this post was submitted on 28 Apr 2025
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iiiiiiitttttttttttt

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you know the computer thing is it plugged in?

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago

Unlike with boomers, this shit was your fault. Y'all refused to kill off iPhone and macbooks and chromebooks and Windows and now this is the world we live in.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 days ago (1 children)

As an IT worker.. it's so depressing that our education systems don't really train people for work. At all.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 days ago (1 children)

"sure, they grew up with technology, they'll be fine"

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 days ago

They grew up in the age of the smartphone and apps. They never had to learn to understand technology.

I have to teach fresh college graduates how to navigate network folders. It's wild.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 2 days ago (3 children)

It's the 1% vs the working class, not generation vs generation.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago (4 children)

I am a zoomer, and this generation as a whole is a lot worse at technology.

Its not something that's happened for no reason, smartphones become more popular and simple to use technology, and older people assuming these people will be good with tech as they grew up with it are big factors.

The 1% is causing a lot of problems, but this largely isn't by them.

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[–] [email protected] 23 points 2 days ago (2 children)

I teach high school and it's amazing to me how much these kids don't know how to use a computer. They can click a button and get to tik-tok. They read the first answer the AI gives them. That's it.

I keep telling them they should be better at computers than an old lady like me.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 days ago

They read the first answer the AI gives them.

This is why Im terrified of my parents learning how to use ChatGPT.

My dad still falls for satire. It took us years to convince him the tabloids in supermarkets about Bigfoot weren't real.

He's not a smart guy. But He's still my dad though.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 days ago

Your comment made me think:

It’s one thing if they aren’t great at using computers to be productive, but for the love of God children please don’t trust what the computer or the company selling it tells you!

[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Classic Lemmy Linux users forgetting that access to a PC and the knowledge to use it is a privilege not afforded to most unlike budget smartphones which cost less than the keyboard you own and are becoming more and more of a necessity than a trivial toy as it was when we first had them.

Lamenting generational failures is a pastime reserved for the old to soothe their egos. If you actually care, understand the systemic reasons why young people are less tech literate and take the steps to reach them.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I understand the reasons, but so many people I've had to deal with don't seem to want to learn.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (5 children)

Bingo. I have noticed a huge downfall in curiosity and engagement with not only technology, but pretty much everything in the world. People just want to be spoon-fed and will fight you throw a hissy fit rather than just... learn or make an effort to figure things out on their own.

I used to be a part of a DIY repair space for tech and mechanics and left because around 2022 it went from fun to just... a bunch of lazy people showing up and whining that other people were not doing the work for them. And you'd explain it was a DIY space for people to self-learn and they would just give you this vague look and get angry and then complain that 'I thought you were suppose to do it for me.'

I don't know what it is, social media or phone addiction or what. It seems to be just as bad will millennials now as any other gen. People just... don't want to try anymore at anything. And trying is the only way you properly learn anything.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Most people carry a smartphone more expensive than my all organs combined to be fair, at least in US.

Linux and technology in general is not that hard as long as you aren't scared of clicking everything and messing around. And I say this as someone who didn't have internet access until 2020.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Gen X checking in here. I’m actually happy to be left out of the memes. Carry on.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I always feel like Gen X should be labeled as the "forgotten generation".

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago

I mean that’s what “Generation X” means. We were forgotten from the beginning, forced into the long shadow of the Baby Boomers.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 2 days ago (6 children)

I've long said that I believe Millennials, as a generational cohort, are the best at typing that ever has been and ever will be. We were the first generation where adults really recognized that we'd be using computers our entire lives and took steps to teach typing. But, so much more importantly than that, we socialized through typing. I had typing classes in school, sure, but I learned to type quickly on AIM and in chat rooms.

Earlier generations only really typed for business or school. Later generations socialize over phones, so they, too, only use a physical keyboard for school and business.

