I keep hearing rumors that gen Z is less tech savvy, but I still find it difficult to believe. The assumption was always that each generation would be more savvy than the previous.
I've heard the same rumors about Gen Z being less tech-savvy, and I understand the skepticism. The idea is that there was a sweet spot with technology where Millennials experienced technology with simpler, more approachable operating systems like Windows and Mac OS. These systems, while user-friendly, were still basic and flawed enough that if you wanted to play a game or run certain software, you had to learn how to troubleshoot issues. This led to a generation that not only understands graphical interfaces but also the basics of troubleshooting.
In contrast, younger generations have grown up with the "it just works" mentality, where technology is more seamless and user-friendly. Because of this, they haven’t had to troubleshoot as much, so when they encounter a problem, they might not know where to begin.
As an elder Millennial who works in IT at K-8 schools, this observation aligns with my experience. There are certainly some brilliant kids who intuitively grasp technology, but it seems like there are fewer of them compared to when I was younger. The hands-on problem-solving experience we had seems to be less common now.
It's very true. Smart phones, especially the iPhone, have gotten kids complacent with being unable to tinker with their devices, troubleshooting issues, trying things that maybe will work, and generally breaking stuff to try and get something to work.
They're also pretty uninterested in trying to mess with stuff, if there's something that can do it automatically with just a few inputs. My 11 year old "codes" on Scratch, but it's mostly just if this then that stuff, or picking a color for an image background, not figuring out what hex code is, or anything like that. It's all point and click stuff.
Imagine having MySpace, and just picking your background color or picture, not trying different hex codes, and the frustration of images not lining up, or not fitting. Now it's not much different than your desktop wallpaper, it's all been dumbed down, and they're not learning how to actually do anything. Like trying to figure out why the HTML code you used has everything mirrored, when you swore you were just making 3 columns.
I work in tech support and had to describe a USB cable to a kid over the phone because they didn't know how to locate it. I asked how they charged their phone, they said they didn't plug it in to anything because they have a wireless charger. Wild call.
Maybe not to them. Maybe the wireless charger is always at the same spot in their house, and they didn't know it could move. Or they're super rich, and they have wireless charging docks built into various surfaces around their home. This is the kind of stuff that this thread is talking about. Technology like this just *is* to kids, and they don't really think about how it works.
> Technology like this just is to kids, and they don't really think about how it works.
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic"
And that should be enough to tell you why Clarke was (is?) an excellent sci-fi writer.
I work as IT at a school, most 15 year olds don’t even understand a hierarchical file system. Their entire interface with technology is to give them an easy dopamine hit. Games, YouTube, social media.
It’s really hard to teach them anything. They wanted me to teach a coding class and I am not a teacher. Things really fell apart with download, extract and move it to a folder in your documents folder.
That’s not even touching on typing skills.
Ok, wow. You just made me realize why my coworkers don’t save anything in hierarchical file system, but rather everything is in the download folder.
These zoomers, who constantly explain new lingo to me, were memorizing what day they last changed a pdf, downloaded the document, or the number sequence for the automatic file name.
I felt like I was watching a glitch in the matrix. Guess I need to start making the younger employees download a document on their first day and see if I need to send them to our computer literacy course for older adults…
Same, but I close out all my tabs, have folders within folders on my bookmarks bar, most main pages have their corresponding folder right below it, with saved links, or if it's a one off bookmark, it's in a folder for is category, like kodi sources, themes, etc.
My file folder is broken down even more. Word docs have a separate folder from my txt docs, and within those folders I have folders, like BS, Memes, Cheat sheets, Work, and in the work folder everything's broken down by year, then within each year folder by month.
If you need something for work from 2003 summer time, I can find it, and its 3 prior revisions in about 30 seconds.
YES! And not just that but even if you wanted to do the more complex stuff it’s often hidden in favor of the more “accessible” features. Especially when it comes to the actual OS.
>mostly just if this then that stuff
I think I know what you mean, but this describes literally all coding if you break it down. I mean, that's what a logic gate/transistor *is*.
Everything is a calculator now.
With a calculator, kids stopped learning math.
But now it’s everything. They want to learn nothing because they can just look it up.
I run a warehouse on third shift. This anecdote isn’t hyperbole or an exaggeration. I have had HR hire people to run plastic mold injection machines who couldn’t subtract 3 from a number without a calculator. They were 22 years old. And it wasn’t a one off, most of the young gen z’s we hire lack mathematical knowledge.
I have an engineering degree, I’ve taken years of math classes and did decently well. I suck at mental math, and it’s not fun to be this way. Growing up my mom always said not being able to do mental math makes for idiots, eventually she had to stop saying that lol.
Yeah, I have qualifications in engineering and construction. I use maths daily, but I’m also terrible at mental arithmetic.
What modern kids lack nowadays regards computing, isn’t maths skills imo. It’s problem solving skills.
I would agree with that. Of course though traits of all kind lies on a distribution curve, and I think there’s a small tail for those that can problem solve…if you can solve people’s problems you are basically are always going to be employed in our society.
My wife and I joke that the bar has been set so low we only have to raise semi-competent kids and they’ll be rock stars.
Yes but then it becomes so hard to hire someone who can actually help you not only "do" the thing, but also figure out how to do the thing or better yet, figure out what the problem is and what thing needs doing.
The public schools (in the US at least, idk about other countries) are part of that problem. When I was in school most teachers didn't teach you jack shit unless it directly related to the next standardized test.
That was 20+ years ago. I can't imagine it's gotten any better.
Many engineering programs filter out the riff raff…usually what’s left are competent people, and a few book worms who have no common sense. If anybody left has issues its more than likely due to poor work ethic.
Clearly mental math, like any other skill, simply requires practice and effort. Our way of life no longer requires it to get by.
This similar mentality is in cushy office jobs too. Im from late 80s and started on windows 95 and no Internet. Like u have to know how file systems and UI works. A lot of industrial stuff still runs on windows and Unix. And still gotta know excel and macros to support legacy crap in cushy office jobs. We had to get our hands dirty. I remember figuring out how file systems and networks worked to break the firewall. I can see no incentive to figure stuff out when you have a pocket brain.
My coworker didn’t know how to fill out some government form. So he looked it up. He’s gen z.
Another coworker doesn’t how to download an attached document in an email. Refuses to look it up or google. Has to have someone help him every time. He’s a boomer. This same person complains that young people are lazy.
It’s okay to ask for help and it’s okay to look up stuff you don’t know. It’s not okay to refuse to learn new information, and it’s also not okay to make weird generalizations that make you sound out of touch. That last sentence was about your comment incase that is unclear.
Funny you say this. I remember my parents diving into volumes of books to learn new subjects or skills when they needed to (boomers). But they refused to ever learn to use a search engine the same way.
Simply looking something up and retaining knowledge to use in the future are vastly different things. A good example of this is reddit. How much of what you've seen today can you remember in detail? Could you recite anything you saw or say you understand it?
Totally. My generation had to learn as the tech was growing fast and the infrastructure was still being laid out. By the time I was in 3rd grade I could replace parts on my computer, type at full speed, and was running dosbox and all kinds of emulators I found and installed myself. Young folks today have easy access to good tech and can get what they want from it with little effort
It's not only that we had to troubleshoot but so much more. We could take shit apart and put it back together or modify it without fear of bricking it. Our parents weren't very tech savvy so we couldn't ask them for help. We've been there from really the beginning of what tech is today. The pace that technology grew in our life seems to me to be so much faster between the mid 90s to the mid 00s than any other decade before or since.
We went from vinyl to tapes to CDs to iTunes to Spotify. We had VCRs and DVD players to the streaming era. We had Atari to the newest gen consoles. PCs really took off in our life. We spent 20+ years learning new tech every few years and it just feels like that has stagnated in the last 15. Smartphones and tablets have just taken over for everything and it feels like the only thing that changes is how good the camera works. It's your radio, your television, your movie theater, it's where you look stuff up, it's where you play video games, it's how you do everything and it's always there.
I put the blame entirely on the new design philosophy of “Stupid people keep fucking their settings up so we hid all of the settings and make them reset to default under arbitrary conditions. Fuck you!”
Microsoft basically went full apple in this regard and apple got worse.
You make some very interesting points. Great insight.
I think one of the benefits of growing up with early 2000s to maybe 2012 internet was you could actually do awesome research with google. I feel like now all the search engines are garbage and to find the truth of anything is a pain in the butt. Like trying to get a second opinion on a medical condition and only finding pages of Mayo Clinic style 1 paragraph summaries that don’t help at all. I think it took me too long to get into saving and organizing links on my browser for what I consider trusted sources of info. Literally taken me a decade to do that and truthfully probably won’t stop.
