Tech Gap – Week 6

For years in both elementary and middle school every student spent a few hours every week in a computer lab. We learned how to use Gmail, how to type, and the importance of the “Save As” tab in MS Word. But why after all this is there still a barrier to understanding computer basics?

How but not ‘why’

“But the issue is likely not that modern students are learning fewer digital skills, but rather that they’re learning different ones,” – Monica Chin

I don’t entirely know where the gap comes from, whether it’s teachers and professors expecting a certain level of understanding or if we all now use certain technology while assuming we don’t need to understand why it works a certain way.

Technology is ever changing and it seems that gaps grow faster than ever. While my brother met his wife on MySpace, I wouldn’t even begin to understand the basic functions of the website; But vice-versa, he has no idea how Instagram works and I’ve been an active user for most of my teen years and young adulthood. One thing I do know that I don’t know is what the back-end of Instagram does. I don’t know why a sticker does what it does, I just know if I click it I can add a song 🙂

There is a fundamental misunderstanding between creating the action and what causes the action. But it’s also not that easy to figure out. I already don’t feel like a competent user of most technology, so why would I benefit from digging in to understand how easy-to-use apps function?

Capitalism?

By allowing companies to prioritize comfort and ease, we lose the connection to the act of creation. Half of my high-school era papers no longer exist because I either didn’t know how to save them correctly or opening them on my computer requires twenty minutes of downloading to open them in the same app I created them in.

“It is alarming when software, commercial or otherwise, comes to signify entire digital genres. Compare the number of results in a search engine for PowerPoint best practices versus slideshow best practices. The results suggest that vendor lock-in has as much of a grip on how people talk about production as it does on what actually gets produced.” – Karl Stolley

Kleenex and Goofle, no longer pronouns but common nouns and verbs, mirror the change we see as tech becomes ubiquitous. Though genericide can have negative consequences, what comes before seems to be a monopolization of the space, designating any object within a certain likeness to the name of the most popular version.

What happens when all we know how to do is use PowerPoint? The barrier to entry for any other slide show program seems too heavy, so why leave? Then PowerPoint will lose favor and the next tech will come along, unable to open any other slide show leaving years of work to file death in the buried recesses of your computer File Explorer.

The Gap

My own experience seems particularly limited, though some may share the sentiment. I grew up in the transitional era. My sisters had flip-phones but I got a smart-phone when I turned 13. My family had a computer room but now we all have individual laptops, and most have desktops, too. My mom was one of those that berated the very existence of a smart-phone until thrust upon her by the expectations of the technologically advanced. I did not have my own computer until college. The latest gaming system I used until a few years ago was…a WII. Somehow both tech literate and beyond saving for the most basic of computer skills.

The gap for those of us who were given only the most restricted access to tech is so large. There is already a misunderstanding for newer generations on the basic functions of computers, but it seems utterly insurmountable to some of us. So what does it look like to become one of the few tech competent?

To my dismay, bridging the gap may actually require trying. Learning what I can, where I can. Choosing the technology that is most perennial and attempting to maintain some semblance of understanding in the world of technology as it grows and expands.