I guess I should amend this theory to include all tech literacy in general.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (4 children)

There wasn't voice Chat in early games and you had to type fast to communicate and not die.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 days ago (12 children)

Typing was taught to boomers and genx first dude. In fact, as a liminal i'd readily say i've had an arseload more typing "teaching" than you have - both keyboard and typewriter- and i'll wager my mother in the age of typewriters had even more.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 days ago (1 children)

As a Zoomer, I also had typing classes, but I learned how to type because I wanted to be able to quickly send messages in Minecraft when I was like 7 years old 🙃

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[–] [email protected] 51 points 3 days ago (7 children)

I've trained a lot of 18-22 y/os in the last 10 years and they are fine. Let's not become the boomers please...

[–] [email protected] 20 points 3 days ago (3 children)

Yeah, being dumb is hardware-agnostic. As some guy put it, "being stupid isn't a big deal anymore; some of my best friends are stupid".
It just stunlocks me a little bit as younger people have been around tech their whole life, unlike boomers, who were born before computers.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 2 days ago (3 children)

"been around tech their whole life" more like they have a locked down phone, locked down game console and MAYBE a desktop computer. It's too rounded out and consumer friendly now, you never have to peek under the hood.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I am gen z and know how to use a computer

Most of us should have been taught how to use computers in school then we expand our knowledge from there on our own

Is this an american only problem?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I'm not American. I'm also Gen z, but the older parts are typically better at computers.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

People are as experienced in computers as their use case is

No one is better at computers than someone else, everyone has different tasks and workflows they use them for

Computer skill isn't linear

It'd be more accurate to say someone is more experienced in their industry area or specific skill, they just use a computer to make the tasks they perform easier

Computers are so intergrated into most things theese days that it'd be very hard to find someone not using one to make their life easier and most jobs are using computers to make it easier and organise better

[–] [email protected] 107 points 3 days ago (25 children)

2 generations. Gen X and Millennials are both of the right age to properly understand computers.

[–] [email protected] 37 points 3 days ago (5 children)

To put a finer point on it, it specifically the younger Gen Xers and older Millennials. That’s the “one” generation this post describes.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 3 days ago (2 children)

I'm on the older end of Gen Xers and at least the nerdier half of us not only know how to use computers, but we've seen the whole evolution of home computing since the Altair. We know in a way you never can why goto is considered harmful.

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[–] [email protected] 21 points 2 days ago (9 children)

To be fair, PDFs suck and the only software that handles them well is paid and proprietary

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 days ago

I felt like an idiot the other day. Customer sent in a pdf with confidential information. I needed to upload the document without the confidential information but only have the free Adobe. I normally redact the information in paint but paint wouldn't accept the file format.

I ended up asking a gen x teammate and she instantly told me to use the snipping tool which solved my problem. Thank you Gen X coworkers

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 days ago

As a dev, the divide between apps users and computer software users is fascinating. My mom can do things in instagram or whatsapp that I didn't even know possible.. but put her in front of a modern computer with a simple application and she's completely lost! I try to explain that it's exactly the same as her phone its just a larger screen/physical keybaord with different apps, doesn't seem to help.

[–] [email protected] 61 points 3 days ago (5 children)

Boomers: analogue phones and rolodexes. The nerdy ones knew Morse Code, though.

Gen X: grew up with picture books on assembly language programming

Millennials: know how to use Microsoft Word and Photoshop. Perhaps can unfuck Windows Registry keys if needed.

GenZ: “What’s a file?”

[–] [email protected] 27 points 3 days ago (11 children)

The nerdy boomers built computers as we know them.

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 2 days ago (6 children)

The thing is most of us cant even rotate a pdf, but we do know how to learn it.

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 2 days ago (5 children)

There's one generation between boomers and zoomers? I'm pretty confident I know who it is you're forgetting.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 days ago (3 children)

Gen X: the forgotten generation.

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[–] [email protected] 33 points 3 days ago (9 children)

it depends on the person. some zoomers are great with tech, hardware and software. others aren't. same goes for every generation. this reeks of the "haha let's shit on the younger generations" millennials have been mad about for years

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 days ago

I was pretty worthless with computers at 16 too.

Now I’m almost 40 and I’m working In the industry and slowly getting worse again

[–] [email protected] 22 points 3 days ago (2 children)

The only reason we have to rotate the PDFs is because they can't figure out how to use the sheet-feed scanner. Theres a picture embossed in the thing! And a sign that we put next to the button!

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