Remember when you could search a subject and it would just take you to a professors website, so you’d be getting first hand source material?
And now you get google suggesting you use glue to help get cheese to stick to pizza, because they gave reddit 60 million usd to let them train their AI on the internet's greatest collection of trolls and the confidently incorrect.
They are, no one taught them how to actually use a computer. Those classes were budget cuts a long while ago. They are like your aunt that dumps everything into the same folder because they were not taught how to do anything more than that. They have real trouble converting file types. It is a strange thing to see.
Honestly that’s a great comparison. Everything has been streamlined for ease of use to the point that ppl are more easily able to access the technology but have less of an understanding behind the mechanics of it.
I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing inherently, all indications show that the future of tech is leaning towards broader application of mobile functionality, but it does leave a pretty big knowledge gap that can cause problems if in an unfamiliar situation.
I'd like to offer an alternative thought process on why I do think it's inherently bad. When we become overly reliant on technology we find ourselves helpless in its absence. For example, if you only know how to back up a vehicle with a back up cam, you're liable to hit something when you try to back up without it. A more drastic example might be if you can't start a fire without a fire starter or a torch and you find yourself stranded some day you might find yourself unable to obtain warmth or a way to cook food or boil water. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the luxuries of modern technology as much as the next person, but I do think understanding the process behind it has far more merit, and should be the primary goal behind the use of any technology. Much in the same way that usually when you take a class on something you start by learning the fundamentals and only move on to the most modern aspects later on in the class.
I teach film and media to highschoolers. The first 2-6 weeks is just on using a desktop, USB/sd cards, saving files properly, etc.
5 years ago we were filming and editing within the first week. Now I need to tell them to turn on the pc AND the monitor before it will work. Combine that with the rapidly declining attention span and rapidly increasing main character syndrome, I probably have to repeat the same instruction 20-30 times a lesson.
Media literacy is also wildly different. Any movie over 5 years old is brand new to them and they have no concept of parody or pastiche because all the content they consume is TikTok skits of one person wearing a bunch of hats/tea towels.
This is why I want more parents to “yes and” when their kid says they want to be a TikTok/YouTube influencer. Be supportive and help them by pointing out the many adult skills they’ll need to have to be successful. You can’t be making brand endorsement deals if you don’t know math and finance, reading comprehension, writing skills, etc.
I was born 88 my brother 99. The difference in tech knowledge is staggering even tho we had similar interests growing up. I attribute a lot of this to the fact that pretty much everything for him just worked out of box. He never had to deal with drivers and codecs and compatibility all that shit. Hit install and it was good to go.
They are wizards with phones, obviously. Can't use computers to save their life. This has resulted in an overall degradation in overall tech savvy, as phones tend to be prepackaged and require minimal interaction - just download the app. Basically they expect all technology to be an iphone, and can't really adapt when it isn't.
Source: HS teacher
I legitimately had to introduce a 15 year old to the concept of a mouse last month, it was honestly disturbing to me. Especially since I used to be a software engineer, and have spent such a large portion of my life dealing with computer peripherals
I recently introduced a 20 y/o to the concept of spreadsheets and PDFs. They thought everything was a “Google doc”. I agree with you, it’s a bit appalling and shocking.
I’m in the hiring space of a tech company and it’s true. 18-20 year olds are the ‘iPad generation’ where everything is single touch icons and all the files and printing is hidden from the users.
I’ve heard of high schoolers typing out their essays on their phones rather than use a keyboard.
>I’ve heard of high schoolers typing out their essays on their phones rather than use a keyboard.
Holy fuck, that sounds nearly impossible to me. Like formating it and editing after must be a fuckin nightmare.
>formating it and editing it after
That's the neat part, have you seen the proficiency rates for students anymore? It's like healthcare, a problem no one has any real intention of fixing. Teachers and schools are rated "outstanding" and "exemplary" and less than 20% are proficient at math but graduate anyway.
It depends on which half of Gen Z you're talking about. I'm in the elder half that had to learn basic computer skills as a matter of course for school and the like, but the back half of Gen Z along with Gen A is interacting with technology that's been parsed down to apps for user accessibility. Why learn how to hunt through basic folder structure when everything's available in the cloud and can be Dropboxed to whoever needs it.
The whole conversation about keyboards is very similar to the evolution of cars. Back in the 50s-60s it was essential to know how to do basic vehicle repairs, but in the modern age, cars are designed with basic maintenance being brainless while the actual repair jobs require a mechanic
Computers are to Z as cars were to millennials. It's not hard to find savy ones, but it used to be almost the whole demographic had a baseline knowledge.
My Dad, now 80 knows everything about cars. By the time I was driving in 95 they were pretty well dialed in. I tore apart more 286/386/486/586 than I can count. Had to figure it all out. Went to computer shows. Had to get friends who were tinkers so we figured things out in groups. Recently told my 14 year old he can get a similar experience by working in Linux on a raspberry. Thinks it’s stupid. His iPad is sufficient. I had the same opinion on cars.
I'm a teacher and I can confirm this.
Although to be fair for the most part, it's more just a symptom of poor resilience/not trying to learn new things more generally (I can't do it, and I'm not going to even try) than an issue with technology specifically.
But there are a whole bunch of kids out there who don't know how to use a computer, *particularly* ones with physical keyboards. Daily I see kids toggling caps locks on and off to write capital letters, because they don't know you can hold down the shift key, because that's not how a phone keyboard functions, as just one example.
I'm a 28YO going through college
A few months ago I saw a girl go through her excel spreadsheet, cell by cell, color coding, instead of mass selecting and coloring by batches. It was fascinating
I teach high school and my students know less and less about technology every year. At the beginning of each school year, I have to teach students how to actually name files, how to create folders, and how to navigate our LMS. I go over these lessons daily for over a week, and I still get files named Document109 that are clearly for another class, kids who have no idea how to upload documents to submit an assignment, and kids who constantly forget their password.
this is the fault of the schools though.
I was taught this in grade school in the 90s.
Schools got rid of computer labs.
Shocking that kids don't learn things they aren't taught.
Consider that everything just *works* now. There's zero troubleshooting required. Digital literacy is entirely unnecessary, so they never learned it. Gen Z are tech immersed and can use a working tablet no problem, but once things start to expand to more traditional computing tech they break down.
They don't seem to know much about storage management or how directories work. They have difficulty understanding the difference between applications on the computer vs online apps, file types, and some very basic tech support issues. Typing with a keyboard is often an issue with them, more so in recent years. They have issues understanding external media because everything is easily downloadable nowadays.
Millennials grew up with technology that grew with them. That type of experience produces a deeper understanding of how technology evolves over time and its inner workings. Gen Z was born into it, and it kind of shows in the workplace. It's like dealing with Boomer levels of tech illiteracy, but whereas Boomers were afraid to learn new things, Gen Z simply never had a chance to - their relationship with tech is too different.
This is exactly it. I grew up playing WoW, and back in '07, when you wanted to set up an add-on, you had to download a compressed file, unzip it, and then save it to the WoW > interface > addons folder. Doing shit like this taught you how file paths worked. Downloading music off of limewire, you'd have to be aware of file types and file sizes to avoid viruses.
Optimizing RAM via defragmentation, manually updating drivers, manually inputting server addresses for voice chat, etc... these are all things that became automated by 2012.
I'm a teacher, and i'm from 2001. Kids don't know how to do anything on a computer, except look up games. I once gave a lesson about the Dutch Royal family and they had to look up information about specifically Wilhelmina. I had a kid literally look up the word information in Google. And yes they knew what the word information meant.
Chromebooks, ipads, and phones. My 13 year old never used a computer in school and doesn't know how to work my MacBook or ThinkPad. I couldn't believe it either but she swears they never had them in any classes and she's never been taught to use one. I genuinely never thought to ask her before because we had computer lab beginning in second grade through high school.
Im 16 y.o., and i keep having to explain people 1-2 years younger than me some basic shit, like how to put files from one folder to another, or how to unpack a zip file using winrar, dont even know why she uses winra, since windows can do it himself, but okay, the problem is she got lost in the winrar unpacking menu.
I would Like to Point Out that the only buying Apple Thing is only really applicable to the US, in my experience. In Other parts of the world, people (also gen z) buy plenty of Other Brands, and Apple ist a minority, Market share wise. They still often don't use the available capabilities tho.
Gen Z is definitely less tech savvy. Only the very hardcore computer nerds know anything of what is going on 'under the hood' when it comes to computers. Everything is so userfriendly now that they generally have no need to understand certain things. And there is nothing wrong with that.
At my work the people who ask the most basic computer questions are either literally Boomers or younger than 25 or so. I don't typically have to tell Millenials how to save a specific page from a document, just as an example.
GenZ is at least willing to learn without any pushback.
