Re:Yahoo Mail’s Plan to Fix Email: Make Computers Read It
by chongli on Monday August 05, 2019 @06:30AM
(#20612876)
Last fall I spent 4 months on a co-op term in the IT department of a reasonably large (~2000 employees, not huge) investment company. Before I started, my boss-to-be repeatedly warned me about the hundreds of emails I would have to read every day.
It was rough going for the first week or so but by the second week I had a large number of folders and filtering rules set up. I had at least 80% of the emails being marked as read and tucked away as soon as they were received, since they were mostly log files I only needed to look at if something went wrong.
The problem is people not learning to properly use a tool that they spend a big part of their time with, and instead fearing that if they touch one wrong thing, one wrong button, their computer or smartphone will explode.
I have no idea how to cure people of this problem. I have been trying to teach my dad how to use his computer and phone nearly all my life. He's learning things, sure, but there's never any moment where I feel like I've handed him the keys to the Corvette, so to speak. Each time I show him how to do something, it's like I'm driving him to a different appointment.
It was rough going for the first week or so but by the second week I had a large number of folders and filtering rules set up. I had at least 80% of the emails being marked as read and tucked away as soon as they were received, since they were mostly log files I only needed to look at if something went wrong.
The problem is people not learning to properly use a tool that they spend a big part of their time with, and instead fearing that if they touch one wrong thing, one wrong button, their computer or smartphone will explode.
I have no idea how to cure people of this problem. I have been trying to teach my dad how to use his computer and phone nearly all my life. He's learning things, sure, but there's never any moment where I feel like I've handed him the keys to the Corvette, so to speak. Each time I show him how to do something, it's like I'm driving him to a different appointment.