> be me
> zoomer
> use linux
> i use linux
> i don't know how to use windows, or macos
> i dont know how to use the most popular operating systems
> wait
> i am the joke now
in today’s edition of "why are the kids I raised so damn incompetent?"
i long for a day where people understand that it’s not the ipad kid’s fault they were given a tablet at age 2
It isn't their fault, but it did happen.
Computers have been dumbed down and simplified for the masses. When I was a kid a computer did not cooperate until you raised your voice.
Yeah, newer generations have been raised on tech that “just worked” consistently. They never had to do any deep troubleshooting, because they never encountered any major issues. They grew up in a world where the hard problems were already figured out, so they were insulated from a lot of the issues that allowed millennials to learn.
They never got a BSOD from a faulty USB driver. They never had to reinstall an OS after using Limewire to download “Linkin_Park-Numb.mp3.exe” on the family computer. Or hell, even if they did get tricked by a malicious download, the computer’s anti-virus automatically killed it before they were even able to open it. They never had to manually install OS updates. They never had to figure out how to get their sound card working with a new game. They never had to manually configure their network settings.
All of these things were chances for millennials to learn. But since the younger generations never encountered any issues, they never had to figure their own shit out.
I do industrial programming. Everything is so far behind that yelling at the "computers" does nothing. Physical violence is just about the only thing they respect.
There are two generations that can do this task X and millennials.
All my homies hate excel
We grew up in an analog childhood, but digital adulthood.
We've been at the cusp of all the changes, we probably had to boot into Ms DOS and navigate to the A:// drive to play whatever was on the floppy disk with a whopping 1.44mb.
Now you download almost instantly to your phone/tablet. The internet as we knew it is mostly dead, everywhere is a walled garden of shit.
During a zoom, I was presenting my full screen and was opening a new tab instantly with the scroll wheel click and the zoomers on the call was mind blown.
Let me guess: they're talking about Millennials, and are entirely forgetting about Gen X once again.
Gen X could write a program that'll make a floppy drive's loading noises play the Imperial March.
I remember watching an interview with the CEO of SUN microsystems in the 90's argue that you didn't need to know how to run a nuclear power plant to use a light switch, and you shouldn't have to know how a computer works to use one.
I guess his vision came true, and we're mad about it?
I am genuinely having a hard time with my Gen Z employee. I have to go through everything step by step each time and it just seems like nothing sticks. I even create documentation for him and he just can't follow it fully.
I'm truly baffled and any advice is welcome.
Make a tiktok with "apple" by charli xcx in the background, subway surfers footage in the corner, and make the camera move further away from the screen (whats screen recording?) at random points.
spoiler
/s , hopefully obviously.
OK so I have a pet theory about this. I grew up in a period when computing involved friction and lack of ready resources to ease that friction. Solving problems involved actual research, in the research process more and more details of how computers operate were exposed to me. I had the time and focus to learn and the motivation to stick at it when it was difficult. I then did something horrible to almost everyone who asked me for help, I removed that friction.
With the noblest of intentions I prevented everyone around me from experiencing that friction, I made it easy. Consequently I caused those people around me to miss out on those basics I struggled with. I uncovered the arcane lore of endianess so everyone around me who wasn't already an adept would be spared. I plumbed the mysteries of the parallel port so that others could use a printer with only mild mystical invocations. I immersed myself in SCSI termination so that my friends and family might partake of IDE (retroactively named PATA) in peace.
I came from an era of computing where these things mattered (at least to some degree) and they moulded me and shaped how I use a computer to this day. My brothers will always be dependent on myself and my ilk to act as guides and so much of what I know is functionally useless today so a neophyte could not follow the twisted path I did.
I was blessed as well to come of age in a time when a computer was a comprehensible assemblage of parts, when I could identify at an IC level the components of it. I feel like that is what is missing in the modern incarnation of technology. I also worry this is where we stagnate, the field is too large for anyone to compass it entirely and we splinter in to specialisations.
However this is also a sign that technology has come of age. I am certain, absolutely positive, that if I was to pick an arbitary topic, say music, I would seem as illiterate and helpless as the Zoomers we are bemoaning as mere consumers of Tech. I can enjoy a piece of music, I can even take a rough stab at the rusiments of how it is made. Ask me to explain the nomenclature of a time signature on sheet music and I will look the dunce before I finish the first sentence.
So maybe we should give them a break and realise that for a lot of them, It... Just... Isn't... Important...
They will learn this stuff if and when they need to. Otherwise "magic box does things when I perform this ritual" is enough for them to function in their world, the same as "Car starts when I turn this key" is enough for me to function in mine.
Holy crap, I wrote this on my phone, what is wrong with me?
Fun read, but the zinger of "it.... Just.... Isn't.... Important" really damages your argument.
The difference in knowing how our technological systems work versus just using them is how you wind up in a world where capitalist rule, intelligence dwindles and choice is stolen. We're seeing these effects in real time. And it's just not technology; take the electoral system here in the US. It stopped being about the functions of our government and became flag waving and baby kissing. Now our tax dollars kill children, the rich are all but unstoppable and we're at each other's throats all because we, collectively, let the systems work without understanding how and why.
Tech today being a glass and aluminum block feeds our lust, insecurity, inequality, comparison etc all in an effort to generate wealth and further divide, all by design. Didn't you think it's very important to know that?
As a zoomer (17) I kind of agree but I really don't think its that deep although big tech does seem to profit off people's incompetence. Yes kids my age know very little about the computers they use. Hell most kids don't even seem to know where their files are or how file paths work. I recently in Comp Sci class had a kid look at me confused when I mentioned the folder he was looking for was in his home directory. The dumbing down of Tech is definitely a culprit. Not always even in ways that the tech easier to use. Finder on MacOS outright hides things from you on purpose like file paths and being able to access arbitrary folder on your system. There are a considerable amount of features locked away in the settings menu where the vast majority of people will never even look. I highly think all of this is malicious as it severely degrades user experience and sets them to fail in the long run. Don't even get me started on the whole random files will end up in ICloud/Onedrive and there is nothing you can do about it.
Boomer don't know how to do shit 'cause computers were so rare. Zoomers don't know how to do shit 'cause big companies profit from people who can't help themselves and have low standards.
There was only a small timeframe where computers were available, accessible yet not enshittificated for profit like today.
Me: Behold!
*quickly presses Control+V
Classmate: Woah! How did you do that??!!!
True story but as a millennial teaching another millennial in college.
yeah there are noobs at everything in each generation. maybe some change in percentages but still. you could tell this story a million times
The amount of my students that wrote the whole email in the subject line is crazy. At first I thought it was a mistake or something. But there are sooo many...
They also don't know what a file browser/explorer is. As soon as the download notification is gone, the file doesn't exist anymore.
Giving files proper names? Unheard of!
For fuck's sake, give us 2005-2007 kids a microgeneration. We're like late zillennials.
How did we fail so hard? Where did we go wrong?
Expectation: these new generations are practically born with computers in their hands when they grow up they are going to create a new world so fast and develop new technologies
Reality: if tik tok doenst work they don’t know what else to do with their 1000+ euro smartphones
We're dumbing everything down. When I was a kid Imade my own tower defense game inside warcraft3 world editor, with custom models and everything. Everything was moddable, customisable. Now everything exists in walled gardens where you can't even switch anything
Are they the same generation whose parents said “they’re really good with computers …they go on the iPad all the time”?
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A collection of some classic Lemmy memes for your enjoyment
