Technology can be difficult for older generations to figure out—but some make it more complicated than it has to be.
A video posted by @vegan_toblerone has gone viral on TikTok for revealing the hilarious way his mother preserves content online: by printing it out whole. The creator shared that his mother takes photos of her iPad and then sends them straight to the printer. Since it was posted, the video has received nearly 600,000 views and 28,000 likes.
“Printed out iPad mother strikes again,” he captioned the video. “‘I don’t know how to take a screenshot on an iPad, anyway,'” he quoted his mother as saying.
In the video, his mother’s printed relics include sports listings and recipes—some of which, viewers say, make sense.
“Honestly I do feel this,” @lexililly26 commented. “I don’t want to keep going back into a recipe and scrolling forever through why this…chicken is so important to them.”
“Recipes on tablets are a pain…as they lock the screen every 30 seconds, and I have to unlock it with oily chicken fingers,” @rod.pants wrote.
Many commenters were horrified imagining the cost of such a hobby: “God, I can’t even imagine how much black ink she’s unnecessarily used,” @llmrbignocholasll wrote.
In the comments, the creator revealed that his mother prints on an HP Envy: “‘Let me say, it is worth it,'” he quoted his mother.
“Wait until she realizes she can print straight from the webpage,” @mkooy03 wrote.
Mariia Vitkovska/Getty Images
Older People Are Using More Technology
A study conducted by the Pew Research Center revealed that technology use among seniors is rising.
Since Pew’s last survey in 2013, seniors have increased their use and adoption of technology and apps in big ways. While they still use less technology as a demographic, they are more digitally connected than ever.
The study revealed that 4 in 10 seniors own smartphones as of 2017, more than double the number of people who did in 2013. When the research center began tracking “internet adoption” in 2000, 14 percent of seniors were Internet users.
As of 2017, though, this number has risen to 67 percent. Social media use is also increasing, with 34 percent of Americans over 65 years old using these platforms.
Tablet use has also increased—about one-third of seniors say they own tablets.
These increases are importantly placed within the contexts of access to education and financial well-being. Tablet ownership, for example, is more common among people over 65 with more education and living in higher-income households. About 62 percent of older adults with household incomes of $75,000 or more said they own tablets, while 56 percent of college-degree earners said the same.
Newsweek reached out to @vegan_toblerone for comment via TikTok.
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.