4 ms·

I just spent 6 hours volunteering as an usher at a pharmacy doing about 1k vaccinations in a day. The number of people over 60 who didn't understand the differe

I just spent 6 hours volunteering as an usher at a pharmacy doing about 1k vaccinations in a day. The number of people over 60 who didn't understand the difference between a text message and an email was around 30% (out of a sample size of 600 during my shift). About 10% of the people who showed didn't have smartphones or text, 4 people did everything only with phone calls. I wonder how many people who only did phone calls were NOT able to get vaccine slots? Working with my aging mother, modern UIs are very complicated. Ever changing gestures, hidden menus, differences between machines, passwords, multi-accounts, etc. Heck my mom can't figure out the volume buttons on her iphone so she holds face time to her ear to hear. Heck even the default apps are hard on her. iMessage keeps getting moved to the home page and SMS to the 2nd page. So she sees the blue bubble and uses that to message us, even tho we are sending SMS. She needs to use the green bubble from the second page. This is not to mention how bad all of these apps or websites are and the loss of a person to call to get clarification for anything not written on a website. 95% of my time yesterday was spent just answering nuances to the basic questions. For instance we were giving Moderna to the first dose people. Every time I announced that to the line, half of the 2nd dose people panicked and said "I need Pfizer". For me as a programmer, keeping it all in my head was easy, it's just a 8 branch 3 level deep if/else statement. For aging people with phones the information became inaccessible. Those with paper printouts of everything were able to just breeze through and paper doesn't reboot, loose battery, or forget, and you can easily hand paper to other people. The rate of vaccinations actually crushed the brand new system in place (which was there because the old system melted at 300 people a day). So paper was great. They just did all the data in put at the end of the day. I'm actually quite worried with our current hodgepodge of low quality software we're greatly isolating older people, or people who are not using tech heavily every day. And this is not just for crappy government software. I saw as many people unable to use their iphone and android basic software. With my mom, netflix, why does it even have a password she has to remember? Device authorization between her roku and a laptop is confounding, they're 2 totally different devices. It's basically impossible.

