Wow! a Netflix Account
A few of years ago I was showing houses to a rather chatty twenty something. She noticed the Netflix envelopes sitting in the back seat of my car waiting to be mailed. She commented on how cool it is that someone my age knows about Netflix.
A couple of years ago a very young local Realtor was all impressed because he sent me a text message and I responded quickly. He seemed to believe that only generation Y uses text messaging which makes me wonder why he chose that method of communication in the first place. His message tripped the arrogance meter that resides somewhere in my subconscious.
Who are you calling old?
I smile when people who are the same age as my children think that technology belongs to their generation. I think of the ancient ones. I can call them ancient because they are over 80 years old. They sit in their townhouse on cold winter days on their Macintosh laptops and surf the net. They can stay in touch with friends and family and explore the world without ever leaving their home.
He has had a blog since 2002, and kept suggesting that it might work for a Realtor as a way of marketing. I didn’t listen I was too busy doing open houses. He got his first iPod a year before I did and kept telling me that I should be pod casting. They got their first home computer in 1980. It wasn’t much of a computer compared to what we have today but it helped them get started and one of them can probably still program the dang thing.
When we were you age . .
They follow me on twitter and get all parental with me if they see a naughty tweet. They are on facebook along with their teen-aged grand children. They are talking about getting rid of their home phone because they can get by with just a cell phone and save a buck or two. The best way to reach them most days is by email.
They are not as mobile as they used to be so they don’t need an iPhone. Only one of them drives now so they order their groceries and just about everything else over the internet, and one of them walks to the farmers market or the corner store for the rest.
They are a bit different from the younger people in that they have the disposable income to buy just about any tech toy they want. They have huge color monitors hooked up to their Macs and their desks are covered with a variety of colorful and expensive tech toys.
Watch what you say
Heaven help the youngster, and by youngster I mean anyone under fifty, who says anything about ancient ones being cute because they get technology. Heck in some ways their ability to live independently depends upon it. They exploit every tool they can find and they do it well.
When it comes to communicating with ancient ones I would never make the assumption that they don’t use email or surf the net. I would ask them how I can best serve them.
