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In article <lc9nmjINNr88@jethro.Corp.Sun.COM> tmhoff@oogoody.Corp.Sun.COM writes:
>>I saw an article in our local paper the other day describing a company that
>>introduces senior citizens to the net (i.e. e-mail, listservs etc.) and
>>provides access to them from their home. 
>
>I have a few ideas, questions, and concerns:
>1. Is there a BBS dedicated to say the 50+ group?

  Odd.. I just heard a woman on "Fresh Air", the CBC radio's Sunday
  morning programme with a heavy seniors slant - she was talking about
  a "Gold and Silver" BBS designed especially for seniors. Apparently
  there are the usual conferences, plus hooks to other BBSs and 
  maybe the net(?). Didn't get the phone number. Gimme a few years ;-).

>2. How can the most foreign ideas of the Internet and computers be sold
>   to this market of users? I think a library, TV, or grocery store metaphor
>   would be familiar and easy to understand. Newsgroups, threads, etc.
>   would be overload, at least at first.

    Yeah... and perhaps a "ham radio" flavour too... my father in law
    always wanted to get into ham radio but never did. He thinks of the
    net as a way to talk to far off pen-pals.... but he won't buy a
    modem - unless, maybe, we buy him one. So he plays Tetris a lot :-).

>3. What easy to use software is available?

   There was a very simple system here called SUZY a year back. The s/w
   came bundled with new IBM PS 1 or 2 (get them confused) systems.
   It had seniors' conferences on it too. Now that the company is 
   defunct, I wonder if IBM will come out with another "strategic
   partnership" agreement with some other provider? SUZY supplied the
   s/w for $25 and got you into their BBS via Datapac, the Canadian
   publicly avail. packet-switching network - you were billed monthly
   by the company, which paid the Datapac bills.
-- 
--- 
       "We cannot think without imagining."  -- Thomas Aquinas
            cbs@gpu.utcs.utoronto.ca (Chris Brown-Syed)