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computers, broadband, and social networking

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computers, broadband, and social networking

Making Computers More User Friendly For Seniors: An Innovative Study At UMiami Is Now Recruiting Participants.

01/10/2012

 

As technology rapidly advances and daily life moves forward, many seniors are becoming disconnected. To stop the widening information gap, the University of Miami’s Center of Research and Education on Aging and Technology Enhancement (CREATE) is conducting a study to introduce seniors to the digital age.

When agencies save paper, seniors lose

Everybody wants to save paper -- but for some, it's optional.  My long-time love-it, hate-it bank enables those online to replace printed statements with statements that are viewable.  They encourage online access, but don't require it. In fact, many make quite an effort to save our governments from printing too much, and many more are on a mission to save those trees and be oh-so-green ('paperless at home' and Save Our Trees). So what other organizations will follow the examples of the Social Security Administration and most recently the Treasury Department? Financial services and banks have been pushing the go-paperless rock up hill for years, but it is always optional for the consumer. There has been some success (possibly due to the economy): paper consumption has, in fact, fallen a bit from 2010 to 2011. But the Treasury's mandate that Savings Bonds can only be purchased online is an ominous warning to the sizable senior population that still is not using the Internet - 42% of the 65+ are online, according to Pew Research, but only 30% of the 'GI Generation', those aged 74+, are online. No savings bond buying for them.

2012 -- 10 Updated Tips for launching a product or service

This post first appeared in late 2010 prior to CES -- with CES coming up next week, given the last year of launches, again let's remind new product and service vendors of what they need to do to launch properly.

So you want to launch a boomer/senior, home health tech, etc product or service.  It's getting to be that time of year for launches and the press that accompanies them. This year, as always there are many vendors that have or will have new products and services or enhanced capabilities -- and want to get attention, prowling the vast aisles of the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas in search of possible channel partners, media attention and a list of who is in their space. In conjunction with that event, perhaps they will 'officially' launch. Or perhaps an existing company will officially launch a new product or service. Here is a checklist as derived from recent encounters and discussions:

Going online for fun and diversion – what’s that mean, anyway?

Pew Research asks about the Internet and ‘fun’.   New this month: The Internet as Diversion and Destination, offering the results of a survey about the use of the Internet, with answers by age to a question: "Did you go ever go online for no particular reason, just for fun, or to pass the time?" They also asked about whether they did so "yesterday," the day before they were surveyed – which is cute, but "yesterday" as a source of meaningful information is, well, so yesterday. The headliner was about the 53% percent of young adults (18-29) who admitted that yesterday they did, while only 27% of boomers and 12% of seniors allocated a piece of their yesterday for this, uh, purpose. This is a frustrating question that Pew does not analyze, nor does it probe further, so speculation clearly is expected.

Tech solutions that overwhelm the problem

When you read about tech and older adults, ask if it is appropriate to the task. Does it fit the problem being addressed? Do caregiving robots make sense? Is the cost such that everyone except the buyers would raise their eyebrows? Everyone admires a pioneer, the organization that will respond to the idea and the sales pitch for putting a few $6000 robots into the homes of children recovering from surgery, for example, so that the children won’t have to come to the hospital for the doctor to see how their recovery is progressing. Apparently no one thought to give the family a Netbook with camera, which would accomplish the same video viewing purpose – for $250.

LightSquared and Skype Co-Founder's FreedomPop Partner to Offer Free Broadband Services

12/11/2011

RESTON, Va. and LOS ANGELES, Dec. 8, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- LightSquared™, a wholesale carrier building a nationwide wireless broadband network that will create consumer choice and drive industry innovation, and FreedomPop, a disruptive new company that will offer free broadband and voice services to all Americans, have signed a wholesale network agreement.

DoSomething.org encourages Teens to Help Get their Grandparents “Wired” this Holiday Season

12/05/2011

NEW YORK – December 5, 2011 – DoSomething.org has joined forces with Skype and Grandparents.com to ask teens to show off their technology skills this winter by helping seniors get started on Facebook, Skype™ and/or helping them sign them up for an email account.

2011 Tech Gifts for Seniors

Last year's list of tech gifts that keep on giving is still pretty accurate in terms of categories -- eReaders and eBooks, video communication devices, game-related and music-related.  But be thankful, tech time marches on, and there are more variants of each, plus some new items to consider -- if you're in aging services or senior housing, pass some ideas along to residents or clients:

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