bombcar 6y ago
It's a tale as old as time - and it's not just "old people" either. The number of young brilliant people who seem to have a mental block around computers is larger than you might think. I've had people call and ask why they can't login and when they share screen the webpage has a huge graphic telling them to approve the notification on their phone (TFA). They don't even read it. And it's not their fault! People have only a limited capacity for things. Imagine if your car changed how it worked every week or so when you sat down to drive - driving would be nearly impossible. https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2005/12/12 https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2005/12/12
analog31 6y ago
Quite agreed. >>>> The number of people over 60 who didn't understand the difference between a text message and an email was around 30% (out of a sample size of 600 during my shift). What is the difference, in plain terms? It's easy to understand the technical difference if you remember that it's based on a historical quirk of cell phone technology and economics from 20+ years ago, that is probably not fundamental or useful today. But try explaining it to a non techie: It's a different app, and happens to be more or less responsive depending on where you are located relative to the antenna towers, so the best explanation is just that you have to check for messages in two different ways on your phone, and not trust to receive a message immediately after it was sent. Actually understanding the difference is as important as knowing why dialing a phone is called "dialing." For the rest of us, just make it work already.
- grogenaut 6y ago
  So we were doing 2 sets of people. Those over 60 who were on their second shot (because they were over 60), and under 60 essential and ag workers. The over 60 folks were all early AM. So over 60 was in this case a known separator. The over 60 folks didn't care why text or email, they wanted to do what they needed to do to get their shots. The system we were using was setup for text. It was a tech choice. To them tho, it's a phone number, and they never text, that's what email is for. Why should they have emails and texts and phone calls and because it's hippa, an in web app email system to keep their data secure. For my mom I'm referring to apple's pushing of iMessage over SMS... she doesn't comprehend the difference and apple's push to get people into their ecosystem is making it impossible to communicate with my mom without carrying around an iphone all day just to respond to her.
  - Sevii 6y ago
    It is insane to me the amount of pain email not being secure by default causes across the economy. All these apps implementing in-webapp messaging systems that suck, then sending me an email with no information other than that I got a message in a system I look at maybe once per year.
    - 6y ago
mietek 6y ago
> Heck even the default apps are hard on her. iMessage keeps getting moved to the home page and SMS to the 2nd page. So she sees the blue bubble and uses that to message us, even tho we are sending SMS. She needs to use the green bubble from the second page. I agree with your overall point, but I am puzzled by this detail. There is no separate app for sending SMS on iOS. The Messages app handles both the iMessage protocol and SMS, has a green bubble icon, and by default, appears in the four-item dock at the bottom of every page of the home screen. Also, app icons don’t move between pages on their own.
- kiwijamo 6y ago
  I am also puzzled. Apple's iMessage/SMS app (there is only one app that does both as you say) will only send iMessage messages to numbers that have iMessage enabled (I know there are some edge cases but these are typically only for those who have recently migrated away from Apple). iMessage will always default to SMS (and is usually the only option) for numbers that have no iMessage enabled. Not an Apple fanboy but how they have set up iMessage/SMS actually is pretty good.
- hedora 6y ago
  It sounds like she’s using signal and iMessage/sms maybe? Signal has a blue bubble app icon, and iMessage has a green one.
- grogenaut 6y ago
  She just sees my name and sends messages to my non-existent iphone instead of to SMS. I don't really know, not having a usable iphone and only a mac makes me not an expert.
paultopia 6y ago
Working with my aging mother, modern UIs are very complicated. Ever changing gestures, hidden menus, differences between machines, passwords, multi-accounts, etc. I'm 41, and, you know, the sort of person who reads HN, i.e., can find my way around a command line, sling enough code to get out of a paper bag, etc. And I can't make sense out of many modern UIs. Half of them are just forests of unlabeled icons. Like, ok, what is the thing that looks like a squirrel making out with a lawnmower supposed to do? The other half are menus inside menus inside menus inside menus where finding the functionality you want is damn near impossible. No government or corporate webform gives you all the information you need up front---no company discloses the full price until you're about to put the credit card in, no government tells you what documents you need until you're ten pages into the application. And don't even get me started on fashionable startups. I just joined an organization that used (past tense, I helped kill it) Basecamp to organize communications, and that thing has a totally different arbitrary nonlinear ontology from every other preexisting human communication technology. What the hell is a campfire and why can't I find my pings and what were the designers thinking to just randomly drop all of this extra cognitive load on people's heads like a pigeon with diarrhea? UI designers, please, just stop!
- dijksterhuis 6y ago
  I'm 30 odd and I struggle with all this! Shiny and new is not necessarily better than easy and works. UI designers are mad, mad I tell you!
- midasuni 6y ago
  I know some companies won’t tell you the full price until the end, but if I walk into a shop and it costs 9.99 on the shelf, that’s how much it costs at the checkout. Same with prices on the menu at a restaurant or on a day out. The number of transactions where the full price is shown upfront vastly outweighs the number of hidden extra transactions
  - fuzxi 6y ago
    I'm not seeing the relevance of this comment. Did I miss something or did you reply to the wrong comment?
steelframe 6y ago
> Working with my aging mother, modern UIs are very complicated. I am a software developer with over 20 years of professional experience designing and building systems. I recently got the COVID vaccine. While I was in the observation area, there was a screen projected advising me to set up my 2nd dose using my smartphone while I waited. I searched for the clinic web site where I first signed up for the vaccine, and then I filled in the same form again that I used to get a my first appointment. One of the options was "Have you already had your first dose?" I checked that, and my expectation was that the system would determine that I have priority for setting the next appointment. Instead the system kicked me into a waitlist. Fortunately, as I was leaving, the staff were adamant about asking whether I had my second appointment set up. I explained that I used the website for setting up appointments and that I was on a waitlist. They were confused and said I should have been immediately scheduled for my second appointment. Fortunately there were a couple of staffed stations set up where they could set up your second appointment if you had trouble doing it via your smartphone. The staff member told me I had gone to the wrong website (??) and, in a slightly annoyed demeanor, asked me for my email address. They did whatever they do on their end, and I got a date and time set up. I think it's perfectly reasonable to go to the website you initially used to set up your first appointment in order to set up your second appointment, and I'd expect the system to give you priority in getting your second appointment when you check the box indicating that you've already had your first dose. (Otherwise, why even bother asking??) I guess the thing I was supposed to do was search my email inbox for one of three messages where there was an embedded link I was supposed to click on. But this wasn't discoverable, and none of the information on the screen told me that was what I was supposed to do. If an experienced software developer misuses the automated system, I'm not sure how the general public doesn't run into problems using it. Of course I do have a knack for always wedging myself into the corners of almost any system I use, perhaps because I don't think like your typical member of the general public does when it comes to systems.
avh02 6y ago
> Ever changing gestures, hidden menus, differences between machines One of the reasons i'm getting sick of all this cloud crap and autoupdating software is that the changes are mostly cosmetic bullshit but I often have to re-learn or re-associate things. (or worse, constantly check my settings because they conveniently change in company-x's favour after a "reorganization" to give you more control or someshit) Sometimes changes come along that are legit improvements. fine. i'll re-learn. but i'm just getting fatigued with bullshit changes.

