Stupid people tricks

[wheel]

I just got an email from an association confirming my attendance to a conference. The email consisted of three scanned letters, attached as jpgs. How did that become easier then putting text in an email?


I used to work with a marketing guy who sent all his emails as excel spreadsheets. He didn't like ms word, so he would type his emails into an excel spreadsheet cell, then attach that to an email.

[jk3210]

I once listen to a woman from a PR firm tell me for 5 minutes how the story I said was on a page of my site WASN'T there. Turns out she didn't know what a scroll bar was and didn't realize there was more to a page than just what came up in the initial browser window.

[wyweb]

three scanned letters, attached as jpgs. How did that become easier then putting text in an email?

I'm guessing laziness. It's easier to attach than it is to type, or even copy and paste.


Well, almost easier than copy and paste.

[g1smd]

I think I already recounted the tale (several years ago) of the guy in the library who used M$ Live search to find Google, then used Google to find Yell, then spent 20 minutes clicking round Yell looking for the phone number of a local business... and finally resorted to using the phone book printed on dead trees to look it up.

If he had typed the business name and the town location into Google, their phone number was in the snippet of the #3 result. :)

[Leosghost]

Turns out she didn't know what a scroll bar was and didn't realize there was more to a page than just what came up in the initial browser window.

I think that applies to maybe 2 out of every 3 people that I have seen using computors ( and I have seen thousands ) that have never been shown / told that the scroll bar exists..owning a wheel mouse seems to make a slight difference ..their fingers hit the scroll wheel by accident ..and then they get it ..

On your own sites it helps to make content that either fits in the window view port ( bearing in mind these same people usually have smaller view ports due to their having installed myriads of toolbars ) or that obviously continues down ( images help ) in the hope that they get frustrated and find out for themselves.

I've had many people tell me that their machine is broken ( and can I fix it ..I don't do repairs except for friends ..this is just neighbors and acquaintances down the years ) "because it only shows the top half of pictures" or text is "cut off" ..at the bottom of the screen .

This subject is huge ;-)

[Hoople]

I lot of the local bar bands we run into have a 'computer genius' make them a cool design in Power Point for free. Then export it as a jpg. Yup, the jpg is entire body content of the homepage!

Many times we talk to them about their music and they ask why they don't come up in searches. Oh another key detail - the page that the jpg was loaded in has a title of: document1, welcome or new page, LOL.

[Leosghost]

I like the flash intros where the "skip intro" link is in the flash intro and doesn't appear 'til the end of the flash intro. ;-)

[Leosghost]

@g1smd
My wife did something very similar to that just this last Sunday here at home ..giving more detail would get me into a heap of trouble ;-)

edit ..and yes I've shown her many many times how to search and how page nav works etc ..some people really don't "grok" computors or the web ( even though they have, as in her case run successful businesses with many employees in the past ) ..still has ( on my advice ) a little book by the computor detailing simply how to switch it and it's monitor on ..and fire up a browser open open office etc ..linux for safety reasons obviously ..

I've given the same sort of little book to many friends and neighbors ..still get "call outs" though ..

[BeeDeeDubbleU]

their fingers hit the scroll wheel by accident

Yes, I have seen that sort of thing.

What annoys me most is when I see people doing something totally stupid in situations where they have asked for help. I tell them the easy way to do something and they dismiss it as too complicated preferring to take five minutes to do something that can be done in 20 seconds.

[g1smd]

You should publish your "little book" as a PDF or ePub file somewhere, with screen shots and photos of course. Millions of people are in need of such a thing.

As for doing it the 5 minute way instead of the 20 second way, I worked with a very brainy PhD a few years ago who was totally frustrated in getting a list to line up in WordPerfect. He used the space bar to line everything up on screen, but when printed nothing was lined up. Totally would not even entertain trying the TAB button. He was still on the same page 2 hours later, and the printer ran out of paper as he had reprinted the whole document dozens of times. Wouldn't entertain trying the "print single numbered page" option either.

[BeeDeeDubbleU]

That is exactly what I mean. Some people think that you are trying to be nerdy or showing off or something when you try to explain how to do something on a PC.

Another scenario I have often encountered is when someone asks you how to do something, you spend the next half hour trying to explain but they are not getting it. They get frustrated and tell you not to bother - they'll find another way of doing it.

"Excuse me I just wasted a half hour of my life trying to explain this to you now you tell me not to bother?"

... or perhaps it's just that I am not a good teacher :(

[AnkitMaheshwari]

Once I had a client who got really excited when I sent a mail with an excel attachment as she never knew you could do such a thing on email. Then, I had to guide her (over the phone) how to download and open the attachment which took about 30-45 minutes.

