Name: Digital Native
Time of Death: Mid-2000s
Cause of Death: Excellent design
More than a month ago I was at the TACOS workshop (you can watch the recorded session here). As part of it there were break out sessions in which we talked about issues that related to technology, the future of the profession, digital worlds etc. During one of these talks the topic of the ‘Digital Native‘ was raised. I gave a half-formed answer then, but now, after some time to think, I have managed to reform my thoughts into a half coherent message.
What is a Digital Native?
It is a weasel term that means different things to different people. I am using it in the context of people’s skills to code. There is a belief, sometimes a religious fervor, that many people hold that everyone under the age of 35 is a digital wizard. That is because we grew up with the Internet, personal computers, and now smart phones and tablets. Apparently, maybe through osmosis??, we are masters of the digital world. Now if you think that because I am under 35 that makes me a king of the digital world and you want to give me a job because of this, STOP reading. Pay no attention to the man behind the blog. I will take your no-questions-asked job.
Confusion of Design and Ability
Another person in the discussion summed up this (dis)belief best,
“Because a kid has been raised to swipe a screen to change the page, we believe that they can code” – (very close to what they said but I don’t want to misquote them so I will attribute to Anonymous)
The discussion was specifically about training and careers involving working with digital products i.e. coding. Unfortunately, we now attribute the ability to pick up and use a tablet with the user’s skills instead of the product designed. How many billions are spent on user interfaces? One click buy on Amazon does not make you an expert in eCommerce. It means Amazon really wants your money and is trying to make is easy for you to give it to them.
Where does design end and skill start?
Take a look at this photo. What is it?
Desktop Folder Icon
What does it look like? A manilla cardboard folder that we use in the real world. When PCs were invented the designers could have called folders anything – repository, holder, beebopbubop. Alright, I made up the term beebopbubop but that’s my point, they could have named them anything and used any icon they wanted. However, we use the term folder and they look like the physical folders you would find in any physical office. Why? Because that is what people in the 1980s and 1990s were use to. They used a schema that everyone was familiar with so that people would understand what to do with folders – put files in them.
5000+ years of good design
This is not new. When the ancient Egyptians began using stone what did they use as their model? Reeds. Seriously, if you go to Egypt and see the Old Kingdom stone buildings, 5000 years ago, you will see reed blinds over windows and doors carved into the stone. It is as if the stone should be unrolled to block out the sun, like a real mat (it is so cool to see). Before stone the Egyptians built with reeds and thus their first attempts at stone making was to emulate what they already knew. It is design 101 – use what people already know. If you have to explain it than you are failing.
Pyramid of Djoser, Mortuary temple – columns made to look like reed bundles. Image from Wikimedia
How Bad has It Gotten?
Ask yourself – when was the last time you change out the battery on your iPhone? iPad? Any Apple product?
You might have to go back to the very first iPod to have an Apple product that lets you change the battery. That’s right, the very concept of trusting you to change out a battery was taken from you. Steve Jobs was obsessive about his products and it shows. He is not alone and while I call out Steve Jobs in the title of this post there are countless other examples of things designed just be picked up and played with, no experience necessary. We have designed out the need to learn anything in lots of digital tools/toys.
Is this Bad?
Like everything there is a good side and bad side to this.
The good – anyone, well almost anyone, can now use a whole range of digital products, from ages 2 to 102. This is great in that it broadens the range of digital tools everyone can use.
The bad – There is an App for That
An entire generation was born in to a world that designed for easy use, which means they have not had to struggle, invent, or learn how to code. If you read the stories of computer users in the 1970s and 1980s you will find that most of them had to learn how to code to use a computer. That was because back then if you wanted a computer to do something you had to program it yourself. Now, you buy an app for that.
People still learn to code. They still tinker and play with computers but they are a small minority. There is no ‘Generation Technology’. We have raised a generation to use ‘one click’ to buy the app that can do the work for them (Generation App or Generation Click, or drop a line in the comments on what they should be called). That, I would say, is not knowing how to code or possessing any sort of skills that employers want. Our success, or more precisely the success of people like Jobs and companies like Apple, has killed off the “native coder generation”.
In an ironic twist, probably the closest thing to a digital native you will get are people over the age of 35-40, and only some of them. They were the ones who had to learn to code just to use a computer.
