What is Digg?638 Comments
- mindsnare, on 10/12/2007, -4/+325Ok I've never had this many diggs on a story on my site, since it's gone above 30 diggs I'll paste the article in here
9 Things The Non-Tech Savvy Do That Annoy Geeks
Posted by Sebconn at 3:59 pm
When you’re a tech nerd working or living with the not so tech savvy, there are a few things they tend to do that make you bite your tongue, and resist the urgh to take over what they’re doing and get it done yourself. They may be trivial, but they are all oh so wrong.
1: Microsoft Word is the application for everything.
Some people have been using the basics of MS Word since Windows 3.1, and have never wanted or needed to learn to use anything else, but they seem to think that Word is for full desktop publishing, database management and photo printing. They may even have the full suite of Office with Publisher and Access, but no matter what the task, Word will do it. Taking the long route seems to be the way to go, for example in order to print a picture, launch a new Word document, insert a text box, then insert the photo, you can then move the picture around and resize it to whatever size you like, which brings us to the next itch.
2: Incorrect Aspect Ratios.
Whether it’s on a new Widescreen TV, resizing photos in Word (of course), or using soome spyware riddled DVD ripper to rip a movie, some people just seem to have no concept of aspect ratio, they don’t seem to mind if Captain Jack Sparrow looks George Costanza with a pirate hat. The amount of bars and pubs that have gone all out to buy their plasma/lcd TVs to hang on the wall, only to run the footy in standard analog stretch to fit nastiness astounds me. Try as you might to explain 16:9 and 4:3 views, the problem continues.
3: Everything Must Be Double Clicked.
It’s quite hard to explain to a not-so computer literate person the difference between icons, buttons and links. They sit there happily browsing the internet double clicking on all the links like they’ve had too much coffee, it’s a habit that cannot be broken, you can tell them as many times as you like that you needn’t click like crazy to view that video on Youtube, but they will continue with their clicky ways.
4: Getting a faster computer will speed up the internets.
Off to the closest Harvey Norman to pick up the top of the line HP Desktop with all the trimmings, they hand over all their cash, take it home and get there 13 year old son to plug it in. Then you get the phone call or chance meeting where they question you on why the internet is still slow as buggery, even with this fancy new computer. “What type of connection do you have” you ask them, so naturally they tell you their ISP (Usually Bigpond, or AOL for the US readers), you slowly explain what you mean by your initial question, and 15 minutes later come to the conclusion that they have dial-up. You try and hold it back, but you can’t, you just cry.
5: I won a trip to the Bahamas!
No, no you didn’t
6: Your desktop wallpaper is NOT your screensaver.
I’m not quite sure how word got around that a desktop wallpaper is the same thing as a screensaver, but so many people seem to get the two mixed up. They can be talking about the background on their phone, or the background on their computer, they keep calling it a screensaver, why? I don’t know how this spread around the non-tech savvy world but it needs to stop, before my eyes start twitching and my head explodes.
7: NO, I DON’T want to fix your cousin’s brother’s uncle’s 10 year old computer.
This one is talked about a lot, hell there’s even t-shirts about it, but it needs to be said. If you’re a tech-savvy person, especially if it’s what you do as a job, people seem to think that you enjoy, and are happy to fix their computer. It’s true, yes we do enjoy a little bit of tinkering every now and then, but it’s a hell of a lot more fun when it’s your own machine, for a start the only person you can piss off is yourself if you manage to screw up, and on top of that, it’s YOUR computer so YOU get the benefits of the upgrade/maintenance. old computers are a bitch, working with old technology (unless it’s 1980s retro) is a bitch, and we don’t like doing it for free. I have no problem doing it for immediate family, and very close friends, but I do not want to get a tech support call from a work colleague’s boyfriend at 8:30 on a Saturday morning (that actually happened to me I might add).
8: The Non-Tech Savvy Geek
There are breeds of human out there who are convinced they are super tech gurus, they’ve sussed out Microsoft Office, and they can program a VCR with their eyes closed, and to top it off, they can talk for hours about stuff they know nothing about, using words they don’t understand. These guys are annoying as hell, and they are dangerous too. If you work with one, they can mess up a whole morning’s work at the blink of an eye. And even more annoying, they always give the other non-tech savvy people false hope, by telling them something is possible when it’s absolutely not, then you cop the bad wrap because you can’t do what they were told was possible. “No I can’t configure your phone to charge via bluetooth”
9: Why can’t I open this file on my floppy disk?
