My parents are pretty much complete opposites in their view of technology: my mother just learned last year how to turn on the computer and types at approximately a speed of 5 words per minute; my father builds computers for fun and spends more money than necessary on any new technological ‘toy’ we can afford. I guess I get my love for technology from my father. My mother, as well as many of my older family members, believes that she doesn’t “need” a computer. “I didn’t have it for the first 50 years of my life, I can live without it now,” she says all the time. Its not a matter of needing, its wanting it. On a weekend, or day off during the week, I probably check my email (numerous email accounts) more than 2 dozen times a day. Yes, I know, that probably sounds excessive. I think I’m addicted.
*Hi, my name is Chrissy, and I’m an Internet-addict.*
My concern is that I (we, as a society) am so dependent on the computer. What will we think of next? How much more advanced can we get? Will I become like my mother and stick to the computer that I grew up using instead of the new technology that my kids will be born into? Probably not. Most likely, I will be like my dad and buy one of the first flying cars and robots. We’ll see….
Chinchillaaaaaa 
@ Chrissy
I had sort of the same problem (is that what we want to call it?) in my family. My father is self-employeed and get all sorts of programs for his computer. But he’s ‘from the old school’. If you need to use it, use have to READ the directions. It’s not a good idea to just ‘play around’ with this stuff. He’s always been like that. When we got our 1st VHS VCR, I connected it, played around with it, and read what I had to read. I pulled a ‘dad’ on everyone in the family — “Read the directions.”
My mother uses a computer at work daily. Most of it is using spread sheets, e-mails and occaisional internet.
Now on my wife’s side of the family, her mother subscribed to AOL for years and years and has never even used a computer. And for most of those years, nobody was living in the house except her and Elizabeth, my sister-in-law and she has Down Syndrome and also never used the computer (for the record Elizabeth now has an email account through Heritage Christian Home. She now e-mails everyone (or how she calls it fe-mails).
With all I know about computer technology, which really isn’t that much; I just can’t imagine how much my children or their children will be able to do.
~cheers
Comment by Peter Schultheis — April 2, 2008 @ 5:11 pm