bombcar 6y ago

It's a tale as old as time - and it's not just "old people" either. The number of young brilliant people who seem to have a mental block around computers is larger than you might think. I've had people call and ask why they can't login and when they share screen the webpage has a huge graphic telling them to approve the notification on their phone (TFA). They don't even read it. And it's not their fault! People have only a limited capacity for things. Imagine if your car changed how it worked every week or so when you sat down to drive - driving would be nearly impossible. https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2005/12/12 https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2005/12/12

analog31 6y ago

Quite agreed. >>>> The number of people over 60 who didn't understand the difference between a text message and an email was around 30% (out of a sample size of 600 during my shift). What is the difference, in plain terms? It's easy to understand the technical difference if you remember that it's based on a historical quirk of cell phone technology and economics from 20+ years ago, that is probably not fundamental or useful today. But try explaining it to a non techie: It's a different app, and happens to be more or less responsive depending on where you are located relative to the antenna towers, so the best explanation is just that you have to check for messages in two different ways on your phone, and not trust to receive a message immediately after it was sent. Actually understanding the difference is as important as knowing why dialing a phone is called "dialing." For the rest of us, just make it work already.

grogenaut 6y ago
So we were doing 2 sets of people. Those over 60 who were on their second shot (because they were over 60), and under 60 essential and ag workers. The over 60 folks were all early AM. So over 60 was in this case a known separator. The over 60 folks didn't care why text or email, they wanted to do what they needed to do to get their shots. The system we were using was setup for text. It was a tech choice. To them tho, it's a phone number, and they never text, that's what email is for. Why should they have emails and texts and phone calls and because it's hippa, an in web app email system to keep their data secure. For my mom I'm referring to apple's pushing of iMessage over SMS... she doesn't comprehend the difference and apple's push to get people into their ecosystem is making it impossible to communicate with my mom without carrying around an iphone all day just to respond to her.
- Sevii 6y ago
  It is insane to me the amount of pain email not being secure by default causes across the economy. All these apps implementing in-webapp messaging systems that suck, then sending me an email with no information other than that I got a message in a system I look at maybe once per year.
  - 6y ago

mietek 6y ago

> Heck even the default apps are hard on her. iMessage keeps getting moved to the home page and SMS to the 2nd page. So she sees the blue bubble and uses that to message us, even tho we are sending SMS. She needs to use the green bubble from the second page. I agree with your overall point, but I am puzzled by this detail. There is no separate app for sending SMS on iOS. The Messages app handles both the iMessage protocol and SMS, has a green bubble icon, and by default, appears in the four-item dock at the bottom of every page of the home screen. Also, app icons don’t move between pages on their own.

kiwijamo 6y ago
I am also puzzled. Apple's iMessage/SMS app (there is only one app that does both as you say) will only send iMessage messages to numbers that have iMessage enabled (I know there are some edge cases but these are typically only for those who have recently migrated away from Apple). iMessage will always default to SMS (and is usually the only option) for numbers that have no iMessage enabled. Not an Apple fanboy but how they have set up iMessage/SMS actually is pretty good.
hedora 6y ago
It sounds like she’s using signal and iMessage/sms maybe? Signal has a blue bubble app icon, and iMessage has a green one.
grogenaut 6y ago
She just sees my name and sends messages to my non-existent iphone instead of to SMS. I don't really know, not having a usable iphone and only a mac makes me not an expert.