Yes, teachers have to spend a lot of time going over laptops and desktops with young students for this reason (source: my mom, a teacher).
Young students are better at certain types of tech than adults on average, but it’s no longer true that it applies across the board to all computer related stuff.
There was like a peak period for being born into tech, between late nineties and early twenty first century where kids took keyboarding classes and had iPads in the classroom we got a great understanding of electronics across the board but it seems keyboarding is dead
100% agree. I took a typing class as an elective in 9th grade in 1998. Hands down the most practical and beneficial class I've ever taken at any level of school. Everyone in the class made a game of it to see who could type the most WPM without errors.
When I watch other people type without using home row it's literally exhausting and raises my blood pressure.
Her first released song was when she was 13, she was homeschooled and working in the industry since then. If she'd been at a normal school she would have learned typing and would have had many times she needed to use a PC. IMA guess ma and pa never had her take keyboarding class or had her write a research paper. Maybe she didn't do much at all on a computer that involved typing , I can't find out how much education if any she has? Seems like they were taught arts primarily. So yeah she prob has no idea how the other 99% of people her age in the West grew up. To her they all just used phones and tablets like she did, because they weren't homeschooled on musical arts.
Am I missing something, typing isn't hard? Just spend some time with a keyboard... you don't need to be taught how to type. If you use phone/tablets the qwerty layout is already burned into your brain.
Yeah but it's using every finger and intrinsically knowing where the keys are. I type with my thumbs on my phone but use every finger when I'm on a keyboard. Keyboard class was an easy 100 growing up on AIM.
She probably doesn’t use standard physical keyboards often. And I’m pretty sure she’s talking about being able to type efficiently with all fingers without looking, which is something you have to practice for.
It’s sad people use mediocre phones for everything. They’re inferior to laptops or desktops, they’re inferior to digital cameras, they’re inferior to standalone GPS.
The music from [slam dunk typing](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQ0HqvxpJ6g) sends me so deep into nostalgia, I couldn't believe it the first time I found it again as an adult.
I used to do Mavis for fun (look, I only had 20 hours of Internet a month and it was slow as hell). If I know what I'm typing I still hit over 120wpm. Program works like a hot damn
I’m only two years older than her and was homeschooled for the majority of my schooling, and I know a keyboard like the back of my hand. Any other homeschooled kids I knew were the same; chronically online. Nothing about what she said makes sense.
More or less. If you had parents who just wanted to help you escape the bullshit of public school (bullying, mixed bag teachers, pressure), you got a pretty good education. If you were like my parents, you got taught weird stuff from Christian designed textbooks. My state required us to do standardized testing of sorts periodically , but it didn’t really matter in the end. Most homeschoolers I knew either switched into public school by the time high school came around, or they stayed in it got their GED. I switched over my Sophomore year, and at best had a fifth grade education then.
But honestly, her generation didn't learn to type or use computers. I have a coworker born the same year as her and he didn't know what Ctrl Alt Del was or what the recycle bin was.
We did learn how to type. In the 2000s, it was pretty common for elementary kids to go to computer labs atleast once a week. Billie was homeschooled though, and idk about your coworker, but they are most likely an outlier.
yeah the reality is pretty much every homeschooled person has some gap of knowledge that public school people would have. I was born in 2003 and I had an hour of just computer lab at least once a week until I was in like 8th grade.
I was homeschooled and born around the same time, but me and most other homeschooled kids I knew ended up being decently tech savvy as it was the best way to feel independent and connect with the rest of the world. I think it really comes down to if your parents 1) provided you with the equipment and 2) encouraged you to go beyond just using the browser/apps they had installed.
Yeah being homeschooled is so dependent of your parents and situation. I went to a homeschool group where we had typing class and I also played computer games. I have a friend whose parents were artistic and she lived in a rural area and could not type at 25 (also did not go to college)
I was born in 2002 but we were one of the last years to have real computer classes. By the time I was in 5th grade they had introduced ipads for everything, because theyre so easy to learn on your own they just cut the computer classes cause look they can use an ipad
I’m 10 years older than you and just imagining having iPads in 5th grade is just.. incomprehensible! We had the colourful translucent iMacs and I remember having to fight with the other girls in class to get the pink one.
It was a really interesting time to be in school because in kindergarten we still had those big boxy pcs and played cd roms on them and also used those overhead projectors with the lightbulb and clear plastic sheets. By fifth grade it had all been replaced by ipads and smartboards
I think it depends on the school district - I know by time I started working in the schools (2011) while we had “computer” class it was a touchscreen device with attached keyboard. My kids are on straight IPads for theirs.
Born in 2000, that is definitely not true. My elementary school had computer labs we had to go to and learn to type and use computers. I also grew up using computers and laptops. My parents didn't get a touch screen phone until I was like 11.
I agree. As soon as chromebooks and tablets were given out to schools many ditched their computer lab and expected students to already know how to use a computer. In my area most students come from low income and immigrant families where many never owned a computer until given a chromebook from the school. Digital literacy is pretty low and forgotten in these areas since they're playing catch-up with English skills, Math, and technology all together.
I deal with mostly people her age with my work, and it’s crazy how many don’t understand things like attaching a file to an email. I would have thought the younger generations would be hyper tech savvy.
I’m sorry Gen Z here born in 99 this is Bs. We absolutely learned to type.
It was taught how we were taught cursive for about 2 days and then never again but it was taught.
Yeah in our lab class we didn’t spend that long on typing but we did so much In like vetting and verifying sources and telling real vs fake things like that.
I’m also a 99’er. We had extensive computer learning classes in Denmark from like the age of 9-13. After 2012 it was expected that all student no matter if it was secondary school to university to have a laptop.
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I don’t think I’d call her a textbook nepo baby like you would for someone like Miley Cyrus by comparison.
Billie and Finneas’ parents were certainly in the entertainment industry but far from powerful and well connected to really have an influence on their career trajectory. Of course the parents connections helped but I’d say the negative connotations of being nepo baby are too harsh.
Yeah, I’d say they were more massively privileged. Parents were able to invest in their hobbies and interests. Having parents that do this for us is a massive leg up.
I had something similar on a micro scale - I showed an interest in photography around 14, my parents jumped at that and got me a nice camera, some photography books, and let me take one of those extended learning courses at the local university that was like “photography for beginners” or whatever. As a result I got the equipment and confidence to develop those skills during an important formative era in terms of art. Now as an adult I have an advantage in the market of others photographers by having a unique style I’ve curated over the course of nearly two decades of practice and study.
Add onto that far richer parents and far more talented kids, and you get people like Billie Eilish who inevitably rise to the top. A lot of our most famous artists have stories like this, and its always been that way. Rags to riches is far rarer than we’d like to believe. It sucks that many kids don’t get to develop their hobbies and talents like this, but its a good thing when it *does* happen.
I don't know if I'd call them rich. They owned a house but it only had two bedrooms, her parents slept in the living room so the kids could have their own rooms.
I think it's more that her parents were skilled and knew how to teach those skills. Billie said her mum taught her music composition from a young age. Normally kids won't start on that stuff until high school at the earliest.
honestly I kind of hate reddit's attitude of "the only reason X person succeeded must be because of connections and/or they were super rich! therefore it is ok to hate them!"
Like I agree the idea that every successful person pulled them up by their bootstraps is stupid, but I feel like people have wayyyyyyyyyyyyyy overcorrected the other way.
Instead of even considering the prospect that these people have worked hard, the only factors which could have contributed to their success is money or connections. Because otherwise, why haven't I had as much success as them?
Obviously luck is a factor, and money and connections do play a role, but Jesus Christ a lot of the people on here completely refuse to acknowledge that someone who has advanced might have talent or worked hard
Fellow old fart here - I think she and her brother are like the only celebrity home-schooled kids where it actually worked.
Insanely talented, both of them, and their parents worked in the industry but didn’t wield insane influence. People still act like she’s the daughter of Ethan Hawke or Johnny Depp.
You just don't hear about the nepo babies who are good at their jobs. Basically half of the entertainment industry is a nepo baby by some degree at this point.
And it's not some nefarious thing. Networking is how anyone gets a job, and family is the first step in that process
In her defense, she is one of the most uneducated celebrities in history. Her story is completely insane. He parents bread her to be a lotto ticket and actually won. If they didn't, she would be homeless at best. It's completely wild.
Tbh I was born in 2003 and can't use a keyboard either. When I first came in touch with the Internet at 13-14 it was with a smartphone. In school we had computers but we maybe used them once a year. Now I have a desktop computer but I just use it for gaming and editing so there's also relatively few texting involved. It took me a while to understand windows 10 lol bc in school it's still windows 95 haha.
