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Social Software & Senior Citizens | 10 comments

[new] define old(er)? (Avg. Score: 3.00 / Raters: 1) (#5)
by Aileen on Tue Oct 28th, 2003 at 06:09:03 PM EURODISCORDIA TIME
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"Older adults using new technologies" - since some of these words have been rattling around in my head, please allow me to tell you the story of how my bank turned me into an old woman:
It used to be pleasant to take a short walk to the bank occasionally, where friendly and competent human beings greeted me by name, understood what I needed, and could even tell me that my husband had already been there (this is not a machine-readable connection, it requires human insight). Then the bank decided to "modernize".
The friendly humans disappeared into back rooms somewhere and the hall was filled with shiny little terminals, with which customers could take care of everything themselves, and these apparently cloned beings in the form of pretty young women in mini-skirted business suits and snappy young men in shiny new ties.
Enter me: since my hair started turning grey long before I was thirty, it is quite conspicuously grey now, especially when I have it securely pinned up out of the way. Although my vision has not improved with age, I have worn thick glasses and had difficulty focusing on my environment since I was 8. I don't dress well - I spend 10-12 hours a day pounding words into a keyboard and staring at a screen, it doesn't matter what I wear. Thus I was immediately identified my a mini-skirted clone as an "older woman" and she had been programmed to expect that "older women" are timid about using "new technology" and require reassuring guidance. I'm afraid I bit her head off, so she was replaced the next time by another clone with a shiny new tie.
These "modern" terminals at the bank are allegedly designed to be accessible to people in wheelchairs. Since I have never seen anyone in a wheelchair using one, I have no idea whether that works are not. I do know that they are next to impossible to operate for someone who is tall and doesn't see very well. The combination of the height, the lighting, the angle and the silly cartoon-like icons on a framed touchscreen leaves me fumbling helplessly, obviously in need of assistance.
I never saw myself as someone reluctant to use "new technologies" before, in fact I have always liked machines and enjoyed experimenting with them, and despite what my children think, I didn't see myself as "old" before - I'm not even 50. But somehow the "modernization" of my bank turned me into an "older woman in need of assistance".
Software, hardware - or the whole constellation of technology and expectations?

Social Software & Senior Citizens | 10 comments

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