I am speaking with literate, competent people. I recently spoke with a guy who is wealthy and a co-owner of a local successful business that has been around a long time. He is a local mover and shaker. He told me he does not own a computer at all.
Meanwhile, the website for his company has one of the best local websites I have tripped across, his business card lists his email address and he carries a very nice smartphone. I imagine he can get online with his smartphone, yet he apparently does not consider that to be a computer for purposes of viewing my websites.
He didn't want my email. He wanted me to text message him my phone number. He is a very intelligent man with a lot going on, but he straight up told me "I am [x age], I am not going to learn this stuff." I know people about that same age on Hacker News who program, etc.
Unemployment is high in this town. I would like to start hooking people up with earning opportunities that already exist on the internet. I am facing a lot of challenges in trying to connect to people. But I think there is a huge opportunity here for making some headway against some of the local problems via spreading the word that the internet is not just a place to watch YouTube videos and hang out on Facebook. There is a lot more going on in cyberspace than that and you can have a lot more going on in your life for the price of a (free) library card and a little digital literacy.
I find it frustrating that every question I have posted so far on Hacker News related to this desire of mine has been generally met with so little real support, for example the utter lack of reply here:
However, it happens to lie next to another concern with a much larger scope and severity: the failure of the American educational system in general. Compared to this, a few Luddites and facebook-only websurfers isn't such a big deal.
Literacy is paramount, NOT digital literacy, I mean the ability to read, write, and perform basic mathematics. Public schools in America are floundering when it comes to basic education. Students leave school without the most fundamental skills required to do anything other than menial labor, let alone author insipid React components.
That's a giant scary problem that is accelerating, and there will be a very ugly comeuppance in the USA for neglecting education.