On top of it she was completely unaware that something called an excel file exists. Initially I thought must be a mac user however, to my surprise was using M$ from the beginning... and I was cursing myself why I took Mac's name in front of her as then I had to explain the OS concept... :(

[jecasc]

Haha, I remember the time when I was a stupid user myself. Once I made an advertisment for the local newspaper in Photoshop. Then I got an email that I forgot to include the fonts with the file. So I went to the windows fonts folder, and copied the fonts into a zip file together with the photoshop file. I didn't hear back from them, but they must have had a good laugh at my expense.

Only a few month later I found out that you embed fonts with a photoshop file by saving it with the option "embed fonts" checked.

Once I called customer service after buying a new Trinitron flat screen monitor. There were two horizontal lines visible on the screen and I wanted to complain. The guy at customer service told me to open the manual on page one. There in bold letters it said: You may notice two horizontal lines on the screen. This is not a defect but are visible support wires needed for the flat screen technologie.

[Leosghost]

You should publish your "little book" as a PDF or ePub file somewhere, with screen shots and photos of course. Millions of people are in need of such a thing.

Organising its publication on line ( as an ebook / PDF ) and in hard ( paper) copy ( and DVD ) has been progressing for a little over a year now ..( and it's not the only "subject" that I'm working on guides for ) ..it ( the PC and also a Mac "Howto" )will be one of the first in a series of guides ) ..I always thought that the "Dummies" series presupposed a level of knowledge and competence in many of the subjects that they treated that was more advanced than many of it's intended audience had ..

It's in 3 languages now ..and translation to two more is in progress ..launch will be in 5 languages simultaneously ..and it will be dirt cheap ( so that the pirates don't bother torrenting it even if they take the time to crack the protection that locks it to a mac address on the downloadable version) ..plus I'd like it to be the kind of thing that grandchildren could easily afford ( say under $10.oo or maybe even under $5.oo ) to buy for their grandparents to help them keep in touch ..Similar thing would be nice for smart phones ..but they change real fast and the market is more fragmented even in Anglophone markets alone.

I decided there was a demand for it ( and similar on other diverse subjects ) after watching my wife ( who is very far from dumb ..but like many a bit technophobe when faced with a computor )..and especially as her work is based around the care of geriatric patients many with Alzheimers /Dementia ( some just have slight memory problems though ..no worse than your average 25 to 30 year old ) in their own homes.

She's frequently asked me to advise her old folks on what PC to buy in order to stay in touch with family that are maybe 500 mile away or more ..they maybe only fire up once a week to real email or to use messenger ( spit! ) or equivalent in Linux ..and sometimes the family buy a laptop for grandma or grandpa ..who are then totally lost with it ( forget how to switch it on ) as soon as the kids have gone home after the weekend ..hence I get lots of volunteer call outs ;-)

I have been printing out and plasticising "How to switch it on etc" "cheat sheets" in French for a while now for many old folks ..and began expanding the idea and going multi format over a year ago..I had bought the "Dummies" guides for some of them ..they couldn't understand it ..it was already too technical.

Linux boxes ( safer as they the old folks ..and in fact many average "users" have a tendency to click any and everywhere ) I get by collecting old machines from our local "town dump" where they are set aside as the arrive ..I cannibalise hardware to make 1 from 3 etc ..and then install Linux ( usually mint ) and give them a "cheat sheet" and some tuition ..and run the occasional group so the better ones can help the others ..

( anyone can refurbish machines like this ..."hint" ;-)

Hardest thing about getting the guide(s) together is the purchase of various domain names ..the trademarking and so on ..and the registering ( France has odd laws for paper "publishers ) as both online and off line publisher in various jurisdictions..and off course the screenshots and animation ( usually "camtasia" or "wink" ) and recording of material , proofreading etc etc ..

( personally I think there's an even bigger market for downloadable 36 hour days and roundtooits than for "guides" ;-)

But if you can make money and provide a real service ..Its worth the effort ..or so I tell myself when my eyes loose focus in front of the screen at 04.00 am or my wife wakes me up at 06.00 am from where I fell asleep in the chair in front of a keyboard.

Btw ..yes I'm aware that proofreading isn't my strongest point ;-) ..I have my prose "triple checked" by others .when I'm not posting or sending emails :-)

[LifeinAsia]

I like the flash intros where the "skip intro" link is in the flash intro and doesn't appear 'til the end of the flash intro. ;-)

Yup- I've mentioned that many times to people.

[sleepy_eye]

We got a collection notice once on behalf of a company that said we owed them .01 dollars. We thought it was a joke and called the company. Apparently they have some sort of automated deal. Bad part was getting the collection agency to back off their 30$ service fee, which they did eventually.