Doug's Archaeology 
bkmeans
July 15, 2014
I certainly agree with you. Most of my students have and use computers, but can’t do anything beyond the most basic tasks, and, if they can’t find an existing template, they are totally lost. There are some clear exceptions, but this is true as a general rule. They also can’t read a syllabus, but that’s another story
Doug Rocks-Macqueen
July 15, 2014
Aye, syllabus is for another discussion but I wonder if you had a syllabus app? 😉
bkmeans
July 16, 2014
then they could ignore on a whole new level 🙂
These Bones Of Mine
July 15, 2014
Definitely agree with this. I feel that coding would be such a useful skill to have, especially in archaeology. Should probably learn some….
Doug Rocks-Macqueen
July 15, 2014
Ah, its nice but not the be all, end all.
These Bones Of Mine
July 15, 2014
true, but another arrow in the quiver wouldn’t hurt!
dover1952
July 15, 2014
I am a member of the Fortran, Basic, etc. generation, age 35+++. I never learned or needed to use any coding with the archaeology work that I did. It would be a mistake to think that the knowledge of how to write code was widespread in my generation. It clearly was not. I knew very few people who now how to write code. I knew people who took maybe one Fortran course, but that does not mean they knew how to write code efficiently to solve a problem. It just meant that they took a course—and that was about it. The few people who could write code effectively and creatively to solve a complex problem were looked upon as “gods.” They often had the ego to go with it too.
For those who did work with statistics and archaeology—and needed coding or punch card work done (remember punch cards?), the thing I heard most often was, “I need to go over to the University of Tennessee Computing Center and get some help.” This statement was usually preceded by a glum and depressed-looking face—a feeling of being bewildered and overwhelmed. The masters of code writing lived at the Computing Center. Like Lucy and her lemonade stand, they basically had a sign up saying, “Computing Advice – 5 cents.”
Maybe at UC-Berkely, MIT, or the University of Chicago every other person on campus was a master code writer. However, I never saw or perceived much of that where I was in the old days. Even today, people still freeze for a moment and then run like hell when the word “math” is mentioned at an audible level. Mention topology and you can give a whole room a heart attack. Speaking of the population in general and even the academic population, it was pretty much the same way with code writing in the old days outside of a place like IBM or the computing center at a university. It was esoterica that freaked out the average guy on the street. It was something to run from rather to embrace, learn, and use.
I think this is why code writing has given way to user friendly apps today. People wanted to be able to do things without learning code—without feeling depressed or the need to run like hell at the prospect of learning a digital language that was viewed as the most difficult math class (Argh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Get me out of here!!!!) ever devised by the human mind.
Now, I know someone who was busy writing code back then is going to say that all of what I just said is bullshit. My response to that is:
“Well maybe it was different where you were standing at that time, but the above is the way it was where I was standing at that time.”
Doug Rocks-Macqueen
July 15, 2014
Yeah- it has never been for the masses but I do think how we give a little to much credit to the current youngsters. At least me standing where I am at this time. 🙂
aitchisonk
July 15, 2014
Wise words indeed. I of course especially like the concept that those that are nigh on digital natives are “people over the age of 35-40, and only some of them. They were the ones who had to learn to code just to use a computer.”
It’s easy to say blah blah first computer I owned was a ZX81 aged 11, then a PC-XT in 1984 at age 14 etc, but as TACOS showed, it really is the people like Ed Lee – who were there, in terms of age, attitude and knowledge,and who have continued to stay aware and abreast of the game – who truly have the perspective to grasp the situation and are the right people to be good, positive, influential CTOs.
.
And we didn’t call it ‘coding’. We were programmers.
Doug Rocks-Macqueen
July 15, 2014
I was trying work in your quote of someone else s quote about ages and what you do but it got cut. Programmers …. ah might be showing your age. 😉
BJ Nicholls
July 15, 2014
That’s manilla folder, by the way. The folders and similar color envelopes were originally made of manilla hemp. It’s good to know the true origin of your icons. 😉
Doug Rocks-Macqueen
July 15, 2014
Stupid auto correct, changed now. Did not know about the manilla hemp. Thanks, I learn something new today. Cheers
dover1952
July 15, 2014
In the 1980s I had a friend who called them “Vanilla Folders.” Guess it must have been the color.
