Re: Buried the lede
Using a computer and going online *is* as routine as driving your own car, it's several orders of magnitude easier than it was in the 1980s.
If your real question is either :
why are applications a bit crap?
why do device drivers for your printer/other device suck?
The answer is
1) Users don't want to pay for one that's any good
2) The business isn't willing to pay to produce something decent
3) The number of people willing to fight for things such as right to repair is too low, allowing unscrupulous companies (hey Apple!) to abuse their position.
In the early 80 to early nineties :
Computers were expensive
Connectivity was pricey and difficult to configure, regardless of if it was a modem or network
Word processors suitable for business were five hundred quid a copy
Printers were also expensive
Early operating systems were generally a real pain to use
None of that is true now.
I see this over and over 'why doesn't <cheap piece of tat> work with <minority operating system, or my hacked together system>?' 'Well if you pay 3-4 times the price you'll have something that works much better and keeps going for years' 'I only want to spend $not_much on <cheap tat>'.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
