going to probably struggle with new tech.

Tech in general is advancing at such an exponential rate that it’s going to surpass a whole lot of people quickly.

I don't think that will happen. Mom used to build websites, and dad is in charge of tech support for a power company. They are in their mid-late 60s. But they've worked with computers most of my life. We have had home computers since the mid 1980s. Neither of them have trouble with smartphones, tablets, or any other electronics.

It could happen. Is typing class still a thing in school? cause younger generations suck ass at touch-only typing from what I can tell, which is the opposite you would expect

Nah, I've met kids who know more than I did back then.

Honestly, I doubt it. We got in on this sort of stuff early in life, so I don't think we'll struggle.

100% sure, I don't even know how to use discord, that shit is confusing as hell while the fediverse is no biggie

And I am completly ignorant about tech I intentionally chose to ignore like tiktok and snapchat

Absolutely. They will try to plug keyboards and screens into the neuralink chip.

The most common complaint I hear on most websites is "I have been here on this website since the first days, and now they redesigned the site and I can't find the place to change my profile picture", so you can already see signs of this.

The reverse also applies too. I notice other Gen Z members often asking things like "how do I make a forum" when they clearly just made a forum thread (they're called threads, not forums) to ask the question. It's like the internet equivalent of "how do I get Green Mario", "why can't Metroid crawl", "why does Zelda always have to save the princess", and "what gives X-man his long nails".

Every new technology so far has been an enshittified version of what we had in the early 2000s, so no.

Lemmy is good, but is basically crowd sourced reddit. So not exactly an alien concept.