paultopia 6y ago

Working with my aging mother, modern UIs are very complicated. Ever changing gestures, hidden menus, differences between machines, passwords, multi-accounts, etc. I'm 41, and, you know, the sort of person who reads HN, i.e., can find my way around a command line, sling enough code to get out of a paper bag, etc. And I can't make sense out of many modern UIs. Half of them are just forests of unlabeled icons. Like, ok, what is the thing that looks like a squirrel making out with a lawnmower supposed to do? The other half are menus inside menus inside menus inside menus where finding the functionality you want is damn near impossible. No government or corporate webform gives you all the information you need up front---no company discloses the full price until you're about to put the credit card in, no government tells you what documents you need until you're ten pages into the application. And don't even get me started on fashionable startups. I just joined an organization that used (past tense, I helped kill it) Basecamp to organize communications, and that thing has a totally different arbitrary nonlinear ontology from every other preexisting human communication technology. What the hell is a campfire and why can't I find my pings and what were the designers thinking to just randomly drop all of this extra cognitive load on people's heads like a pigeon with diarrhea? UI designers, please, just stop!

dijksterhuis 6y ago
I'm 30 odd and I struggle with all this! Shiny and new is not necessarily better than easy and works. UI designers are mad, mad I tell you!
midasuni 6y ago
I know some companies won’t tell you the full price until the end, but if I walk into a shop and it costs 9.99 on the shelf, that’s how much it costs at the checkout. Same with prices on the menu at a restaurant or on a day out. The number of transactions where the full price is shown upfront vastly outweighs the number of hidden extra transactions
- fuzxi 6y ago
  I'm not seeing the relevance of this comment. Did I miss something or did you reply to the wrong comment?

steelframe 6y ago

> Working with my aging mother, modern UIs are very complicated. I am a software developer with over 20 years of professional experience designing and building systems. I recently got the COVID vaccine. While I was in the observation area, there was a screen projected advising me to set up my 2nd dose using my smartphone while I waited. I searched for the clinic web site where I first signed up for the vaccine, and then I filled in the same form again that I used to get a my first appointment. One of the options was "Have you already had your first dose?" I checked that, and my expectation was that the system would determine that I have priority for setting the next appointment. Instead the system kicked me into a waitlist. Fortunately, as I was leaving, the staff were adamant about asking whether I had my second appointment set up. I explained that I used the website for setting up appointments and that I was on a waitlist. They were confused and said I should have been immediately scheduled for my second appointment. Fortunately there were a couple of staffed stations set up where they could set up your second appointment if you had trouble doing it via your smartphone. The staff member told me I had gone to the wrong website (??) and, in a slightly annoyed demeanor, asked me for my email address. They did whatever they do on their end, and I got a date and time set up. I think it's perfectly reasonable to go to the website you initially used to set up your first appointment in order to set up your second appointment, and I'd expect the system to give you priority in getting your second appointment when you check the box indicating that you've already had your first dose. (Otherwise, why even bother asking??) I guess the thing I was supposed to do was search my email inbox for one of three messages where there was an embedded link I was supposed to click on. But this wasn't discoverable, and none of the information on the screen told me that was what I was supposed to do. If an experienced software developer misuses the automated system, I'm not sure how the general public doesn't run into problems using it. Of course I do have a knack for always wedging myself into the corners of almost any system I use, perhaps because I don't think like your typical member of the general public does when it comes to systems.

avh02 6y ago

> Ever changing gestures, hidden menus, differences between machines One of the reasons i'm getting sick of all this cloud crap and autoupdating software is that the changes are mostly cosmetic bullshit but I often have to re-learn or re-associate things. (or worse, constantly check my settings because they conveniently change in company-x's favour after a "reorganization" to give you more control or someshit) Sometimes changes come along that are legit improvements. fine. i'll re-learn. but i'm just getting fatigued with bullshit changes.