> Young people (on average) know less about computing than they did.

They know less about desktop computing.

And they know more about cultural computing. In the same way they'd be clueless when faced with a DOS prompt, many older people are clueless about how Insta etc work.

You could argue that's not really computing, and in a very obvious sense it isn't. But it's certainly a form of application development, for a very specific kind of application.

And the up side is that - unless AI takes over - people who can do nuts and bolts infrastructure computing will be rarer and in even higher demand than they are now.

I do disagree with the article: there are lots more opportunities for kids to deep dive into almost any field of tech that they choose to.

But, on the other hand, I've met teenagers who lacked confidence even using a browser to navigate to an unfamiliar website. They've learned how to navigate particular apps as silos.

This reminds me of my parents and grandparents' generation using computers. Comfortable with what they know and use regularly; no concept of what happens outside of that narrow window.

Kids these days know less about cars than they used to. Lots of them drive, but they couldn't service the engine.

Same energy.

Tangent.

I grew up with cars I could (and did) service. I still remember how to break down a drum brake, and adjust it so it worked again when re-assembled. I've used grease zerks on the auto I drove. I've helped troubleshoot a carburetor.

Can't do that anymore, and it's only partially because the components don't exist, but because everything is so much more complicated you have to specialize in it to get much done.

Tangent wrap-up.

Maybe these "digital natives" have simply decided to specialize in something other than computers (and cars). Not all of them: I work with several folks who are decades younger than me, and they're perfectly comfortable with packet captures and bare metal databases.

My great grandma played Klondike Solitaire with actual cards. How low-level is that?

Yup, this article is some world-class curmudgeoning. Most kids my age weren't programming at 7, so I had free reign on the commodore PET in the school library. Same thing goes for kids of today. Most are passive consumers, some will tear their world apart and figure out what makes things tick.

> Can't do that anymore, and it's only partially because the components don't exist, but because everything is so much more complicated you have to specialize in it to get much done.

As a tuner, this reads strangely. I've rebuilt my ABS disc brakes and ECU tuning has been a thing for decades. People are building 300hp Saabs in their garages with open source software.

> I grew up with cars I could (and did) service. I still remember how to break down a drum brake, and adjust it so it worked again when re-assembled. I've used grease zerks on the auto I drove. I've helped troubleshoot a carburetor.

Maybe not the same thing, but about two years ago, my car's check engine light came on. Dealer quoted me $2400 to fix the issue (ABS pump failed because of low voltage on system power). About a month ago, some friends and I spent a Saturday replacing the ABS pump. $300 ebay part, $20 worth of tools, $10 worth of brake fluid, $50 worth of OBD-2 readers to confirm what the problem was, and $50 for lunch for my friends.

I think it's not impossible to fix cars today. Maybe you won't be tuning an engine to get more power out of it, but it's 100% possible to tear down your brakes, brake systems, and lots of other stuff if you know where to look. I'm not super technical with cars, but if you forced me to it, I could change out my car's brake pads given two days.

This stuff isn't easy, and the tools are more computerized now, but if you want to understand modern cars, the info is out there. Buy your car's maintenance manual. It'll probably cost $30, but you'll have more information about your car than you could ever possibly learn. Every circuit, every resistor, every bus line, every hydraulic line.

But I think you're right that there is a class of people who work at a level above the tech. And I think that's what "digital native" usually refers to. Something less like a software engineer, something more like a societal engineer (I don't want to use the term "social engineer" because that's a loaded term in the security world). For them, tech is a platform to be used for alternate ends - followers, and likes, and clout and such.

I think it's a good thing that not everyone needs to be able to troubleshoot DHCP issues in order to get online - though I know that my friends and I got really good at that in high school. The fact that we enable people to operate at the level of societal engineering (as opposed to forcing everyone to operate at the level of software engineering) speaks to the maturity of tech. And that, at least, should be comforting to those who use tech to create tech.

desktop computing had core skills that could be developed, that would apply across different programs.

on mobile systems, the balance of power feels very different. apps are each their own immersive experiences, each picking their own widgets, toolkits, styling, paradigms. many apps are a thin shell over far off closed services we could not understand if we tried.

mobile has been a very advanced war on general purpose computing. the value of understanding the os, understanding "computing" has gone way way down in this far more black boxes environment. the user has been treated like an idiot, protected endlessly from themselves, and the technical underpinnings deeply deeply masked over.

computing is being destroyed, especially on mobile. the desktop is one of the few places one has any chance to learn about computing in any meaningful way.

I wish this thread would focus more on this, and less on how poorly the article expresses it. The very concept of "mobile" as some sort of distinct platform is an attack on general purpose computing. Refer to a smartphone as a "computer", and people will look at you strangely. The entire thing is a highly succuessful exercise in escaping the decades of culture norms surrounding general purpose computing.

Until you can make a first class "mobile app" on a mobile, it's a system for manipulating people.

Which is a problem when you get to to work in the real world in some cases I have seen a lot of basic knowledge.

Of course its muggings here how has to perform the task of putting it all back together - the emotional labor to use a modern term.

The business world will all be app-based once Gen-Z starts founding companies.

I've already seen some of that various agencies sharing work on numerous different "sharing platforms" and this is not internes this is supposedly big name agencies working for major brands.

And I don't see any merit in being proficient in using any touchscreen device, which have been proven intuitive enough for a toddler or even an ape to understand. So you can tap, drag, scroll, swipe? Impressive digital nativity.