Ask Lemmy

Many people are very uncomfortable with the degree to which their work and life depend on computer systems they do not understand. They feel vulnerable to computer problems, pressured into depending on more tech than they really want, and do not believe they have the knowledge or resources to remedy problems with it.

So when something goes wrong, they feel helpless. This is not unfounded, but it can often make the problem worse.

Depending on the person, this can lead to blaming or blame-dodging behavior. IT folks — did you ever ask someone what the error message was and they say "It's not my fault!" or "It's not my job to fix it, you're the computer person!" ... as if blame ever helped!

The "tech person" differs not so much in knowledge but in having a different emotional response to tech doing a weird/broken thing: when something goes wrong, they jump to curiosity. It's not "I already know how to fix this" but "We don't know what happened here yet, but we can find out." Knowledge comes from exercising this curiosity.

But this is not something that everyone can do, because people who feel unsafe don't typically go to curiosity to resolve their unsafety.

Tech people presume that normal people think about how technology works

They don't even try to conceptualise how something on their phone gets there from the internet or 'the cloud' - when things stop working they don't think about the fact that their an app on their phone is using a network connection to a router, which distributes an internet service that connects them to a server, that is running a program, on which they have an authenticated account...

They wouldn't even know where to begin with troubleshooting, it's just 'broken' and they get frustrated

I had a coworker get livid when an end user didn’t know what “the start menu” was.

Pointing out that the last version version of Windows to actually say “Start” on the start menu is old enough to drink (XP was released over 22 years ago; mainstream support ended 15 years ago) did not quell his anger.

Relevant XKCD

I work in an admin role in the construction industry. I regularly encounter seasoned engineers, project managers, and architects who don't know the difference between a website and an app, or how to scan a QR code.

But then I remember that they know how to build a house from scratch, and I don't. We're all good at different things.

Everything.

From the difference between WiFi, cellular data, and wired Ethernet to the ports on a computer.

People don’t know shit, and it’s getting worse thanks to the abundance of things like tablets and phones. Nobody knows anything about operating systems, file system structure or types, or even how to turn Bluetooth on.

And I am not what I consider highly tech literate. Plenty of stuff stumps me or I simply don’t know how to do. Yet I’m the family “IT guy” that has to troubleshoot and fix stuff.

Probably the worst part isn’t people not knowing. That’s fine. There’s tons of shit I don’t know. It’s the unwillingness to remember and learn about the system. That’s pretty maddening.

Having the kind of habits you need to keep yourself safe and private online.

Blows my mind how many people don’t consider or sometimes even reject the idea of things like password managers because “it’s too complicated”.

Basically everything.

Like, even filling out a basic Excel sheet can be difficult to some people who have absolutely no experience in it.

Dropping another "everything."

There are LOADS upon loads of people whose entire understanding of the internet and tech is

1- purchase phone 2- Install Facebook 3-??? 4- profit

Once Facebook had a builtin browser there was no reason for whole swatches of the population to leave the app ever again. It seems insane to us here on lemmy but most people just..... Don't give a fuck. 🤷

How to change the input source of a tv.

Personally, when I'm looking around for different software, as someone that's in-between unfamiliar and familiar with tech: if it doesn't have an installer/executable/apk and only describes a way to build/compile from source, I have to imagine it wasn't intended for non-devs to start with.

Yet somehow I seem to find my way to software like that occasionally. 🤷‍♀️

We assume that people know what an OS is, what OS they're running, and how to install an OS.

I've seen it dozens of times, especially on here, where someone describes Linux, convinces the person that they'll like it, and then gets the equivalent of a blank stare when they say 'You just need to download the ISO and install the OS'

My mother is in her 70s, and if you set up her computer to run Linux in the same way that it comes ready to run Windows, she'd be fine after a short readjustment. If you gave her a USB stick with Linux on it, she wouldn't get anywhere because she has no clue what she's supposed to do with it.

She doesn't care about the OS, as long as her browser opens and loads Facebook, letting her keep in touch with her friends.

Turning it off and on again fixes so many things.

Thank you.
This post made me realize that sometimes I get a little too annoyed when other people don't understand concepts that are completely obvious to me.

I'll have to reassess how I explain certain things, like how being connected to wifi doesn't mean having internet. Things like that are just not graspable when someone simply doesn't know all the steps that lie between a server and their phone at home, and that's absolutely fair.

It's common sense to a techie, but it's not actual common sense, as in everyone naturally learns this as they grow up

The government created the Internet, not Elon Musk

People don't even know what a browser is... Yet if anybody expresses the slightest frustration with Netflix or anything else, the immediate responses hey you just need to set up a Plex server.

It's two things wrapped into one.

First, the assumption is that people know the names of the software that they use.

The second is that other people who are not techy consider it just fine to spend hours and hours creating a stopgap solution that shouldn't have to exist in the first place. They don't.

All the lingo and acronyms.

I personally don't think most people would even know how to make a text file on their computer without looking it up. Anything beyond usage of a Web browser and maybe connecting to WiFi is black magic for most.

Go to a website. If I say "go to support.ourwebsite.com" I expect you to do that. It blows my mind how often people manage to do a search for the URL and then ask me which result to click on.

Tech people overestimate people’s ability to distinguish harmful versus harmless actions. To us it seems obvious that there’s read operations, write operarios, and execute operations, and that the read is basically safe, write can lay traps for you, and execute can kill your computer or the control you have over it.

But that’s not obvious to everyone. We just tell them “Don’t run any code or give it permission to overwrite anything” but most people don’t know what the significance of that is or how to notice when a button is going to cause a write or execute.

I think tech people have overly high expectations of the average person’s ability to pirate.

I remember when Netflix was going to raise prices and all the online comments were like “Yo ho I will start pirating!” and it’s like, kind of sounds like you were already pirating. The expectation that Netflix would lose masses of money as average people turned to pirating was always outlandish to me.

Yes, it’s simple to do, but the vast majority of people are apathetic to minor nickel and diming, especially if it’s basically automatic reoccurring fees, and are intimidated by the idea of learning 1337 hacker stuff.

How to use a smartphone. I got my 82YO mom a phone on my account and set it up for her. Walked her through using the appstore, installing and deleting apps, using voicemail, email, and texting. She rarely leaves home, so I put her on a metered data plan. Last month her WiFi gateway went out, and ATT replaced it. This month I got a huge data charge because she didn't reconnect her phone to the new gateway.