Doug Rocks-Macqueen
July 15, 2014
The good old vanilla manilla.
Russell Alleen-Willems
August 3, 2014
Spot on, Doug. Apple makes some very nicely designed products, but it’s amazing how few people in this day and age know how to actually work with editing or creating simple digital tools like webpages when we interact with dozens to hundreds of them a day. Archaeologists aren’t immune this, which is surprising since we tend to be pretty good at adopting tools from other fields for our own uses. I know a number of older archaeologists who are proficient in FORTRAN or bending command-line ArcGIS to their will, but outside of a small (but hopefully growing) clique, some young archaeologists may not even know how to search for text in a document. It’s painful seeing someone scroll through a document manually changing the same word a dozen times!
Harrison Eiteljorg said it pretty well:
“Too many archaeologists are still mis-using computer technology regularly – or failing to use the technology at all. In addition, many archaeologists who do use computer technologies are still trying to re-invent the proverbial wheel. Worse yet, archaeologists who create good and useful computer resources have a very small audience of colleagues knowledgeable enough to use those resources. Furthermore, few members of the profession are in a position to assess the quality of the digital resources that are available for their own use or when writing a review – whether of project results or of a grant proposal. (Eiteljorg II 2008:2)”
“I had begun asking graduate students about their proficiency with computers on various campuses when I visited to lecture. Their responses, in fact, had been the impetus for my survey of graduate programs, because the students’ responses to my questions were very worrisome. Most thought themselves to be reasonably adept with computers. On further questioning, however, that seemed to mean that they could use word processing software, email programs, and web browsers. Time and again, the graduate students I polled would indicate that they had little or no familiarity with database management systems (DBMS), computer-assisted design software (CAD), or geographic information systems (GIS) – while nevertheless thinking themselves to be computer-savvy. (Eiteljorg II 2008:2)”
Eiteljorg II, Harrison
2008 Archaeological Computing. 2nd Edition. Bryn Mawr, PA: Center for the Study of Architecture. http://archcomp.csanet.org/
To help remedy this, I’m excited about projects like the Software Carpentry non-profit, which teaches free and low cost workshops for scientists on simple skills for automation, data organization, and basic programming: http://software-carpentry.org/.
Making archaeologists aware of the array of digital tools and how they can be used is also something I’ve tried to do with my business and blog: http://www.diachronicdesign.com/blog/2013/01/21/1-welcome-to-diachronic-design/ (I hope you’ll forgive me a small bit of self-promotion).
Doug Rocks-Macqueen
August 4, 2014
Self-promotion is always welcomed. How else would we know about your great work 🙂
Adam
August 3, 2014
You say “That was because back then if you wanted a computer to do something you had to program it yourself. Now, you buy an app for that.” Out of interest, I’d like to get an idea of how many people out there writing android/apple mobile apps fall within certain demographics (<20 or 25yrs) etc. I bet there's a good amount, though I should actually do some research. Perhaps things have shifted more to young learners/those slinging code doing so to put apps out there, sake of entrepreneurialism, etc. The Mark Zuckerberg sort of deal.
I imagine things change where you are too, i.e. London vs. San Francisco. Add to which changing ICT curricula (I'm 25 and I remember doing basic HTML at least in school) should expose younger people to coding, in addition to other initiatives like http://girlswhocode.com/. Millions of Raspberry Pi units have sold since 2012. There's also Maker Faire and Kickstarter (crowdfunding has enabled small time R&D projects developing products) becoming internationally prominent. Not sure where I'm going with this but it was supposed to be along the lines of contrary to the doom-and-gloom outlook for tech skills and interest (beyond the iProd)
Doug Rocks-Macqueen
August 4, 2014
Possible location of your stats might be the BLS- they track data on occupation but I am not sure it would capture self-employed, hobbyists, etc.
A counter to the doom-and-gloom is always welcome.
Content Catnip
August 4, 2014
Agreed. That’s why there are production tools like PCs and laptops that are not as popular as consumption tools like touch screen devices and smart phones. It’s a shame, but there will always be a core people who are still making things. And some people move from consumption to production too! I don’t like to think that this generation is lazy