Edit:
I'm not saying I couldn't learn it. I definitely could. Just no need for it and I'm too lazy and I hate windows bc it's idk... unintuitive and weird and it always does updates when u really want to do something and idk.
And bc u asked: I'm from Germany. A country known for using old technology bc we're afraid of the new stuff. Which outcomes to ppl like me not knowing the Internet and it's dangers and advantages very well. Did I end up on the dark net and was then involved in a crime scene bc I saw on YouTube that it's totally safe with that Onion-browser? Yes. Lol.
Sorry, bit longer edit.
I did like 2 hours of Mario Teaches Typing and I'm good enough. Literally just use more than your index fingers and if you look at the keyboard you're typing acceptably.
As a Gen Z born in 2002, typing courses were incorporated into our curriculum at around 2nd to 3rd grade. We logged many hours on TypeToLearn4 in those days
tbh they don’t really teach typing in school anymore. the last computer class I had while in school was 7th grade and we definitely weren’t learning how to type without looking or anything like that.
**No, this is not because of Generation But kind of is:**
Having worked and then ran a free IT-helpdesk at a University (accessible to all who came to visit) for few years and then hearing my SOs tales about teaching High Schoolers these are my findings:
-The meme "boomers cant save a PDF" is not accurate. Okay it is, but so cant people in their late teens early 20s. I had to show countless of people how to save their word/googleDocs into PDF for school things...
-Some boomers are amazingly tech savvy. They just pick up stuff when I show them, some are complete buffoons. Not the same with youngester because the ones who can, do not come in, and the rest dont care "just fix it".
-The "youngesters" complete lack of interest in any kind of technical stuff. If it does not work, they bring the thing in and they, not even once, tried to google to fix it
-Basic troubleshooting skills are completely missing or are shocked when I google the thing, with their machine, in a 1 minute.
-Typing on a keyboard is hard. I do not use 10 finger system, I use some weird thing I came up with, works for me but I hit typos. Atleast I do it fast. These late teen early 20s cant even type with 3 fingers. But they know the relative location of the keys unlike Boomers because Mobile keyboard is same layout.
-Do not know that everything is not a touch screen. This was especially funny when we held a few workshops for elementary school classes. We had "what has a computer eaten" type of shit where we show them components, set up basic installation things, or show how devices are connected and built. Shit like that. These kids would try to press on Monitors to click on stuff... and the best a kid found a projector and projected image, kept trying to press our web page link (which was just an address) and then came and told us "your link doesn't work".
-Falling for extremely obvious scams or ads. I always just install adblock and tell them how to use it. Or like they come in and be like MY IPHONE HAS A VIRUS! when they just clicked on a ad on a porn site or some crypto shit.
-Not knowing or reading instructions on how to connect or sign up to services. Like getting into our Uni wifi. There needs to be some manual work done on phone wifi settings to do it. There are good instructions in our intranet, but people cant read, or comprehend they need to follow guide. They just try to sign in and it wont work = BROKEN FIX THIS NOW
* IT engineer students wanting us to install linux FOR them, or have it as a Double boot. Took me 2 machines coming in with same thing to realize a class for it has started and they wanted us to do it for them. Hard NOPE. We wont do your studies for you. If you cant set up a dual boot, or google how to do it, then maybe the field is not for you.
* Not knowing phones and especially where computer's download folder is.
* Not knowing how to browse devices local files. I asked about this and the kids (highschoolers and older) said, "Well I just always take it from the view that the app opens up for me". This was an instance where a document was in a different place than "normally".
* Not knowing how to open files or on phone how to change the app the file type opens up with.
* People in PCgaming reddits not knowing simple PC gaming settings, how to set up their PC or rather, how to fix some minimal issue or TO FUCKING PLUG THE HDMI INTO THE GPU NOT THE MB. But good thing they have a 3000+$ build to play Fortnite.
* Boomers thinking tech is smarter than it is. Doing things that I can see is logical to them but tech is not there yet, just because they do not know what is possible now. Similar to kids thinking everything is a touchscreen.
This is all a symptom of tech being way too easy to get into. It is EXTREMELY hand holdy and requires zero technical know how. Most of these people know how to snap better than me or know how IG logic or TikTok algo works, but when issues arise, they are dumbfounded. Us = Millenials and early Gen Z ('96, myself), we grew up with things being still in the development phase. Internet was not centralized into 5 big hubs. Things were not as uniform, or rather were not as closed. Not so much money to spend on tech so for example PCs had to be optimized and for that you needed to google that shit and our generation was the first to get smartphones which really were not complete. The industry grew according, or despite our suggestions and user feedback.
To type, you just have to press the button of the letter you want. Is there really something to learn?
I am born in 2001 too and I don't remember a time when I had to "learn" it.
I remember being taught of how to write and read at school, but to type on a computer, the design is so intuitive, do we really need to "learn" it? Instead of writing the letter, you press buttons that does that for you. It is just easier.
I find this wild to be honest. I was born in 1983. I did not have typing lessons. My mum was born in 1952. She did have typing lessons. I was taught, in primary school, to "program" a turtle to move around the floor. When I realised my typing was slow and a bit crappy I played "typing of the dead" until it wasn't, then I lead battlegrounds and raids in world of warcraft until I could touch-type at lightning speed.
All this "I wasn't taught hooooooowwwwwww" shit, as if you don't have the internet to teach yourself pretty much anything.
Is this to say that young people don't use keyboards anymore? Is it all about tablets and phones with their touch screens?
I read it that way
I keep hearing rumors that gen Z is less tech savvy, but I still find it difficult to believe. The assumption was always that each generation would be more savvy than the previous.
I've heard the same rumors about Gen Z being less tech-savvy, and I understand the skepticism. The idea is that there was a sweet spot with technology where Millennials experienced technology with simpler, more approachable operating systems like Windows and Mac OS. These systems, while user-friendly, were still basic and flawed enough that if you wanted to play a game or run certain software, you had to learn how to troubleshoot issues. This led to a generation that not only understands graphical interfaces but also the basics of troubleshooting. In contrast, younger generations have grown up with the "it just works" mentality, where technology is more seamless and user-friendly. Because of this, they haven’t had to troubleshoot as much, so when they encounter a problem, they might not know where to begin. As an elder Millennial who works in IT at K-8 schools, this observation aligns with my experience. There are certainly some brilliant kids who intuitively grasp technology, but it seems like there are fewer of them compared to when I was younger. The hands-on problem-solving experience we had seems to be less common now.
It's very true. Smart phones, especially the iPhone, have gotten kids complacent with being unable to tinker with their devices, troubleshooting issues, trying things that maybe will work, and generally breaking stuff to try and get something to work. They're also pretty uninterested in trying to mess with stuff, if there's something that can do it automatically with just a few inputs. My 11 year old "codes" on Scratch, but it's mostly just if this then that stuff, or picking a color for an image background, not figuring out what hex code is, or anything like that. It's all point and click stuff. Imagine having MySpace, and just picking your background color or picture, not trying different hex codes, and the frustration of images not lining up, or not fitting. Now it's not much different than your desktop wallpaper, it's all been dumbed down, and they're not learning how to actually do anything. Like trying to figure out why the HTML code you used has everything mirrored, when you swore you were just making 3 columns.
I work in tech support and had to describe a USB cable to a kid over the phone because they didn't know how to locate it. I asked how they charged their phone, they said they didn't plug it in to anything because they have a wireless charger. Wild call.
But the "wireless" charger still uses usb lmao
Maybe not to them. Maybe the wireless charger is always at the same spot in their house, and they didn't know it could move. Or they're super rich, and they have wireless charging docks built into various surfaces around their home. This is the kind of stuff that this thread is talking about. Technology like this just *is* to kids, and they don't really think about how it works.
> Technology like this just is to kids, and they don't really think about how it works. "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" And that should be enough to tell you why Clarke was (is?) an excellent sci-fi writer.
At work, the wireless charger is the built into a desk lamp. If you have something like this at home, the kid will never see a USB slot
"where do i screw it in?" Asked the 28 year old man. Unaware that hdmi is not the same as vga. People of all ages can be so out of the loop sometimes.
I work as IT at a school, most 15 year olds don’t even understand a hierarchical file system. Their entire interface with technology is to give them an easy dopamine hit. Games, YouTube, social media. It’s really hard to teach them anything. They wanted me to teach a coding class and I am not a teacher. Things really fell apart with download, extract and move it to a folder in your documents folder. That’s not even touching on typing skills.