This one isn’t super common but it’s definitely happened to me a few times. Some people store all their important documents on a floppy disk, arguably one of the most unstable storage methods available bar writing the binary data in sand on a beach. So surely they have backup yes? No, no they don’t, you express sympathy on the outside, but really, you’re shaking your head muttering “you complete idiot”
Yes this list is pretty self righteous, a mechanic or farmer could write a similar list directed at people who know bugger all about their profession, and they probably would, but they can’t work out how to turn on their computer. - DurkaMcDurk, on 10/12/2007, -18/+297my biggest one is a server that can't handle the "digg effect"
- mrASSMAN, on 10/12/2007, -5/+276OK, those are all bad, but I have a ton more that annoy me to despair.
#10 Belief that their hard disk is their RAM and downloading data will use up all their RAM and slow their computer down. It's impossible to explain that it will only use up storage space and not the working memory of the computer.
#11 Typing http:// before every URL or meticulously highlighting and deleting only the address between "http://www." and ".com" to get anywhere. Dammit it's just google.com!
#12 Technology teachers who don't understand the concept of keyboard shortcuts. They will tell you to do everything by the menus; they don't realize you can do the same thing much faster instead of clicking everywhere when you want to save or paste or etc. It just annoys me. Besides that, they seem to have learned everything they know from computers of two decades ago, and haven't kept up with the latest developments (or maybe its just the retarded teachers I have been doomed to get "taught" by.)
#13 Saving all your webpages on your desktop instead of just adding it as a bookmark. I always come across someone who has their desktop filled to the brim with shortcuts to websites (and they only use one or two of them anyway) and it's impossible to get anywhere within its cluttered mess. And, when you tell them they should clean it up or that there's a much better way to do the same thing, they take great offense.
#14 They will all use Internet Explorer despite there being 3 better browsers on the computer. (had to put this!)
#15 Using a low resolution signal on a huge LCD monitor.
#16 "you're on the computer all the time, so clearly you're just playing around with games and not doing anything important"
#17 Their inability to understand or bother to learn how to use some device or piece of software automatically means "this is a piece of *****".
#18 "THE MAC ONLY HAS ONE-MOUSE BUTTON IT SUX!!" (you can hook up any mouse you want to, shut up.) ..Though I agree Apple should just get rid of the one-button mouse all-together.
#19 Obsession with making websites with horrifying backgrounds and impossible to read text.
#20 Calling wireless cell phone headsets "using my Bluetooth".
I could go onto 100, but these are just some that immediately came to mind. - j01101010, on 10/12/2007, -5/+273they also forgot "Is that good?" I can't even begin to tell you how annoying I find that question. I am the tech guy in my group of friends so i have a couple people that always ask me for tech advice. When these people upgrade their computers they always ask me "Is that good?" as in "I'm gonna get 512 MB of RAM, is that good?" The reason i find that question so annoying is that almost every time the answer will be "It depends on what you're using it for." It's not really their fault and I understand where they're coming from, but its still annoying to me.
- datcrazydj, on 10/12/2007, -1/+234Whenever one of my friends see any HTML code, they refer to it as "MySpace Code".
- oriondr, on 10/12/2007, -11/+238One thing that bugs the crap outta me is when a non-tech savvy person is logging into a machine:
*moves mouse to the 'username' box & clicks*
*types in username*
*moves mouse to the password box & clicks*
*types in password*
*moves mouse to the "log on" button & clicks*
It's Username[Tab]Password[Enter] dammit! - bocaJWho, on 10/12/2007, -5/+231Gamers who don't have any idea how computers/networks work.
- pwallroth, on 10/12/2007, -1/+209How about people trying to get you to fix their computers over the phone. Just as hard as calling your mechanic and having them explain over the phone how to fix an engine.
- thecoolestcow, on 10/12/2007, -6/+209My biggest pet peeve when helping someone (usually over the phone) is when the conversation goes somewhat like this:
Me: Right click on Local Area Connection.
Woman: OK.
Me: Click properties.
Woman: Right click or left click?
Me: ...Left click. OK now click Internet Protocol and --
Woman: Right click or left click?
I hate that question with such a passion. It's as if they had never even heard of the right click until I just told them to use it. Irks me to no end. - alwaysmc2, on 10/12/2007, -5/+201http://duggmirror.com/offbeat_news/9_Things_The_Non_Tech_Savvy_Do_That_Annoy_Geeks/
- kyleh, on 10/12/2007, -2/+191#10- Internet Explorer is NOT "the internet"!!
i don't know how many times I've tried to explain this to people. - TheWorm, on 10/12/2007, -3/+170The absolute worst is when I'm trying to fix people's problems over the phone/internet and they aren't even sure what OS they're using. You'd be surprised how often this happens. Usually they don't even know what an Operating System is and think that Microsoft made their computer, and that they have a Mac becaus they use iTunes.
