God bless them but they are technologically challenged to the MAX.

Finally got wi-fi in the house over Christmas, then onto DVR and HD TV last month.

Now Mom's bought herself an iPad
Dad has a Kindle Fire that he is just beginning to use

Next weekend I have to take them both to get new cell phones. Thinking about completely switching them to iPhones because I am getting a new Mac (gasp!) and I wanna engage them as much as possible so that they figure out how to use the shit.

What do you all think about this topic?

4/17/2012 10:49:38 AM

my dad has been in IT for 30 years and can't figure out how to install skype so he can video chat with his grandchildren

[Edited on April 17, 2012 at 10:51 AM. Reason : he did buy a huge-ass hdtv the other day though so i guess that counts for something]

4/17/2012 10:50:30 AM

the way my parents type e-mails and especially text messages always brings the lol's.

4/17/2012 10:51:42 AM

my folks are proficient in e-mail and skype, which I am proud of. But their smart phones and tablets... I'm not sure they understand the awesomeness of having the internet at your fingertips 24/7

4/17/2012 10:53:27 AM

no joke, it took my mom a year to figure out how to attach something to an email. Couldn't do it with verbal instructions either.

4/17/2012 10:54:37 AM

I'm glad I'm not alone in this battle

4/17/2012 10:57:09 AM

lol

4/17/2012 10:59:21 AM

my mom cannot get past using google for everything.

this is how she goes to youtube: http://www.google.com - search for youtube, click on first result

same thing for amazon, facebook, and nearly every other popular website she uses.

i do not and will not ever understand this

4/17/2012 11:01:04 AM

AHAHAH I love this thread

my mom is just getting used to texting...she used to call to tell me the most dumb shit ever so I was all "please text me for things like this"

but her texts are grammatically correct and it makes me smile so hard (which I guess is good because I don't want her to be all srsly n shit)

4/17/2012 11:05:07 AM

4/17/2012 11:05:16 AM

^^^ I do this

4/17/2012 11:09:01 AM

Dad is really good. We Skype, he does regular backups of his shit, etc. HDTV, DVR, & pretty good at texting.
Mom is inept. She barely can do more than check email. She has a cellphone and hates it.
Father-in-law only know how to do the PC at work for inventory stuff. He checks his mail there, but does nothing tech related at home.
Mother-in-law plays FB games and that is about it. She barely understands wireless. I had to setup her Roku and wireless network for her laptop.
Grandad is very tech savvy for his age. Has a home network of 5-6 PCs with Home Networking I helped him setup and run. He has print sharing going and handles his business work through multiple machines. They even Skype sometimes with us. The worst thing he does is still want to type everything IN CAPS. All of his web searches are WWW.GOOGLE.COM when auto complete is running.
Grandma is not very tech savvy. She does use my shared Dropbox to check out photos I post in there since they do not have a Facebook account.

[Edited on April 17, 2012 at 11:16 AM. Reason : ]

4/17/2012 11:14:57 AM

Quote :

"Thinking about completely switching them to iPhones"

My mom got an iPhone. BIGGEST MISTAKE EVER. Now she can facebook message me from anywhere.

4/17/2012 11:16:25 AM

lol, my mom doesn't have Facebook and my Dad refuses to talk to me through it.

I just want them to enjoy and be able to use their phones. And the Android has been a challenge for Mom. I thought maybe the iPhone would be easier, but not really sure if theres THAT much of a difference.

4/17/2012 11:20:01 AM

My parents were on some Gift of the Magi stuff this Christmas.

Stepdad bought Mom a PS3 + Move so that she could play the Zumba game.

Mom bought stepdad GoogleTV so that he could do stuff downstairs in the living room.

However Mom can't even work her iphone, let alone navigate the PS3 home screen and figure out her game. Stepdad doesn't understand how his harmony remote works with his DVR, DVD, Disc Changer, sound system, so he definitely can't navigate to the correct input and use Google TV.

Both presents are collecting dust.

4/17/2012 11:20:08 AM

Somehow during the course of cleaning or something, my mom managed to unplug the HDMI chord out of the back of the TV.

My dad was out of town, so she called me.

She told me what happened, and I thought it would be a quick fix.

Trying to explain to her how to plug that thing back in to the back of the TV, while on the phone, was one of the most painful things I've ever had to do.

It literally took over 10min and some yelling did occur.

4/17/2012 11:38:22 AM

My mom hasn't figured out facebook yet thankfully! However, she is a smartphone whore and it's only a matter of time. She used over 5 gigs of data one month watching videos on her phone because she was feeling too lazy to turn on wifi or go get the laptop.

She is not tech savvy and does ok with android. I think switching them from android to iphone would just make it worse because it's something else to figure out.