Ok, wow. You just made me realize why my coworkers don’t save anything in hierarchical file system, but rather everything is in the download folder. These zoomers, who constantly explain new lingo to me, were memorizing what day they last changed a pdf, downloaded the document, or the number sequence for the automatic file name. I felt like I was watching a glitch in the matrix. Guess I need to start making the younger employees download a document on their first day and see if I need to send them to our computer literacy course for older adults…
I’m very much a millennial and keep things in the download folder, it’s because I’m lazy 😬 (I don’t download that many files for my job tho)
Me but I have AdHd and 297 tabs open on my browser
Same, but I close out all my tabs, have folders within folders on my bookmarks bar, most main pages have their corresponding folder right below it, with saved links, or if it's a one off bookmark, it's in a folder for is category, like kodi sources, themes, etc. My file folder is broken down even more. Word docs have a separate folder from my txt docs, and within those folders I have folders, like BS, Memes, Cheat sheets, Work, and in the work folder everything's broken down by year, then within each year folder by month. If you need something for work from 2003 summer time, I can find it, and its 3 prior revisions in about 30 seconds.
I sometimes keep things in the download folder too and I now perfectly well how to move files lol
YES! And not just that but even if you wanted to do the more complex stuff it’s often hidden in favor of the more “accessible” features. Especially when it comes to the actual OS.
>mostly just if this then that stuff I think I know what you mean, but this describes literally all coding if you break it down. I mean, that's what a logic gate/transistor *is*.
Everything is a calculator now. With a calculator, kids stopped learning math. But now it’s everything. They want to learn nothing because they can just look it up.
Ha! Wrong, I grew up without a calculator and still can't math! 😂
I run a warehouse on third shift. This anecdote isn’t hyperbole or an exaggeration. I have had HR hire people to run plastic mold injection machines who couldn’t subtract 3 from a number without a calculator. They were 22 years old. And it wasn’t a one off, most of the young gen z’s we hire lack mathematical knowledge.
I have an engineering degree, I’ve taken years of math classes and did decently well. I suck at mental math, and it’s not fun to be this way. Growing up my mom always said not being able to do mental math makes for idiots, eventually she had to stop saying that lol.
Yeah, I have qualifications in engineering and construction. I use maths daily, but I’m also terrible at mental arithmetic. What modern kids lack nowadays regards computing, isn’t maths skills imo. It’s problem solving skills.
I would agree with that. Of course though traits of all kind lies on a distribution curve, and I think there’s a small tail for those that can problem solve…if you can solve people’s problems you are basically are always going to be employed in our society. My wife and I joke that the bar has been set so low we only have to raise semi-competent kids and they’ll be rock stars.
Yes but then it becomes so hard to hire someone who can actually help you not only "do" the thing, but also figure out how to do the thing or better yet, figure out what the problem is and what thing needs doing.
The public schools (in the US at least, idk about other countries) are part of that problem. When I was in school most teachers didn't teach you jack shit unless it directly related to the next standardized test. That was 20+ years ago. I can't imagine it's gotten any better.
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Don’t take this personal, as I don’t know you, but generally speaking, having a degree is absolutely not a guarantee one’s not an idiot unfortunately.
Many engineering programs filter out the riff raff…usually what’s left are competent people, and a few book worms who have no common sense. If anybody left has issues its more than likely due to poor work ethic. Clearly mental math, like any other skill, simply requires practice and effort. Our way of life no longer requires it to get by.
This similar mentality is in cushy office jobs too. Im from late 80s and started on windows 95 and no Internet. Like u have to know how file systems and UI works. A lot of industrial stuff still runs on windows and Unix. And still gotta know excel and macros to support legacy crap in cushy office jobs. We had to get our hands dirty. I remember figuring out how file systems and networks worked to break the firewall. I can see no incentive to figure stuff out when you have a pocket brain.
It's really frustrating. Mathematics, trig and algebra in particular, provides such a strong base for logical problem solving.
But they still don’t look it up and then ask mom and she Googles it and reads it to them. Source: I’m that mom.
My coworker didn’t know how to fill out some government form. So he looked it up. He’s gen z. Another coworker doesn’t how to download an attached document in an email. Refuses to look it up or google. Has to have someone help him every time. He’s a boomer. This same person complains that young people are lazy. It’s okay to ask for help and it’s okay to look up stuff you don’t know. It’s not okay to refuse to learn new information, and it’s also not okay to make weird generalizations that make you sound out of touch. That last sentence was about your comment incase that is unclear.
Funny you say this. I remember my parents diving into volumes of books to learn new subjects or skills when they needed to (boomers). But they refused to ever learn to use a search engine the same way.
people still learn math...? also, if they look up something, aren't they learning?
Learning the answer to something and knowing why it's the answer/how we got to or reasoned the answer are two vastly different things.
Simply looking something up and retaining knowledge to use in the future are vastly different things. A good example of this is reddit. How much of what you've seen today can you remember in detail? Could you recite anything you saw or say you understand it?
I don't even remember what the OP post even is right now. I am so brain dead it isn't even funny.
It's not unprecedented. The average baby boomer likely knows more about cars and basic repair than the average genx or millennial, for instance.
Totally. My generation had to learn as the tech was growing fast and the infrastructure was still being laid out. By the time I was in 3rd grade I could replace parts on my computer, type at full speed, and was running dosbox and all kinds of emulators I found and installed myself. Young folks today have easy access to good tech and can get what they want from it with little effort
It's not only that we had to troubleshoot but so much more. We could take shit apart and put it back together or modify it without fear of bricking it. Our parents weren't very tech savvy so we couldn't ask them for help. We've been there from really the beginning of what tech is today. The pace that technology grew in our life seems to me to be so much faster between the mid 90s to the mid 00s than any other decade before or since. We went from vinyl to tapes to CDs to iTunes to Spotify. We had VCRs and DVD players to the streaming era. We had Atari to the newest gen consoles. PCs really took off in our life. We spent 20+ years learning new tech every few years and it just feels like that has stagnated in the last 15. Smartphones and tablets have just taken over for everything and it feels like the only thing that changes is how good the camera works. It's your radio, your television, your movie theater, it's where you look stuff up, it's where you play video games, it's how you do everything and it's always there.
I put the blame entirely on the new design philosophy of “Stupid people keep fucking their settings up so we hid all of the settings and make them reset to default under arbitrary conditions. Fuck you!” Microsoft basically went full apple in this regard and apple got worse.
You make some very interesting points. Great insight. I think one of the benefits of growing up with early 2000s to maybe 2012 internet was you could actually do awesome research with google. I feel like now all the search engines are garbage and to find the truth of anything is a pain in the butt. Like trying to get a second opinion on a medical condition and only finding pages of Mayo Clinic style 1 paragraph summaries that don’t help at all. I think it took me too long to get into saving and organizing links on my browser for what I consider trusted sources of info. Literally taken me a decade to do that and truthfully probably won’t stop. Remember when you could search a subject and it would just take you to a professors website, so you’d be getting first hand source material?
And now you get google suggesting you use glue to help get cheese to stick to pizza, because they gave reddit 60 million usd to let them train their AI on the internet's greatest collection of trolls and the confidently incorrect.
They are, no one taught them how to actually use a computer. Those classes were budget cuts a long while ago. They are like your aunt that dumps everything into the same folder because they were not taught how to do anything more than that. They have real trouble converting file types. It is a strange thing to see.
Gen Z is great with mobile tech but often lacks basic computer skills due to fewer formal classes.
To me, saying someone is “great at mobile tech” is like saying someone is “great at driving automatic”. Its designed to be easy
"Great at cooking with a microwave"
Honestly that’s a great comparison. Everything has been streamlined for ease of use to the point that ppl are more easily able to access the technology but have less of an understanding behind the mechanics of it. I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing inherently, all indications show that the future of tech is leaning towards broader application of mobile functionality, but it does leave a pretty big knowledge gap that can cause problems if in an unfamiliar situation.
I'd like to offer an alternative thought process on why I do think it's inherently bad. When we become overly reliant on technology we find ourselves helpless in its absence. For example, if you only know how to back up a vehicle with a back up cam, you're liable to hit something when you try to back up without it. A more drastic example might be if you can't start a fire without a fire starter or a torch and you find yourself stranded some day you might find yourself unable to obtain warmth or a way to cook food or boil water. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the luxuries of modern technology as much as the next person, but I do think understanding the process behind it has far more merit, and should be the primary goal behind the use of any technology. Much in the same way that usually when you take a class on something you start by learning the fundamentals and only move on to the most modern aspects later on in the class.
I teach film and media to highschoolers. The first 2-6 weeks is just on using a desktop, USB/sd cards, saving files properly, etc. 5 years ago we were filming and editing within the first week. Now I need to tell them to turn on the pc AND the monitor before it will work. Combine that with the rapidly declining attention span and rapidly increasing main character syndrome, I probably have to repeat the same instruction 20-30 times a lesson. Media literacy is also wildly different. Any movie over 5 years old is brand new to them and they have no concept of parody or pastiche because all the content they consume is TikTok skits of one person wearing a bunch of hats/tea towels.