- thejackamo, on 10/12/2007, -2/+167i had a guy call once who said his internet connection wasn't working. i talked him through all of his network settings over the phone, and when it looked like he didn't have anything wrong on that end, i had him check to make sure the lights on his modem were all responding. check there as well. this took about 10 minutes to go through. then the following ensued:
"ok sir, could you go into safari and just go to a website."
"like what?"
"just any website will do."
"ok.....ok, i went to yahoo [me in my mind: people still use that??] and the screen is blank."
"blank like it has nothing on it? or does it say anything about "the page is not responding" or anything?"
"no, just blank."
then it dawned upon me.
"sir, are you typing in the address and pressing enter?"
"yeah i a....wait, what?"
"(a little louder and slower) are...you..PRESSING..en-TER?"
"....oh. oh, ok. it's working now."
ARRRRRRGGGGGG!!!IUHGJKLDBKJ - Easty, on 10/12/2007, -5/+162"1: Microsoft Word is the application for everything."
God yes.
I can't begin to tell you how many people have sent me pictures that were just copy-pasted into a word document. - dchaosdx, on 10/12/2007, -0/+148several stupidass things i hear when selling computers:
1.) why should i spend $1000 on this machine with a 1.8ghz core 2 duo when this $360 machine with a celeron does 3 ghz? do you think i'm that stupid?
2.) how many gigabarts does that machine have? (only heard that once)
3.) that computer only has 1gb of memory, i guess i should stay with the one i have at home that has 20gb. that's probably why i paid $3000 for it 8 years ago.
4.) i'd never buy an HP computer, their processors are crap. gateway makes better processors.
5.) customer: "i need a new modem". me: "here ya go, twenty bucks". customer: "that's not a modem, i guess i mean i need a cpu" me: "we don't sell cpu's by themselves, only complete computer towers", customer: "well how about one of those webtv's", me: "here ya go, msn webtv!", customer: "where's the dvd writer?" and so on and so forth.
i always think about telling the customer "you're an idiot. it's like going to a ford dealer and saying "i need a new engine" and then when they say they don't sell them you say "well then show me a chevy" - error792, on 10/12/2007, -2/+149#8 bugs me most... I was trying to set up an internet connection, but accidentally started creating a network. So this person claiming to know how to set up the internet since "she had already done it on her computer" came and changed a dozen TCP/IP connections, ***** up the settings so badly it was worse off than before, AND I was unable to revert it. She hadn't set up her connection, she had had a techie do it and then had to make *one* tiny change. Also, the librarian thinks that because she has computers in her library, she's a computer technician. If an application takes more than a second to load (these are Windows 98 computers), she thinks the computer is hanging and that you have to "click on it a few more times" to get it to open.
Argh. - lavitus, on 10/12/2007, -2/+146How about people who nearly put thier finger through the screen trying to point something out. Especially on an LCD.
- SirNoobius, on 10/12/2007, -11/+155dude two weeks ago my dad's cousin called me all the way from italy asking me why microsoft outlook doesn't work. i was like wtf do i know. install thunderbird and then she was all like I thought you were good at these things and i was like no i am not and dont ever ask me for help again.
- DolphinGL, on 10/12/2007, -1/+140#2,3,4,& 6 bug the ***** out of me all the time.
The list is also missing:
10: Learn to set your desktop resolution to native so that gorgeous LCD you just dropped $400 on doesn't look like complete ass at 800x600. - Easty, on 10/12/2007, -3/+139Oh god.
- invertedtwisted, on 10/12/2007, -1/+137Yeah, you can drive some people insane by deleting "the internet" off their desktop...
- sdpdt, on 10/12/2007, -3/+131I hate it when students on this hall buy regular phone cables for their ethernet ports and b-tch when it doesn't work.
- mutatron, on 10/12/2007, -0/+128Also, using "database" to mean any non-MS Word application. Where I work we have a web app that helps run our telecom refurbishing operations. We're working on a new version of it, and of course it's backed with a database. One of the higher ups asked in a general meeting how soon the database would be finished, I said "it's 95% complete already." Only later did I realize he was talking about the web app, which of course is still months from completion even though the database is now complete.
- bobbothegrayson, on 10/12/2007, -3/+128we geeks are so anal retentive
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -4/+125my biggest pet-peeve, the computer is NOT the hard drive. Dont point to the computer and say "they hard drive is bla bla bla" and expect someone to know how to fix it. They cant fix it, because there is nothing wrong with the HARD DRIVE!!
