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All these stories about zoomers not knowing how to do computer stuff is making me want to write a fantasy world where magic is prevalent but most people do not bother to know how it works or question it beyond its surface applications, despite it being the basis for all military and economic might.
Well I wanted to write that, but then I realized I was talking about FMA: Brotherhood.
I feel like the Empire in warhammer 40k operates on a similar premise, all there machune rituals and what not are just maintanance, but nobody understands the machines, so they'll just reenact what was shown to someone eons ago or what have seemed to cause some effect.
just like me blowing into NES Cartridges when a game would not start :D.
Smearing computers with weird oils and burning sage in a server room sounds crazy now, but rather that than try your luck with a customer service LLM.
In sci-fi proper that is also a plot point of Isaac Asimov's The Foundation. The giant galactic empire collapses and all the scholars are holed up on a planet to preserve knowledge. They then go out to other planets and give technology, but everyone is so ignorant that it seems like magic and the scholars kind of roll with it.
In a similar vein is A Canticle for Liebowitz which is about an order of Monks whose goal is to preserve all technology and information after an apocalypse scenario. I think it may have been the inspiration for the Brotherhood of Steel.
It moves through time and shows how ignorance of technology can mix too easily with religious power.
"So, like, you can just conjure up a gun out of a brick?"
"It's more complicated than that! You have to do a bunch of math and science and draw a circle and stuff"
"Okay, sure... but then you can just create a gun. Or you can science water into wine. Or any dirty liquid into clean water. Or medicine? You can turn dust into medicine. Using nothing but your brain and a stick of chalk."
"Well, yes! Isn't it cool!"
"And what did you say your title was, again?"
"The big fucking gun alchemist, why?"
Discworld's magic system is like this. The wizards often don't know why certain parts of a ritual or spell are in place, but it works so they don't touch it
Half of the plots of the Wizard books are about what happens when someone ignores that advice and does start poking at things better left alone. Wizards are only human after all, and the magical equivalent of a "don't touch; wet paint" sign leaves them so very tempted.
It's also basically how the Adeptus Mechanicus operates in 40k. Lots of worshipping the old tech, preserving it, and there's some limited giant machines that they could never fathom rebuilding or even fixing so they're very protective of them
Also, basically my codebase at work.
Ive seen at least one other anime that was like that, cant remember the title but the magic system was surprisingly fleshed out for a 12 episode anime
Edit: Akashic Records of Bastard Magic Instructor
they don't understand what is an emulator?
Something to do with these fellas, I think:
ostriches ? ah, I get it. OStrich
It's affecting the older generations too. My grandma loved playing solitaire on her laptop. I asked her "did that come with the OS?" And she responded with "What's an OS". Crazy times.
It's like that 'What's a computer?' ad
Everything is so abstracted nowadays that even the specialists are disconnected from understanding the underlying systems
It was inevitable. Long ago you had to know a lot about cars and engines to own a car. Now only enthusiasts know that kind of stuff.
That's how i think of it. My dad can tear a car apart. I can't wrap my head around changing the brakes. But i know how computers work, because i grew up needing to know.
I always found it fascinating to learn about the things I used in my life worked, because as a kid I loved learning to take things apart, mod, and put them back together. But there never seems to be enough time to study and understand everything, because most devices we use are over-engineered (read: repair hostile), so I can't ever think about becoming a jack of all trades like my family members are.
Electronics, yes. Mechanical, no. I have to pay someone else to help me.
Eh, there's a curiosity aspect as well. I can't do work on my car, but I can change the oil, tires, brake pads, and such. I understand the principle of how an IC engine works. I'm a computer programmer but I think it's because I'm a curious person who likes knowing how things work, and computers offer more chances to learn than anything else on the planet.
It isn't ignorance that has ever bothered me about boomers, zoomers, or anyone else. It's that 99% of people you meet are fundamentally incurious. They don't care how things work, they don't care if they could work differently.
Now sports cars have paddle shifters so people can pretend to drive manual
Reminds me about that line in World War Z (Max Brooks)
(Paraphrasing) "Some survivors were frustrated with the assignments they were given. A lady who was a former TV exec was furious that she was assigned to a janitorial unit, led by someone who's lifetime salary she made in a month!
For people like her, you didn't have to worry about fixing a plumbing issue or cleaning your home. She just hired someone else to do it, because she made money talking on the phone, and the more people she hired, the more time she could spend talking on the phone. After the Great Panic, nobody bothered to use phones anymore. There were no TV contracts that needed to be made, but there were toilets that needed work, and floors to clean. In a strange way, the blue collar workers outranked their "superiors" in importance to the community. We needed mechanics, engineers, HVAC workers, plumbers. We had those people of course, but there was never enough of them."
The concept of an emulator isn't even that old. Like, literally all throughout the 2000s and 2010s. How did this generation grow up so oblivious to everything? "What's an emulator?" "How do you use a computer?"
Bro, are we talking about 80 year olds or 20 year olds
Smartphones have made tech interaction ridiculously accessible and also into a locked down blackbox kinda thing at the same time. Consider how everything is a website now, and yet many people don't know how to use a browser, as they install hundreds of apps instead.
As someone who is 25 I get some weird looks when I blankly and automatically tell people I don't have nor will I use apps for store services. I'll use a website happily but the busted ass apps can go fuck themselves.
For me it's the privacy angle that matters.
All these restaurant apps being pushed like "it's cheaper on the app!" and "you can get a free side on the app!"
And I'm almost tempted to install it, but then I remember by doing so I'm giving the company a wealth of data to slurp on me, letting them bombard me with notifications, and giving their logo a shining advertisement spot in my app drawer so every time I'm hungry I see it, and want it.
When I think about the higher non-app price in those terms, as a "privacy tax" to keep my data and my dignity, then I'm happy to pay it.
That's also a factor, but functionality matters as well in this situation. The fact that I have a phone made in 2024 and 2/3 of fast food apps dont fucking work on my phone is kinda ridiculous. Does help remove the temptation to get the apps though, thanks Motorola you save me some privacy now let me remove your shitty default apps you motherfuckers.
If the oldest zoomers are almost 30 and the youngest are just barely teens, I guess we've reached the point where "younger" zoomers could be 18 or 20.
Am zoomer, am 18
So like, how did she get an emulator working on iOS without knowing how?
You can just download one from the App Store as of a year or so ago.
A lot of emulators are just apps, but the iso itself is a bigger mystery. My guess is an older sibling or even parent helped set that up. Nobody in their right mind would bundle a licensed game with an emulator on the app store.
I don't think it was even an emulator, it was probably the official Nintendo port called 'Super Mario Run'.