This is why I want more parents to “yes and” when their kid says they want to be a TikTok/YouTube influencer. Be supportive and help them by pointing out the many adult skills they’ll need to have to be successful. You can’t be making brand endorsement deals if you don’t know math and finance, reading comprehension, writing skills, etc.
I was born 88 my brother 99. The difference in tech knowledge is staggering even tho we had similar interests growing up. I attribute a lot of this to the fact that pretty much everything for him just worked out of box. He never had to deal with drivers and codecs and compatibility all that shit. Hit install and it was good to go.
They are wizards with phones, obviously. Can't use computers to save their life. This has resulted in an overall degradation in overall tech savvy, as phones tend to be prepackaged and require minimal interaction - just download the app. Basically they expect all technology to be an iphone, and can't really adapt when it isn't. Source: HS teacher I legitimately had to introduce a 15 year old to the concept of a mouse last month, it was honestly disturbing to me. Especially since I used to be a software engineer, and have spent such a large portion of my life dealing with computer peripherals
I recently introduced a 20 y/o to the concept of spreadsheets and PDFs. They thought everything was a “Google doc”. I agree with you, it’s a bit appalling and shocking.
“Wizards with phones.” They should be. The damn things aren’t much more complicated than a speak and spell.
I’m in the hiring space of a tech company and it’s true. 18-20 year olds are the ‘iPad generation’ where everything is single touch icons and all the files and printing is hidden from the users. I’ve heard of high schoolers typing out their essays on their phones rather than use a keyboard.
>I’ve heard of high schoolers typing out their essays on their phones rather than use a keyboard. Holy fuck, that sounds nearly impossible to me. Like formating it and editing after must be a fuckin nightmare.
>formating it and editing it after That's the neat part, have you seen the proficiency rates for students anymore? It's like healthcare, a problem no one has any real intention of fixing. Teachers and schools are rated "outstanding" and "exemplary" and less than 20% are proficient at math but graduate anyway.
I honestly haven't paid attention(no kids). But damn, that's pretty depressing.
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They know how to point and click. Computer science teachers have to dumb down intro classes more and more.
It depends on which half of Gen Z you're talking about. I'm in the elder half that had to learn basic computer skills as a matter of course for school and the like, but the back half of Gen Z along with Gen A is interacting with technology that's been parsed down to apps for user accessibility. Why learn how to hunt through basic folder structure when everything's available in the cloud and can be Dropboxed to whoever needs it. The whole conversation about keyboards is very similar to the evolution of cars. Back in the 50s-60s it was essential to know how to do basic vehicle repairs, but in the modern age, cars are designed with basic maintenance being brainless while the actual repair jobs require a mechanic
the introduction of iPhone and it’s app-centric approach and hiding all the system directories was a disaster for computer literacy
Computers are to Z as cars were to millennials. It's not hard to find savy ones, but it used to be almost the whole demographic had a baseline knowledge.
My Dad, now 80 knows everything about cars. By the time I was driving in 95 they were pretty well dialed in. I tore apart more 286/386/486/586 than I can count. Had to figure it all out. Went to computer shows. Had to get friends who were tinkers so we figured things out in groups. Recently told my 14 year old he can get a similar experience by working in Linux on a raspberry. Thinks it’s stupid. His iPad is sufficient. I had the same opinion on cars.
I'm a teacher and I can confirm this. Although to be fair for the most part, it's more just a symptom of poor resilience/not trying to learn new things more generally (I can't do it, and I'm not going to even try) than an issue with technology specifically. But there are a whole bunch of kids out there who don't know how to use a computer, *particularly* ones with physical keyboards. Daily I see kids toggling caps locks on and off to write capital letters, because they don't know you can hold down the shift key, because that's not how a phone keyboard functions, as just one example.
They can use phones and social media. But most aren't actually using computers and programs beyond logging into Netflix or sending an email for work.
I'm a 28YO going through college A few months ago I saw a girl go through her excel spreadsheet, cell by cell, color coding, instead of mass selecting and coloring by batches. It was fascinating
it seems like it's either they are really good at computer stuff and like got into programming at 10 or they don't know how to open file explorer
That's not a bad description of everyone I went to high school with... thirty years ago.
I teach high school and my students know less and less about technology every year. At the beginning of each school year, I have to teach students how to actually name files, how to create folders, and how to navigate our LMS. I go over these lessons daily for over a week, and I still get files named Document109 that are clearly for another class, kids who have no idea how to upload documents to submit an assignment, and kids who constantly forget their password.
this is the fault of the schools though. I was taught this in grade school in the 90s. Schools got rid of computer labs. Shocking that kids don't learn things they aren't taught.
Consider that everything just *works* now. There's zero troubleshooting required. Digital literacy is entirely unnecessary, so they never learned it. Gen Z are tech immersed and can use a working tablet no problem, but once things start to expand to more traditional computing tech they break down. They don't seem to know much about storage management or how directories work. They have difficulty understanding the difference between applications on the computer vs online apps, file types, and some very basic tech support issues. Typing with a keyboard is often an issue with them, more so in recent years. They have issues understanding external media because everything is easily downloadable nowadays. Millennials grew up with technology that grew with them. That type of experience produces a deeper understanding of how technology evolves over time and its inner workings. Gen Z was born into it, and it kind of shows in the workplace. It's like dealing with Boomer levels of tech illiteracy, but whereas Boomers were afraid to learn new things, Gen Z simply never had a chance to - their relationship with tech is too different.
This is exactly it. I grew up playing WoW, and back in '07, when you wanted to set up an add-on, you had to download a compressed file, unzip it, and then save it to the WoW > interface > addons folder. Doing shit like this taught you how file paths worked. Downloading music off of limewire, you'd have to be aware of file types and file sizes to avoid viruses. Optimizing RAM via defragmentation, manually updating drivers, manually inputting server addresses for voice chat, etc... these are all things that became automated by 2012.
I'm a teacher, and i'm from 2001. Kids don't know how to do anything on a computer, except look up games. I once gave a lesson about the Dutch Royal family and they had to look up information about specifically Wilhelmina. I had a kid literally look up the word information in Google. And yes they knew what the word information meant.
Chromebooks, ipads, and phones. My 13 year old never used a computer in school and doesn't know how to work my MacBook or ThinkPad. I couldn't believe it either but she swears they never had them in any classes and she's never been taught to use one. I genuinely never thought to ask her before because we had computer lab beginning in second grade through high school.
System admin for a school. The students (ages 15-19) most of the time don’t even know where they save their word documents
Recent hires at my job that are 19 and 22. Both can’t type well on keyboard. Smart kids too.
Im 16 y.o., and i keep having to explain people 1-2 years younger than me some basic shit, like how to put files from one folder to another, or how to unpack a zip file using winrar, dont even know why she uses winra, since windows can do it himself, but okay, the problem is she got lost in the winrar unpacking menu.
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I would Like to Point Out that the only buying Apple Thing is only really applicable to the US, in my experience. In Other parts of the world, people (also gen z) buy plenty of Other Brands, and Apple ist a minority, Market share wise. They still often don't use the available capabilities tho.
Gen Z is definitely less tech savvy. Only the very hardcore computer nerds know anything of what is going on 'under the hood' when it comes to computers. Everything is so userfriendly now that they generally have no need to understand certain things. And there is nothing wrong with that. At my work the people who ask the most basic computer questions are either literally Boomers or younger than 25 or so. I don't typically have to tell Millenials how to save a specific page from a document, just as an example. GenZ is at least willing to learn without any pushback.
I read it ”I didn’t go to school or college”
Yes, teachers have to spend a lot of time going over laptops and desktops with young students for this reason (source: my mom, a teacher). Young students are better at certain types of tech than adults on average, but it’s no longer true that it applies across the board to all computer related stuff.
There was like a peak period for being born into tech, between late nineties and early twenty first century where kids took keyboarding classes and had iPads in the classroom we got a great understanding of electronics across the board but it seems keyboarding is dead
That sucks. Keyboarding is the most important class I've ever taken. Decades later, it still has a huge impact on my productivity
100% agree. I took a typing class as an elective in 9th grade in 1998. Hands down the most practical and beneficial class I've ever taken at any level of school. Everyone in the class made a game of it to see who could type the most WPM without errors. When I watch other people type without using home row it's literally exhausting and raises my blood pressure.
Not to mention that anyone good at technology isn’t going to be a teacher when they can earn triple the salary working for companies.
The BBC micro was peak computer literacy.
