After a long hiatus for which I have no excuse, Chit Chat Across the Pond Lite is back with a fabulous interview with Adam Engst, publisher of the long-running Internet-based email newsletter, TidBITS. Adam’s been on the show a few times and he’s always a delight.
This episode focussed on an article he published in TidBits entitled, iPhone Recommendations for Senior Citizens.
My audience knows that I’m an advocate for the accessibility of technology in all forms, and they also know that I bristle at the suggestion that people past a certain age aren’t good at technology. If you throw in gender along with that, such as a phrase I hear all too often, “It’s so easy your mother could use it”, the top of my head blows off.
I read Adam’s article with a desire to learn any tips he could provide to making the iPhone more accessible to seniors and at the same time I was ready to jump down his throat if you implied that elderly people can’t be technically competent. I was delighted to find that he pushed none of my hot buttons and gave terrific advice. In our conversation we talk about how to approach senior citizens on what their needs are, and to understand where their limitations might be. Do they lave low vision? Arthritis? Cognitive issues? Dry fingers?
We talk about the pros and cons of Face ID vs. Touch ID as it relates to the different challenges each person might be facing. Adam even gives some cool suggestions on how to rearrange their home screen on the iPhone including a Shortcut he created that might make communicating with just a few people easier.
After you sign up for the TidBITS newsletter, you can follow Adam on Mastodon at @[email protected] and @[email protected]
Read an unedited, auto-generated transcript: CCATP_2023_11_02
In my Apple consulting business I have about a dozen senior citizens who are overwhelmed with all their Macintosh can do when basically they are using it for email and web access. I demonstrated my 12.9-inch iPad Pro with the Magic Keyboard and it turns out that’s what they really want… they don’t need a computer. The iPad backs up to iCloud automatically. It’s easy to turn on and off. It’s easier than the Mac to understand. It’s easy to reverse pinch to read some text. All of these dozen folks in fact switched from the Mac to the iPad. There is one disadvantage for me… I never see them again. Oh… BTW, at 77 years of age I am also a senior citizen!
That’s awesome, David. I think there’s a lot to be said for an iPad vs. a Mac for a lot of people. It even seems to keep them out of trouble to some extent!