Define Connectivity

RantWoman hangs with a number of people who are at least RantWoman's age but have not been nerding about technology since high school. This means RantWoman sometimes finds herself speaking not only in terms of, say, universal service fee or affordable connectivity program but in more idiosyncratic terms and in concepts more digestible to people who do not swim in technobabble all the time. 

Case 1, paraphrasing slightly: RantWoman, I am still using Windows Vista and I don't even like to connect to the internet but are there any programs that do speech recognition?  (RantWoman is pretty sure he mentions having JAWS though what version RantWoman has no desire to know.

Facepalm, which the caller can't see because it is a voice call and he is a blinder than RantWoman

Fire up the Google, which brings results free of all the endless ad links of modernity.

Video 1: Persistent blind guy has no interest in Perl Scripting.

Video 2, one of a series available at SimonSez.com Instructional video

Uh-oh. Now what?

--Is RantWoman saintly enough to download a bunch of videos and mail persistent blind guy a USB drive?

--Should RantWoman help blind guy find a library where he could at least try out both the internet and newer software?

--Is there a social worker somewhere, besides RantWoman, who MIGHT maybe be able to cheerlead persistent blind guy about paths to an actual internet connection and more up-to-date technology?

Stay tuned...

Case 2, QR code reader: 

Caller RantWoman talks to frequently. Caller recently received a new Windows 10 machine, just in time to manage the transition from Windows 8 at the end of Windows 8 support. 

Caller is trying to sort out some questions about Microsoft 365 or Google. RantWoman's understanding is that caller's new computer came with Windows 10 and a non-internet version of Office. RantWoman is not sure caller realizes this and new computer keeps pestering her about wouldn't she like to sign up for Office 365? 

NO! Caller lives on a very fixed income and has neither desire nor capacity to add any kind of new annual fee.

Caller does have home internet. RantWoman is unclear about all the details but caller has found service she can live with through some kind of budget plan. Among other things, this means she has ducked all the tedious back and forth needed to sign up for the Affordable Connectivity Program. Caller has email; RantWoman recently needed to try to talk caller through some steps RantWoman takes for granted about creating an email on one account, sending it to another account, and editing the email before forwarding it to the intended recipient. RantWoman's desire to be patient with new learners is strong; RantWoman's actual ability to be patient is a lot less than when she was younger.

But editing email is not the only point. This caller has some kind of low-budget Android phone that comes with her phone plan. The price is right. But in an age when all kinds of information can be had on the fly by pointing one's device camera at a QR code, this caller's phone does not have a QR code reader.

What to do???

RantWoman suggests calling the budget service provider: people are paying good money for their services and not having access to a QR code reader is like not building a bridge all the way to the other side of a river.

(Ditto for low budget devices, say tablets, that turn off built-in accessibility features, but that is another rant)

RantWoman also suggested firing up the Google, or the DuckDuckGO, since this caller has some experience with DDG. For a search term, use the exact model of the phone plus QR Code reader. 

RantWoman just realized she is not thinking with all her brain cells: this caller should just fire up the Google play store and use the search term QR Code reader. Caller is not really excited about possibly having to fish through a bunch of different apps and RantWoman herself is not in the habit of interacting with app ratings, for one thing because RantWoman is impatient based on her own accessibility needs. But maybe searching on the PC and then identifying one or two apps to try on the phone will seem less risky: only download one or two of the apps with good ratings.

Which pieces of RantWoman advice will bear fruit??? Stay tuned.