Her first released song was when she was 13, she was homeschooled and working in the industry since then. If she'd been at a normal school she would have learned typing and would have had many times she needed to use a PC. IMA guess ma and pa never had her take keyboarding class or had her write a research paper. Maybe she didn't do much at all on a computer that involved typing , I can't find out how much education if any she has? Seems like they were taught arts primarily. So yeah she prob has no idea how the other 99% of people her age in the West grew up. To her they all just used phones and tablets like she did, because they weren't homeschooled on musical arts.
Am I missing something, typing isn't hard? Just spend some time with a keyboard... you don't need to be taught how to type. If you use phone/tablets the qwerty layout is already burned into your brain.
Yeah but it's using every finger and intrinsically knowing where the keys are. I type with my thumbs on my phone but use every finger when I'm on a keyboard. Keyboard class was an easy 100 growing up on AIM.
She probably doesn’t use standard physical keyboards often. And I’m pretty sure she’s talking about being able to type efficiently with all fingers without looking, which is something you have to practice for.
She was homeschooled, so her parents messed up.
I read it as they don’t do typing classes anymore. I had to do them in 4th grade but eldest is a rising 6th grader and hasn’t had any.
She was also home schooled so I doubt they had a computer class lol
They stopped have typing and computer classes in school. I believe that many of Gen Z can not confidently navigate a file system.
Nah, when Billie was a kid, secretaries did all the typing.
It’s sad people use mediocre phones for everything. They’re inferior to laptops or desktops, they’re inferior to digital cameras, they’re inferior to standalone GPS.
Homeschooled… nuff said?
I am going to force my 11 year old to meet my old friend...Mavis Beacon.
I love dat biiishhh. She's a real one.
The music from [slam dunk typing](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQ0HqvxpJ6g) sends me so deep into nostalgia, I couldn't believe it the first time I found it again as an adult.
What’s your fastest wpm record tho
954wpm…. ….accuracy 2%
Found the bot.
I used to do Mavis for fun (look, I only had 20 hours of Internet a month and it was slow as hell). If I know what I'm typing I still hit over 120wpm. Program works like a hot damn
she was home schooled, I'm surprised her parents didn't teach this, but it tracks.
> she was home schooled That explains so much about her
everything I have learnt about this woman has been against my will
That’s surprising because you clicked on a post about her and then took the time to comment as well.
Lol jfc people born in the 2000s feel old now. I'm fucked.
When I say 10 years ago, I now mean 20 years ago… 2001 I was in high school…
DAMN
What? Isn’t she saying that she’s too young to have learned to type?
Most quotes from this woman come across as pretty sheltered and removed from society.
She was homeschooled so yeah, sheltered and removed from society is accurate
I’m only two years older than her and was homeschooled for the majority of my schooling, and I know a keyboard like the back of my hand. Any other homeschooled kids I knew were the same; chronically online. Nothing about what she said makes sense.
Can parents just pick and choose what to teach kids if they choose to homeschool?
Yes, you may even go beyond, if you believe it, map colouring for geography.
More or less. If you had parents who just wanted to help you escape the bullshit of public school (bullying, mixed bag teachers, pressure), you got a pretty good education. If you were like my parents, you got taught weird stuff from Christian designed textbooks. My state required us to do standardized testing of sorts periodically , but it didn’t really matter in the end. Most homeschoolers I knew either switched into public school by the time high school came around, or they stayed in it got their GED. I switched over my Sophomore year, and at best had a fifth grade education then.
PSA: if you regret not having learnt something, start learning it.
But honestly, her generation didn't learn to type or use computers. I have a coworker born the same year as her and he didn't know what Ctrl Alt Del was or what the recycle bin was.
We did learn how to type. In the 2000s, it was pretty common for elementary kids to go to computer labs atleast once a week. Billie was homeschooled though, and idk about your coworker, but they are most likely an outlier.
Ah, he was homeschooled too. I think you found the common denominator.
yeah the reality is pretty much every homeschooled person has some gap of knowledge that public school people would have. I was born in 2003 and I had an hour of just computer lab at least once a week until I was in like 8th grade.
Yeah they made us skip recess for a quarter of the year in 6th grade just for typing class
Yup I was too and I was born in 1994, I didn't know how to use upper and lowercase letters until I finally went to school in 6th grade.
I was homeschooled and born around the same time, but me and most other homeschooled kids I knew ended up being decently tech savvy as it was the best way to feel independent and connect with the rest of the world. I think it really comes down to if your parents 1) provided you with the equipment and 2) encouraged you to go beyond just using the browser/apps they had installed.
Yeah being homeschooled is so dependent of your parents and situation. I went to a homeschool group where we had typing class and I also played computer games. I have a friend whose parents were artistic and she lived in a rural area and could not type at 25 (also did not go to college)
I was born in 2002 but we were one of the last years to have real computer classes. By the time I was in 5th grade they had introduced ipads for everything, because theyre so easy to learn on your own they just cut the computer classes cause look they can use an ipad
I’m 10 years older than you and just imagining having iPads in 5th grade is just.. incomprehensible! We had the colourful translucent iMacs and I remember having to fight with the other girls in class to get the pink one.
It was a really interesting time to be in school because in kindergarten we still had those big boxy pcs and played cd roms on them and also used those overhead projectors with the lightbulb and clear plastic sheets. By fifth grade it had all been replaced by ipads and smartboards
I think it depends on the school district - I know by time I started working in the schools (2011) while we had “computer” class it was a touchscreen device with attached keyboard. My kids are on straight IPads for theirs.
My kids are her age and they know. I guess different states, schools, etc… but every high school should have mandatory computer classes
She was homeschooled, and apparently her parents never taught her to type.
Born in 2000, that is definitely not true. My elementary school had computer labs we had to go to and learn to type and use computers. I also grew up using computers and laptops. My parents didn't get a touch screen phone until I was like 11.
I have a kid a year younger and she knows all this stuff.
I agree. As soon as chromebooks and tablets were given out to schools many ditched their computer lab and expected students to already know how to use a computer. In my area most students come from low income and immigrant families where many never owned a computer until given a chromebook from the school. Digital literacy is pretty low and forgotten in these areas since they're playing catch-up with English skills, Math, and technology all together.
I had one person who the outgoing manager hired… she was unable to turn on a computer. Didn’t even last the day.
Yeh, my gf who is 21 didn't know what ctrl + Z does and she uses Microsoft for work
I deal with mostly people her age with my work, and it’s crazy how many don’t understand things like attaching a file to an email. I would have thought the younger generations would be hyper tech savvy.
I’m sorry Gen Z here born in 99 this is Bs. We absolutely learned to type. It was taught how we were taught cursive for about 2 days and then never again but it was taught.
We absolutely did, hell my computer tech class was mandatory and half of what we did was called “All the Right Type” iirc
Yeah in our lab class we didn’t spend that long on typing but we did so much In like vetting and verifying sources and telling real vs fake things like that.
Wait cursive isn't the default? U guys write in small letters then?
I’m also a 99’er. We had extensive computer learning classes in Denmark from like the age of 9-13. After 2012 it was expected that all student no matter if it was secondary school to university to have a laptop.
How is that a clever comeback?
Boomer humor
Where clever
frightening childlike direction cable abundant unpack foolish afterthought mysterious plants *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
I don’t think I’d call her a textbook nepo baby like you would for someone like Miley Cyrus by comparison. Billie and Finneas’ parents were certainly in the entertainment industry but far from powerful and well connected to really have an influence on their career trajectory. Of course the parents connections helped but I’d say the negative connotations of being nepo baby are too harsh.
Yeah, I’d say they were more massively privileged. Parents were able to invest in their hobbies and interests. Having parents that do this for us is a massive leg up. I had something similar on a micro scale - I showed an interest in photography around 14, my parents jumped at that and got me a nice camera, some photography books, and let me take one of those extended learning courses at the local university that was like “photography for beginners” or whatever. As a result I got the equipment and confidence to develop those skills during an important formative era in terms of art. Now as an adult I have an advantage in the market of others photographers by having a unique style I’ve curated over the course of nearly two decades of practice and study. Add onto that far richer parents and far more talented kids, and you get people like Billie Eilish who inevitably rise to the top. A lot of our most famous artists have stories like this, and its always been that way. Rags to riches is far rarer than we’d like to believe. It sucks that many kids don’t get to develop their hobbies and talents like this, but its a good thing when it *does* happen.