- dunezone, on 10/12/2007, -0/+120I like the double click one, mostly older people dont understand this.
- BrainedChild, on 10/12/2007, -13/+129You know, I'm all for venting frustrations, and some of these things are pretty annoying/funny, but it's not fair to call these people idiots. After all, they're good at things we suck at.
I've run into the memory vs. hard drive thing quite a bit, and it's understandable. When I was 10 (1994), I didn't know the difference, let alone what memory was for. I knew what it was by age 11, though.
And while I get annoyed at people constantly asking for PC help, I also understand my friends getting upset when I ask for car help. I don't like getting ripped off at the mechanic any more than your "average" person does a PC repair shop.
You have to remember, we get jobs doing this sort of thing because they can't. We shouldn't bite the hand that feeds. - cablemodemguy, on 10/12/2007, -1/+114What about people who think getting a high speed connection will magically turn an old PC into a new one?
One time I had a trouble call for a guy that thought a cable modem would make his camera hold more pictures, and needed a field tech to "come fix it". - TonyCubed, on 10/12/2007, -0/+111You know what is bad? I was in my colleges head office one time asking them to enable my account for the computers so I could print off some of my work, and the computer froze.
And they said: "Damn thing.."
me - "Whats up?"
Guy - "This computer just froze"
me - "OK then, erm, just restart the computer then?" -- Come on, you know it, if a program doesn't start for whatever reason, the chances are, you need to reboot the computer.
Guy - "Nah, I'll turn it off and turn it back on them"
me - "ok then..."
*Guy turns the monitor off*
Me thinking - "Wtf.."
*Guy turns the monitor back on to find the computer is still switched and tells me that the computers are down until someone can fix them*
*Starts screaming in my own head! :( :( :( :( :( *
At the end of the day, I love tinkering with computers, but, seeing people do stupid things make me angry and these stupid "Computer Training" Schemes need proper teachers. - Kale, on 10/12/2007, -0/+110This list expresses things I have felt for years. The double click, the aspect ratio, etc. Two things I would add, my dad always clicks on those annoying popups that say "We've found spyware on your computer, click "Yes" here to remove it", when the whole window is a bitmap ad to take you to some shady "spyware remover" that is most probably spyware itself, and my mom still goes to yahoo by typing "www.yahoo.com" in the Google searchbar, then clicking on the first link (she does this with every website she visits). I finally got them weaned off of IE6, and have Firefox and Opera installed, plus got them to run on a regular user account unless they needed to install something, and that seems to have stemmed the tide of constant viruses they were getting.
At one time, I would catch good deals on computers components on eBay, then re-sell full computers for a small profit. I guess since people knew me, they assumed they had tech support for life, and would call me and ask, "How do I set up multiple columns on Word?" and things like that. I got so tired of the constant support I stopped. - damentz, on 10/12/2007, -0/+110Asking how many songs your computer or mp3 player can hold drives me nuts. Whoever came up with that measurement should die, it's way too vague and its hard to understand. Why people just do not learn that songs vary from how long the song is and the average bitrate is beyond me.
- Tippis, on 10/12/2007, -0/+103@ bocajwho
"Gamers who don't have any idea how computers/networks work."
Ahh... the classical "I have a 24MBit connection, so it must be the server's fault if I get ***** ping (never mind the fact that the server sits on the other side of the planet)" - InternetUser, on 10/12/2007, -1/+104Oh. My. God. The ASPECT RATIO thing drives me insane. People have a 4:3 image stretched to 16:9 and I actually SHOW them what it's supposed to look like and they CAN'T TELL THE DIFFERENCE. wtf?
and the footy thing in the pubs ... haha so true. Always Sky Sports News in 16:9, ahh. I think the presenters would look skinny & weird if I ever met them in person xo - akira117, on 10/12/2007, -5/+107One of the things that annoys me is putting "www." in fount of an email address.
- TomP, on 10/12/2007, -7/+109I HATE THESE PEOPLE:
8: The Non-Tech Savvy Geek
There are breeds of human out there who are convinced they are super tech gurus, they’ve sussed out Microsoft Office, and they can program a VCR with their eyes closed, and to top it off, they can talk for hours about stuff they know nothing about, using words they don’t understand. These guys are annoying as hell, and they are dangerous too. If you work with one, they can mess up a whole morning’s work at the blink of an eye. And even more annoying, they always give the other non-tech savvy people false hope, by telling them something is possible when it’s absolutely not, then you cop the bad wrap because you can’t do what they were told was possible. “No I can’t configure your phone to charge via bluetooth” - zm634, on 10/12/2007, -0/+101#10 Claim they don't have to understand computers because they have you there to do it for them.