[Edited on April 17, 2012 at 1:31 PM. Reason : ...]

4/17/2012 1:29:33 PM

you just called your mom a whore

4/17/2012 1:32:30 PM

a smartphone whore

4/17/2012 1:33:28 PM

hahahaha

when my mom wants to send me pictures, instead of sending them all in one email, she'll send them one by one, in individual emails so I get like 30 emails.

This happens whether she's sending from her laptop or her phone.

4/17/2012 1:33:45 PM

My mom recently got an Android phone and i told her to try and use it every day for something other than making and receiving cellular calls and she has been doing it! I'm afraid to teach her how to text message, but she uses the GSP and other stuff on it.

^my mom is incapable of emailing pics using anything other than her phone.

I really need to install windows 7 on the computadora at home, I just don't get home enough.

I'm Krallum and I approved this message.

4/17/2012 1:34:56 PM

my mom has never had a cellphone, and when you let her use yours... gawd that shit is funny, even better when she tried borrowing my sisters to call my dad (she had a droid or something at the time) HAHAHa

that was a good laugh, she just got frustrated and was yelling 'I just want to make a call, the... but.. eh ... RAWR' then not as funny because she would give you an evil stare as you dial the number for her while stifling a laugh.

Also, my mom likes music, so we got her the most basic mp3 player we could ever find. She returned it and got a discman, which she said was hard to find.. go figure

4/17/2012 1:50:18 PM

I try to explain to my mom that technology is not the confusing DOS command line it used to be in the 90s and that everything is pretty intuitive and I think she's finally coming around.

I'm Krallum and I approved this message.

4/17/2012 1:52:15 PM

Quote :

"my mom is just getting used to texting...she used to call to tell me the most dumb shit ever so I was all "please text me for things like this" but her texts are grammatically correct and it makes me smile so hard (which I guess is good because I don't want her to be all srsly n shit)"

My mom goes for the 1337 and I hate it. Mom, please just f-ing type out "I love you" instead of luv or ::heart::

Mom and Dad's DVR stays at about 95% full because they never remember to delete things until it gives the warning. geez. there is so much good stuff in this thread

4/17/2012 3:35:53 PM

Quote :

"She returned it and got a discman, which she said was hard to find.. go figure"

Almost spite out my Mtn Dew all over my desk when I read that.

4/17/2012 4:06:58 PM

my dad still calls me when he's trying to scan something. that in itself is a challenge but then i have to go through with him the steps to attach a file to an email.

i ended up putting logmein on both my mom's and dad's computers so I can do stuff for them....hahaha.

my parents are also those people who buy and HDTV but do not pay for HD programming. it's frustrating.

4/17/2012 4:09:22 PM

My dad tries to play family IT guy to his brother and sister, which means he calls me to resolve their issues. That shit never goes well.

4/17/2012 4:52:38 PM

damnit, spit not spite. damn autocorrect

4/17/2012 4:54:52 PM

My dad has a 60 inch flat screen, but no digital cable. Watching NCAA Tournament games on that thing in SD was a fucking nightmare.

He makes my mom disconnect from the wireless before turning off her laptop and unplugging it, after every single use. I have no idea why. None of that makes any sense to me.

4/17/2012 5:18:10 PM

Also my dad has a texting plan on his phone but will not open/respond to any he receives because he's worried about having to pay for them

4/17/2012 5:20:06 PM

my dad is hit or miss... he had all the tv/blueray/surround sound stuff the day it comes out, and set up his entire clinic's Network/server/operating system (medical practice so he has specific software it needs)


yet he doesn't know how to set up his alarm on his (flip) phone, and when he bought one of the first blackberry's that came out, I inherited it within 2 months because he didn't need "all that razzle dazzle bullshit."


I should also mention that I get daily requests to play farmville with him

4/17/2012 5:21:52 PM

My 91-year old grandmother uses Excel on Windows 98 to keep up with her church member's donations.

On the other hand, if the slightest thing goes wrong, she calls my dad for help.

4/17/2012 5:37:56 PM

Grandparents use email and some facebook. Grandpa plays free cell constantly. he has over 60,000 games played. He was a C++ programmer/professor and used to break codes for the NSA. grandparents just got cell phone and barely use it.

Parents both use facebook, dad more frequently but he has more friends. Mom uses all sorts of accounting software, master at excel, sage, etc. she's probably better than me with a lot of it. she's a solitaire fiend and plays on her pc and iphone. my parents email me a bunch of chain stuff that's funny.