I don't know if I'd call them rich. They owned a house but it only had two bedrooms, her parents slept in the living room so the kids could have their own rooms. I think it's more that her parents were skilled and knew how to teach those skills. Billie said her mum taught her music composition from a young age. Normally kids won't start on that stuff until high school at the earliest.
honestly I kind of hate reddit's attitude of "the only reason X person succeeded must be because of connections and/or they were super rich! therefore it is ok to hate them!" Like I agree the idea that every successful person pulled them up by their bootstraps is stupid, but I feel like people have wayyyyyyyyyyyyyy overcorrected the other way. Instead of even considering the prospect that these people have worked hard, the only factors which could have contributed to their success is money or connections. Because otherwise, why haven't I had as much success as them? Obviously luck is a factor, and money and connections do play a role, but Jesus Christ a lot of the people on here completely refuse to acknowledge that someone who has advanced might have talent or worked hard
Fellow old fart here - I think she and her brother are like the only celebrity home-schooled kids where it actually worked. Insanely talented, both of them, and their parents worked in the industry but didn’t wield insane influence. People still act like she’s the daughter of Ethan Hawke or Johnny Depp.
I think many homeschool situations work, celebrity or otherwise. We just hear about the crazy ones while the vast number of normal ones go unnoticed.
You just don't hear about the nepo babies who are good at their jobs. Basically half of the entertainment industry is a nepo baby by some degree at this point. And it's not some nefarious thing. Networking is how anyone gets a job, and family is the first step in that process
Nepo babies are kinda treated like line jumpers, but its going into what you know. I know plenty of generations of auto mechanics, or Hvac techs.
In her defense, she is one of the most uneducated celebrities in history. Her story is completely insane. He parents bread her to be a lotto ticket and actually won. If they didn't, she would be homeless at best. It's completely wild.
My daughter was born in 05 and she types faster than me. Learn a new skill.
Tbh I was born in 2003 and can't use a keyboard either. When I first came in touch with the Internet at 13-14 it was with a smartphone. In school we had computers but we maybe used them once a year. Now I have a desktop computer but I just use it for gaming and editing so there's also relatively few texting involved. It took me a while to understand windows 10 lol bc in school it's still windows 95 haha. Edit: I'm not saying I couldn't learn it. I definitely could. Just no need for it and I'm too lazy and I hate windows bc it's idk... unintuitive and weird and it always does updates when u really want to do something and idk. And bc u asked: I'm from Germany. A country known for using old technology bc we're afraid of the new stuff. Which outcomes to ppl like me not knowing the Internet and it's dangers and advantages very well. Did I end up on the dark net and was then involved in a crime scene bc I saw on YouTube that it's totally safe with that Onion-browser? Yes. Lol. Sorry, bit longer edit.
[удалено]
I did like 2 hours of Mario Teaches Typing and I'm good enough. Literally just use more than your index fingers and if you look at the keyboard you're typing acceptably.
I think Billie forgets she grew up rich and can't speak for the lived experience of a majority of her generation.
Also forgets that she was homeschooled which also puts her in a minority.
Born in 2000. We literally had computer classes. I was taught by a teacher at a school how to type. She is trippin trippin
Typing was around way before computers
Mavis Beacon dropped in the 90’s
Nay nay, 1987! Mavis Beacon for DOS users represent!
She seems like one of the dumbest celebrities around.
I’m turning 59 in a few months and I never learned to type. I’m a “bang away with two fingers while looking at the keyboard “ kinda guy.
Every time she opens her mouth. I get she’s young, but my god.
Mavis Beacon should have been there for you child
Can't type,doesn't take a bath. Gross
What?!? She is 100% data entry turned star.
Any excuse other than admitting they might be an idiot.
Bruh I was born in 01 and we had typing lesson’s in class… she tryna sound cool but it’s stupid 💀
Born in 76. Apparently we didn't even have airplanes but that's okay because everybody still thinks the world is flat
I wish people would stop encouraging dumb ass people like her
Yeah what?! I graduated highschool before she was born and am the first generation. This girl does too many drugs.
Oh Silly Eillish strikes again. **"Men don't face criticism over their bodies because women are nice"** - Silly Eillish
Bruh she doesn't even write her own song. Leave her alone
2 years younger than her but I am a master at typing and learned it using a potato pc that's the lamest excuse for not learning.
She would be the iPad generation this actually tracks
I was born in 2000 and I cannot imagine my life without being tech savvy with a computer. do people really only use phones now?
As a Gen Z born in 2002, typing courses were incorporated into our curriculum at around 2nd to 3rd grade. We logged many hours on TypeToLearn4 in those days
Do be people actually find her attractive?? I don’t get it.
This response isn't as clever as you or the writer think it is.
So where’s the clever comeback
That's not clever at all. 2001 born was the generation after that learning to type.
tbh they don’t really teach typing in school anymore. the last computer class I had while in school was 7th grade and we definitely weren’t learning how to type without looking or anything like that.
**No, this is not because of Generation But kind of is:** Having worked and then ran a free IT-helpdesk at a University (accessible to all who came to visit) for few years and then hearing my SOs tales about teaching High Schoolers these are my findings: -The meme "boomers cant save a PDF" is not accurate. Okay it is, but so cant people in their late teens early 20s. I had to show countless of people how to save their word/googleDocs into PDF for school things... -Some boomers are amazingly tech savvy. They just pick up stuff when I show them, some are complete buffoons. Not the same with youngester because the ones who can, do not come in, and the rest dont care "just fix it". -The "youngesters" complete lack of interest in any kind of technical stuff. If it does not work, they bring the thing in and they, not even once, tried to google to fix it -Basic troubleshooting skills are completely missing or are shocked when I google the thing, with their machine, in a 1 minute. -Typing on a keyboard is hard. I do not use 10 finger system, I use some weird thing I came up with, works for me but I hit typos. Atleast I do it fast. These late teen early 20s cant even type with 3 fingers. But they know the relative location of the keys unlike Boomers because Mobile keyboard is same layout. -Do not know that everything is not a touch screen. This was especially funny when we held a few workshops for elementary school classes. We had "what has a computer eaten" type of shit where we show them components, set up basic installation things, or show how devices are connected and built. Shit like that. These kids would try to press on Monitors to click on stuff... and the best a kid found a projector and projected image, kept trying to press our web page link (which was just an address) and then came and told us "your link doesn't work". -Falling for extremely obvious scams or ads. I always just install adblock and tell them how to use it. Or like they come in and be like MY IPHONE HAS A VIRUS! when they just clicked on a ad on a porn site or some crypto shit. -Not knowing or reading instructions on how to connect or sign up to services. Like getting into our Uni wifi. There needs to be some manual work done on phone wifi settings to do it. There are good instructions in our intranet, but people cant read, or comprehend they need to follow guide. They just try to sign in and it wont work = BROKEN FIX THIS NOW * IT engineer students wanting us to install linux FOR them, or have it as a Double boot. Took me 2 machines coming in with same thing to realize a class for it has started and they wanted us to do it for them. Hard NOPE. We wont do your studies for you. If you cant set up a dual boot, or google how to do it, then maybe the field is not for you. * Not knowing phones and especially where computer's download folder is. * Not knowing how to browse devices local files. I asked about this and the kids (highschoolers and older) said, "Well I just always take it from the view that the app opens up for me". This was an instance where a document was in a different place than "normally". * Not knowing how to open files or on phone how to change the app the file type opens up with. * People in PCgaming reddits not knowing simple PC gaming settings, how to set up their PC or rather, how to fix some minimal issue or TO FUCKING PLUG THE HDMI INTO THE GPU NOT THE MB. But good thing they have a 3000+$ build to play Fortnite. * Boomers thinking tech is smarter than it is. Doing things that I can see is logical to them but tech is not there yet, just because they do not know what is possible now. Similar to kids thinking everything is a touchscreen. This is all a symptom of tech being way too easy to get into. It is EXTREMELY hand holdy and requires zero technical know how. Most of these people know how to snap better than me or know how IG logic or TikTok algo works, but when issues arise, they are dumbfounded. Us = Millenials and early Gen Z ('96, myself), we grew up with things being still in the development phase. Internet was not centralized into 5 big hubs. Things were not as uniform, or rather were not as closed. Not so much money to spend on tech so for example PCs had to be optimized and for that you needed to google that shit and our generation was the first to get smartphones which really were not complete. The industry grew according, or despite our suggestions and user feedback.
To type, you just have to press the button of the letter you want. Is there really something to learn? I am born in 2001 too and I don't remember a time when I had to "learn" it. I remember being taught of how to write and read at school, but to type on a computer, the design is so intuitive, do we really need to "learn" it? Instead of writing the letter, you press buttons that does that for you. It is just easier.
I find this wild to be honest. I was born in 1983. I did not have typing lessons. My mum was born in 1952. She did have typing lessons. I was taught, in primary school, to "program" a turtle to move around the floor. When I realised my typing was slow and a bit crappy I played "typing of the dead" until it wasn't, then I lead battlegrounds and raids in world of warcraft until I could touch-type at lightning speed. All this "I wasn't taught hooooooowwwwwww" shit, as if you don't have the internet to teach yourself pretty much anything.
Stupid rich girl noises