Grandma is posting a photo on Facebook.
Grandpa is looking for former colleagues on LinkedIn.
And more and more people ages 50 and older are joining social networks, according to a new report by the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project. The study found that social networking has almost doubled among this population ”” growing from 22 percent to 42 percent over the past year.
According to comScore, a digital measurement company, 27.4 million people age 55 and over engaged in social networking in July, up from 16 million one year ago.
Am I alone in finding this kind of thing incredibly patronising? The whole tenor of it is amazement at seniors being able to do anything more than switch on their laptop. First of all, the over-55s is a nonsense classification. We have had the internet for around 15 years, so anybody 60 or so would have been using it for at least 10 years and probably more. Second, I want to say to the reporter, ‘Young whippersnapper, these folks have run schools, colleges, parishes, businesses. They have reared children. Some of them fought for their country. Why be so surprised that they are still able to do whatever it takes?’
I am 63 – and still feisty …. grrr ….
In the Episcopal congregations I know wherein 75% of the “regulars” are the 75+ age bracket, few of them have felt it necessary to embrace computers, the internet, and cellular telephones in any way. They actually talk about changing technology as a failure of “younger people” to show respect and care for the needs of elders.