Meet or hear Laurie in one of the following:

Washington DC March 23.

Related News Articles

02/07/2024

GrandPad announces Grandie, an AI-powered virtual companion.

01/30/2024

The rise of passive, non-intrusive PERS devices at CES.

01/25/2024

The tech market for seniors boasts many tools, but not all of them are user friendly. 

01/17/2024

Says a report from the Senate Aging Committee.

01/13/2024

From 101,000 to 422,000 -- mostly women.

You are here

November 2016

Mitigating loneliness – what is being, can be done?

You may notice that it is the Christmas cheery season. [Rant on] Isn’t it great to see the sleigh-bell imagery, decoration excess, and TV Christmas-caroling crowds? Observe all the promotion, advertising and shopping discounts for must-have stuff. One guesses that Christmas must matter to self-identifying Christians, now only 75% of the US population, down from 80% in 2006. Yet the Christmas season is not about religion. It is a platform – a springboard for irrational spending, financial hangovers, 30% of annual retail sales, and the result -- goods that the recipient doesn’t want, need and can’t store – and that the giver can’t afford. 

Facebook usage is up -- what does its growing media role mean?

Pew new social media numbers tell a story – sort of.  Now we know, that despite of -- or perhaps because of its inadvertent dissemination of fake news, Facebook usage is up. So consider that 62% of online age 65+ adults use Facebook.  Also note other Pew data:  only 58% of adults age 65+ are online.  So translate that into 36% of the total 65+ population (or 16 million) using Facebook.  Observe that 83% of American older adults aged 65+ have grandchildren. Is there a relationship between having grandchildren and needing to view updates on Facebook?  Look at AARP Tek Facebook training. It is just too basic given Facebook's role as both dominant news media source and influencer. 

Stop with the drones and other device nonsense

Hopefully a road full of self-driving cars is media mythology.  For the breathlessly awaiting, note Wall Street Journal quote about it being 25-30 years before self-driving cars will dominate the roadways. Apparently there are 250 million vehicles on the road today that are at least 10 years old (impressive in a country that only has 318 million people). Also appreciate that 25 years from now is when millennials will enter their 60s. Will they be just as eager then as they are now to leave the driving to a Google engineer – or will they be as cautious as today’s boomers?  Will these 50-year-olds be walking slowly, bent over as they cross the street, the image of 'old.'  Maybe at 50, they will not be as ignorant as this video shows them to be now.

Like polls, health tech market size and savings could be wrong

In a week where polls were so wrong, predictive science may be shaken.  Watching pollsters apologize this week for missing the obvious, folks wonder if the polling process has flawsPew Research concluded: most pollsters 'underestimated' support for the eventual winner. Duh. Were these polls out of whack due to 'nonresponse bias'-- that certain types of people don’t respond to surveys?  Are non-responders a 'type' or were they were becoming grumpy at the phone's frequent ringing, listening to the hum of the robocaller connections to live pollsters?  And if so much money was spent on conducting polls and research that did not predict the outcome, how about polling and surveys that track and predict technology uptake, particularly in the much-hyped category of digital health? 

From LeadingAge 2016 – One-time topics or notable signals of trends?

LeadingAge ended last week, leaving tea leaves about the future.  This annual conference is the largest for the world of non-profit senior housing companies – and while much of it focuses on the tactical, a number of sessions tackled change, some of it wrenching for this industry. We already know that older adults in the future will find fewer and smaller nursing homes, and the ones remaining will be more focused on acute care, driven, as always, by payments, policies and the significance (big) of higher move-in ages. One session coached about 'abandonment'  of strategies no longer needed.  These changes necessitate innovation among the organization 6000 member companies – and the mix of services that these companies provide

When AARP speaks, tech firms listen for the art of the deal

When AARP launches a site for caregivers -- insurers and home care services listen. Today AARP launched CareConnection -- a site for family caregivers. Services from Care Connection will be "ranging from in-home care support (via CareLinx and Hometeam), Teladoc-powered telehealth services, meal delivery service from bistroMD, and professional caregiving advice" from AARP's long-time insurance partner, UnitedHealthcare. Perhaps this new site will out-do Care.com, Caring.com, Caregiver Action Network, and all the other 'caregiver' subject matter and referral websites. This new CareConnection is a business within AARP Services, the for-profit subsidiary of AARP – which leads the deals that are a notable part of the nearly $1.5 billion of the organization's revenue.

category tags: 

Categories

login account