- elnerdo, on 10/12/2007, -1/+96My most hated thing is when people assume that since you "Know Computers" you must then be able to troubleshoot ANY PROGRAM that has EVER existed.
- GirSaysDoom13, on 10/12/2007, -0/+94this is a real conversation that happened to me about a month ago.
him: did you hear about the new iPod?
me: there is no new iPod.
him: yeah, there is! it's called the iPod River!
me: i'll be under your bed tonight with a knife. - rm999, on 10/12/2007, -3/+96"Getting a faster computer will speed up the internets."
That's the only one on there that really annoys me. Most of the other ones kinda follow my "ignorance is bliss" and "live and let live" philosophies (if someone stretches their desktop wallpaper, why do I care?) But needlessly replacing a computer is wasteful, bad for the environment, and costly. 75% of the time a format can entirely fix a computer. Another 20% of the time, a minor hardware replacement/upgrade would suffice. Rarely does an entire computer need to be replaced.
I have had only two computers in the last eight years, but I still get frequent compliments about how fast my computers are because I keep them up-to-date and clean from messy software. I also spend a fraction of what a lot of people who don't know this do. - mrASSMAN, on 10/12/2007, -0/+91Oh yeah,
#21 Sending constant mass emails (to everyone on his/her contact book) IN CAPITAL LETTERS announcing something that only 1/100 of us give a ***** about. - budman2000, on 10/12/2007, -3/+90Where I work, its not MS-Word that is the "application for everything", its MS-Excel.
Idiots put stuff in Excel because "it has column's".
Anything and everything can be adapted to columns, so everything goes into MS-Excel. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -3/+89Worse than Word for everything is Excel for everything. I've seen letters typed in Excel! Line by line on each row. Pagination was a nightmare.
- 2L84ME, on 10/12/2007, -4/+87My little trick is to act as if I don't know what they're on about and slowly make them say the right answer.
My family will often refer to Microsoft Office as simply "Microsoft." So when my mum nags me about a problem in "Microsoft," I'll often ask if I should head to Redmond to help out. (I'm slowly converting them to Linux, I swear!) - mindsnare, on 10/12/2007, -2/+84Off topic but let me just say the my god, the Digg effect is brutal,
I got more traffic to my site than I have ever had in 4 years total, I get 20gig of transfers a month and that seems to have been obliterated in about 10 minutes, amazing. - noeljohnhoward, on 10/12/2007, -0/+80i know what you mean about the faux tech savvy. One guy convinced a friend of mine that he needed a 600 gig hard drive to make his computer faster.
"no, the hard drive is for storage. not speed related. and you dont need that much storage"
"well i do have over a hundred photos.." - funkyu00, on 10/12/2007, -3/+81How about when someone asks how much "memory" people have on their computer when they really mean hard drive space and not RAM? Other people ask me how much memory my mp3 player has and its a hard drive mp3 player.
- computerdude33, on 10/12/2007, -0/+73One of my friends tries to justify her computer-savvyness by stating, "I SET UP OUR LINKSEES!"
- JamesWilson, on 10/12/2007, -2/+74My mom worked for Charter cable and she would have people calling in with complaints like:
"Why is there these black bars on the top and bottom of the screen?"
--"Ma'am that's letterbox, it is supposed to look like that."
And:
"Why doesn't my cable work, I paid the bill! I have digital cable with you guys, why doesn't it work?"
--"Okay sir, is your cable box plugged in and lit up on front right now?"
"Well our electricity was just cut off"
“Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the the universe.”
-Albert Einstein
Jeez..some people. - TheBigBrother, on 10/12/2007, -3/+75I hate people that relate problems to some maintenance thing i did.
- I change the display resolution
"my internet is not working anymore since you used it"
- I clear the internet cache and favicons
"i can't open word anymore because of you"
- I try to help cluttered desktops by sorting into folders "games", "text docs", "pictures", and "music"
*3 days later the desktop is cluttered again*
------------
finally.
people that think they're so smart by downloading a demo over and over again (causing the desktop problem above) instead of just cracking it - waxoff, on 10/12/2007, -0/+691) Referring to disk space as memory.
2) ***** LOADS of utter crap starting every time the computer boots...
3) You have a broadband connection and still pay for and use AOL. See #2.
4) Right click vs Left Click. Know the difference.
5) Referring to moving/installing/copying any file is "downloading." Other computers need not be involved. As in "I downloaded the file from the CD." -
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