4/17/2012 6:13:11 PM

my dad used to be the worst when it came to learning new technology. he still does the "hunt and peck" typing method, though. but he texts (which i never thought would happen) and uses his droid all the time...it's funny, my mom has said that he uses the most data by far out of anyone on their plan (her, him, my sister, my brother, and a few employees). my mom, who used to be the more tech savvy of the two, is terrible about her phone. she misplaces it all the time and regularly takes more than 5 hours to respond to a text.

they both struggle with the dvr...dad will try to record a single football game and ends up recording every single college football game on espn until someone fixes it. same thing with my mom.

4/17/2012 6:32:14 PM

EPIC UPDATE

I called my mom yesterday and she answered the phone,

"hello"
"hi mom, can you-"
"hellllooooooo"
"mom... mom, can you hear me"
"(insert my name here) are you there?"
"MOM, I CAN HEAR YOU, CAN YOU HEAR ME???"
"oh, now i can, i had the phone upside down"

How did she read the caller ID and know it was me if the phone was upside down? I am so confused.

::

4/25/2012 12:55:14 PM

so far my parents are handling their new phones (Moto Droid Razr) pretty well. Neither of them realized that they were supposed to charge them EVERY DAY so yesterday when I tried to call either of them... phones had died. Then they were like "for some reason my phone died today" and i was like "well did you charge it last night?" "no." "ok Daddy, make sure when you go to bed you plug it in ok??" "ok"

Mom did the same thing, but shes used to charging hers overnight, just forgot to do it i guess.

4/25/2012 12:59:35 PM

my mother cant figure out how to hook up a DVD player but knows every feature of facebook forward and backward. SMH

4/25/2012 1:03:50 PM

haha, people come in to the store all the time complaining about their batteries.
Them: "Something is wrong with my phone, it won't stay charged!"
Me: "How often do you have to charge it?"
Them: "EVERY NIGHT!"
Me: "Sounds about right, any other concerns?"

4/25/2012 1:04:49 PM

Quote :

"when my mom wants to send me pictures, instead of sending them all in one email, she'll send them one by one, in individual emails so I get like 30 emails. This happens whether she's sending from her laptop or her phone."

This. I showed my MIL how to do this the other day as well from an iPad. Always getting one picture per email no matter what.

I tried to tell my mom she could even upload the photos to the Picasa album of Buddy online herself as it's an open to those who have access...she definitely wasn't understanding that!

4/25/2012 1:06:34 PM

Yes people are stupid as fuck bitching about their cell phone battery.

I don't work in wireless sales anymore but when I did I would offer to "test" it by charging it to 100%, and calling the "battery test number" and letting the recording play for an hour to see if the battery drained an abnormal amount. I would advise them to come pickup their phone in 2-3 hours.

I think the "battery test number" is a myth, I never knew what it was, never needed it, because absolutely NO ONE really thought there was anything enough wrong with their phone enough to leave it with me for 2-3 hours.

4/25/2012 1:08:26 PM

aw, parents and technology, good job for trying! God help us when we get older.

[Edited on April 25, 2012 at 1:09 PM. Reason : ^^^ someone did that exact thing while we were purchasing our phones!]

4/25/2012 1:08:49 PM

4/25/2012 1:09:57 PM

ayo technology

4/25/2012 2:38:42 PM

my dad took a keyboarding class in high school.

At the time he got laughed at for it, but stuck around for the girls.
Later in life it apparently helped him immensely.

I thought it was a good story. Just goes to show - never be afraid to take the unpopular and stereotyped classes.

4/25/2012 2:42:50 PM

My moms just got a new computer. She's called me like 5 times today

I'm Krallum and I approved this message.

4/25/2012 2:58:50 PM

^^ i took home economics in 7th grade and had to do the bag-of-sugar-baby thing for a week

as a current father of three human babies, that experience has helped IMMENSELY

4/25/2012 3:05:55 PM

My parents have one cell phone, between the two of them. It's never turned on unless they are traveling. Otherwise it lives in the glovebox of the car, except for Mom taking it inside to charge once a week. They have voicemail but refuse to use it (the box isn't even set up and they decline my offers to set it up for them).

On the computer, on the other hand, Mom joined facebook in January and has been spending several hours a day on it ever since.

4/25/2012 4:30:28 PM

Quote :

"AHAHAH I love this thread my mom is just getting used to texting...she used to call to tell me the most dumb shit ever so I was all "please text me for things like this" but her texts are grammatically correct and it makes me smile so hard (which I guess is good because I don't want her to be all srsly n shit)"

DB and I have the same mom

4/25/2012 4:38:03 PM

Quote :

" but her texts are grammatically correct"

I do this.

4/25/2012 4:40:27 PM

My 91 year old grandmother still uses WebTV

4/25/2012 4:48:53 PM