Tech Support for the Technology Challenged
How many tech support people are in your office? At my company there are three—two “real” tech people and the receptionist—me! This is not a joke, but it is quite laughable when you hear the facts. My generation grew up learning to type on typewriters, and we switched back and forth from manual to electric. The hot product of the day was the IBM Selectric® which had a moving ball with the typeface set into it instead of single strike keys. As far as we knew at the time, IBM had room sized computers in big tall buildings. Everything I have learned since then is from younger people who seem to have a photographic memory and nimble fingers. Compared to them I am barely computer literate!
At the “ aging baby-boomer” end of the spectrum I find myself in the odd position of giving tech support to authors who call in and need different kinds of help, from where to login, to how to attach a file to their message and all points between. This raises the question, what resources exist out there to help people when they aren’t calling us? Apparently many children of boomers ask the same question. Let the research commence!
Here’s what I found that offers tech help to “tech challenged seniors.”
The Resources
Senior Net is a company which teaches computer skills through their workshops at 60 learning centers all over the United States. Their courses are directed at adults age 50 and older. They also provide various online courses so you can learn at home, according to your own schedule. They are partners with and sponsored by: Adobe, IBM and Microsoft. They have been in business since 1986.
Woo hoo! A website created for boomers and their parents. It’s a many-faceted destination for people to find help—from how-to’s and product reviews, to advice for small business and a “rant” section to vent your frustrations with technology in general. If you’re approaching 50 or have already arrived, this tech site is for you!
BTT (Boomertechtalk) was started by 3 people, Linda Sherman and her husband Ray Gordon and their friend Bruce Sallan. After Linda, a Social Media Marketing Consultant, helped Bruce in his new career as a columnist, they realized that there was a information gap for baby boomers. As Boomers we’re caught between our techie children and our parents. BTT wanted to help parents keep up with their kids and help adults who want their parents to keep up with them. BTT is a tech help desk online.
This website was created in 2010 to help parents of Google employees. It seems every time an employee went home for the holidays, he was besieged with requests for “tech help” such as how to attach pictures to an email. The site offers a large assortment of videos for teaching computer skills. Each video is under 2 minutes in length. You can send them to your parents as a kind of tech “care package.”
According to a Google blog post, TeachParentsTech.org allows users to select more than 50 basic how-to videos they could send to parents — or frankly, anyone else who might need a little tech help. The videos cover topics from copying and pasting to sharing large files. The recipient will receive a message from the sender, along with a link to the selected videos.
The Telikin is a state of the art simplified computer, which comes with all software loaded. The user needs access to a high speed internet connection. Take your computer out of the box and just plug it in. The package consists of a touch screen in either a 18.6 inch monitor or 20 inch monitor, complete with hard drive in the monitor itself. The computer costs roughly $700 to $1000 depending on which size monitor you choose. Friendly videos even help you understand the already simplified setup and the company offers a support team who will do more complex tasks such as setting up your email.
The Telikin offers applications such as photo sharing, email and video chat, and makes it simple to navigate by pressing buttons on the touchscreen which appears on the desktop every time you power it up. It makes technology fun for seniors or their grandchildren because it is so easy to use.
These are just a few of the most popular places to find tech help. You can “google” phrases that describe your area of interest from “tech help for seniors” to “tech help for my iPhone” to “tech help for (fill in the blank)” any particular application or new gadget you have in mind, and you will find pages of websites at your fingertips. You’ll know you’ve reached a milestone when you find yourself actually having fun doing the research!
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Best Regards
Wombi
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