Old person here, so fed up with IT that makes life harder. I don’t get what the bank app is telling me to do, so I go into the branch. They have to ask the manager. I get a confusing text from the doctors. None of the reception staff understand it either. Where’s this ‘Jetsons’ life I was promised? - ThreadSky

drpam.bsky.social • 24 days ago

Old person here, so fed up with IT that makes life harder. I don’t get what the bank app is telling me to do, so I go into the branch. They have to ask the manager. I get a confusing text from the doctors. None of the reception staff understand it either. Where’s this ‘Jetsons’ life I was promised?

Comments

andrewnotbot.bsky.social•23 days ago

The quality of software has gone down over the years. A move to developers testing their own code and a lack of emphasis on usability means apps and websites are developed to tick requirement boxes.

saltednuts.bsky.social•24 days ago

Thatcher flogged it to Dennis’s mates

asparagusnextleft.bsky.social•23 days ago

There's a reason they only made one series of The Jetsons.

parisdaguerre.bsky.social•23 days ago

I think it’s AI that is making it all so much harder.

tippingpoint24.bsky.social•23 days ago

It's actually bad system design.

hairyloon.bsky.social•23 days ago

I'm taking issue with an organisation that is insisting that I use their website rather than simply writing in with the problem, and another that is insisting that I use a form, more than half of which asks for irrelevant information.

jenrichards.bsky.social•24 days ago

With you, Pam . At 82 I have a fair grasp, but it gets too much. And I'm only going to get older

drpam.bsky.social•24 days ago

It’s not just that I think but that we are dealing with people who have no memory of a world that worked very efficiently without IT. I’m not a Luddite, but I do think we need to consider just because we can put something online, should we just do it, or should we debate the pros and cons first?

drpam.bsky.social•24 days ago

But when we’re gone there will be no one there to think that thought. I waited behind a young man who was very politely trying to deal with the fact that he could no longer access any of the money in his account. The clerk, about the same age, was sympathetic, but the computer said no, so…

drpam.bsky.social•24 days ago

What got me was they both seemed to accept that this was just the way it ‘was.’ This would have never happened before internet banking. You’d go into the branch and go as far up the management system as you needed to get your account released. But they don’t remember that world…

ditchster.bsky.social•24 days ago

I am so sick of it all Pam. All I want to do is talk to someone at times but all you get offered is a chatbot or app. I loathe dealing with banks/utilities & councils. You often need a laptop to access services. So discriminatory 😞

drpam.bsky.social•24 days ago

While I was in the doctor’s, the receptionist was explaining to a lady next to me, I’d judge to be in her mid-70s, that she could only make an appointment online. The problem was apparently a drop-down box. It was clear that the lady had no idea what that meant. It was awful….

drpam.bsky.social•24 days ago

Which seems to me to make them very vulnerable to AI systems framing the world in ways that are convenient to them (not from a basis of consciousness, but rooted in algorithms) & the human beings just then fall into line. It’s worrying, I think. I feel like the old bloke at the end of ‘Logan’s Run.’

nibblerrat.bsky.social•24 days ago

Ah Peter Ustinov 👍

jenrichards.bsky.social•24 days ago

I agree with all of that. Memory is a very fragile commodity

brennanholt.bsky.social•23 days ago

It's really disabling isn't it? Sorry you've gone through all that for such necessary things.

brennanholt.bsky.social•23 days ago

The KKK took our baby away...it's in the pockets of all these men we lionised in the naughties and whose real colours we see clearly now. Probably more than four possibilities but I liked how this book laid out a lot of this dilemma. https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/transformation/four-futures-life-after-capitalism/

davehaterofracism.bsky.social•23 days ago

I bought petrol in Malta - I pulled onto the forecourt , the attendant asked ' how much? ' , he put the fuel in , I passed him a 20 euro note and I drove off - it felt like I had been transported back to a past life.

terrielizabeth.bsky.social•23 days ago

Oh goodness I so hear you ! 🥴

karenpearny.bsky.social•23 days ago

I’m 53 and have fibromyalgia and ME which affects my cognitive levels. I hate technology now as I struggle to grasp new progress. Years ago I worked in banking and did temping in blue chip companies and was in a diff place each week on different systems and just did it! Now can’t do any stuff!

jenihooper.bsky.social•23 days ago

How frustrating for you. Who is supposed to benefit? Should be for our convenience but often takes longer or is impossible to understand.

drpam.bsky.social•23 days ago

I am sure more receptionist time is lost helping people find their way through increasingly complicated IT systems than deautomating the system to some extent at the user end, even if that means employing more staff.

girasoles-lady.bsky.social•23 days ago

it makes it easier for the IT owners to cop out of doing their job, as people can’t be bothered!

Comments

Posting Rules

Reply