Why do you suppose the collective is technologically dyslexic (as a whole)?

I think it’s just because they tend to be very specific, so unless the right person happens to come along at the right time, they will slip into eternal orphanhood.

From reading Fluther for a while and looking at how people behave, I gather that it (and places like Askville, or Yahoo Answers) are often the very first Internet community that these folks have ever joined. If this is the first place someone has ever really hung out online, chances are, they’re not all that technically savvy.

Fluther also seems to draw a generally more middle aged crowd, whereas younger people are often more technologically “hip.” Also, the more technically literate are likelier to hang out at different sites, such as slashdot.

I tend to agree with @Jayne. A lot of the questions that end up as orphans are ones that are about certain models of a device.

@laureth ; What does a cigarette lighter have to do with middle aged jellies? Am I THAT old?

Eh?

Oops! This is the link I meant to put in up there. The lighter link was leftover on my clipboard from another question.

I also third @Jayne – I know we have incredible tech-minded Flutherites that answer the really hard tech questions. However when the question is about a certain feature on a certain product the chances of finding another user who has encountered the same problem is slim.

Even it the chat room @gggristo walked me through modifying a PHP based program, and I am clueless as to what PHP even means.

There is also the chance of “Question Burnout” meaning a question has been asked so many times that the tech minded do not want to bother.

“How do I jailbreak my iPhone?”

For linguistic dyslexia, “it requires to much work” . Too

We can be experts in only so many areas; I feel sometimes that if I cram another fact into my brain, an older piece of info will fall out of my ear.

I know everything there is to know about everything, but certain people I just don’t care for.

@gailcalled . . . I’ve had that happen. It was very unpleasant and I would not recommend it to anyone.

@laureth I remember Andrew showing me that website before. But how on earth does it, y’know, know the age, gender, amount of kids, etc. etc? I never filled out a form with that information when I signed up on Fluther.

I just assumed those questions were unanswerable because the person asking had absolutely zero idea what they were talking about, so anyone who could answer wouldn’t even know where to begin.

@gailcalled I know .. I missed an “o” .. I noticed just now as I read all your posts. In my defense, English is a retarded language. =D

There’s something sad and lonely about question orphans and I wish there were some orphans I could adopt but… they are all too tech savvy for me.

Because no one uses Lotus Notes anymore.
I see a lot of Lotus Notes questions there.

Many of the tech questions asked on Fluther are hyperspecific, and having general tech knowledge, as I think many jellies do, doesn’t help you fix super-specific problems on super-specific platforms.

IE, I know plenty about macs, but I don’t have an iPhone, so I have no idea how to fix things on it- why would I know that?

And iPhone questions are the easy ones- many orphan questions are about pieces of tech I haven’t even heard of.

Maybe it is due to the type of people who come to this site. I like to discuss many topics that are not related to technology or what I consider to be unimportant questions. Also, i do not own IPOD , IPHONE or any of those things nor do I have any intention to have them. Even though I am in my 20s, my technological knowledge stopped at the late 90s.

@airowDee XD I’m kinda the same way. I never even had a cell phone until recently.

So what I’m gathering is that people are asking questions that are about a specific technology.. one that the collective doesn’t own for the most part.

It just seems odd to me that the collective primarily focuses on life questions..

Life Questions are more interesting. Everyone has some experience and certainly opinions. Where’s opinions in an Ipod doomafricky?

I think @aphilotus said it all. I can speak for myself as being very limited in my technology knowledge, and what I do know is very broad.

I do know when the word “dyslexia” is misused, though!

Speaking of high tech, how many crumbs can a laptop hold?

@faye I don’t know. How many?

@ubersiren Is the word not used correctly? I’m still learning English.

@NaturalMineralWater just worrying about mine.

@faye AH! LOL! I thought you had a joke all lined up. xD

Well if mine is any indication a laptop can hold at least an entire loaf of bread. My boys aren’t very nice to it.

Oh, I must apologize. I didn’t realize English was not your first language.