Seniors Site

If you want to stay connected with people who matter most in your life, you need to keep up with the times. It may feel awkward at first threading unfamiliar territories, but believe me, once you get used to it, it’s hard not to get hooked on it! I remember the first time I experimented with social networking sites, it was with MySpace. My second was Facebook which I find extremely entertaining and maintained a healthy relationship with the site up to this day. From my first one, which I rarely use now by the way, up to my very recent—Twitter—I have had several in-betweens ranging from unknowns to almost famous. Yes, considering my age, I went overboard and a little social-network crazy!
During these years, I learned to speak the social networking language and I would be very delighted to extend this apparently “Lilliputian” knowledge but has grown important over the years especially to seniors who would like to join the ever growing social networking circle. Here are some basic social networking language you need to get you up and running:
·    Tweet. You only tweet in the microblogging service Twitter. To tweet means you put a message of about 140 characters in your Twitter account for your friends to see. It’s almost similar to shouting your thoughts to the world!
·    Post. You “post” anywhere. You post tweets in Twitter. You post entries on your blog. You post your status updates in Facebook. Post, for me, is a general term you can use for almost all your internet activities. Just like post-its, when you stick it to your social networking account, it stays there and everyone is free to read it.
·    Status. It’s what you are doing or thinking right now. You update your status according to what you feel you would like the world to know.
·    Network. This is your people. Your circle of friends. Those you have added and accepted as friends. They are free to see everything about you or at the very least, the things you have willingly shared through your account.
·    Profile. This is where your information lies. Your profile will show the progress you are making and the activities you engage in. This is also where you need to be very careful since your profile is visible to your friends and even to people you barely know.
·    Wall. Walls are popular around Facebook community. When you open an account with Facebook, you are automatically given your space to play with. This so-called space comes bundled with your profile page and of course, the ever popular wall. This is where your recent activities are charted and messages directed specifically to you are written.

These things are done now and although there were horror stories associated with it, successful ones outweighs them a ton. Every year, billion of dollars were spent online such that banks the world over have now set up their own banking system online, enabling their members to access their bank accounts online and seek help from there when needed. Indeed, technology has provided an extremely convenient way for most of our purchasing needs, especially for seniors with limited range of motion. Even environmentalists agree, shopping online saves us a lot of things and contributes tremendously to the well being of our environment. Something that was remotely possible then.
However, there are still nagging apprehensions when it comes to online shopping since no regulating body monitors these sites, to think that the nature of the internet is global. Just to be fair, shoppers and sellers are both exposed to a very risky situation when it comes to online shopping. For now, we’ll focus on shoppers since most of my friends are interested with this matter.
It’s true. Many of my senior friends are now entertaining thoughts of shopping online. And, I can see clearly why they would want to shop this way, given crazy weather conditions, risky road circumstances and the amount of energy needed just to go out and get stuff from a store, online shopping seems to be the best shopping choice for seniors. Problem is, how to pay for these things without exposing ourselves to fraudulent transactions. Here are your options:
·    Shop only from reliable stores. This must be the rule of thumb when shopping online. Make sure that you are browsing through a site with “https” on it. This can be seen up there in the web address box. Aside from that, check if you have the little security icon below which is normally a padlock. These things should be on your browser window.
·    SSL certificates are important. SSL stands for Secure Socket Layer protocol which ensures secure transactions between you and the server. Your computer usually notifies you when it detects expired SSL certificate or if there’s something wrong about the server’s certificate.
·    Security seals. Their website should have security seals from security providers. One of the most popular signs is VeriSign. To make sure that the website has really earned the seal, click on the seal which should lead you to a verification page of the security provider.
·    Make sure your computer is virus free. Why? Malwares can infect your computer. When it does, it will record your keyboard strokes and send it to a remote server to be used for malicious activities—identity theft included. With that said, even if you shop only from reliable stores, your account info will still be stolen from you.
·    Use debit cards that are not aligned to your bank accounts. There are debit card providers which allow card holders to just put money in that account when needed. It may or may not require you a maintenance fee but at the very least, you don’t risk your entire life savings account.
·    Use online payment services. Like PayPal, they serve as a go-between. You just have to pay fees for their services of course, but they come very handy in situations when you need to purchase from stores that are considered suspicious.

I’ve been in the internet for such a long time that I sometimes find myself applying internet lingo to my everyday life and yes, conversations—much to the dismay of my senior friends. I won’t dare blame them, it’s really hard to keep up with how the internet speaks unless you personally experienced them. Ever encountered these words: lol, lmao and ikr? Completely, insanely incomprehensible! But for your aging mind’s information, these words stand for “laughing out loud:, “laughing my ass off” and “I know right?”. See? Simple words made difficult!
So let’s add the word “phishing” to that. I stumbled upon a very informative article in the internet this morning and like me, the author has had phishing attacks so I can totally relate to what he is saying. I decided to post his link to my social networking sites i.e Twitter and Facebook so that my friends would be forewarned of these new ways to phish. Silly me, I did not bother to check if the wordings are age-appropriate to most of my friends and I even got comments like: “What phishing?” and “What on earth?!”
Due to this, I quickly realized that not all of my senior friends are not too acquainted with most internet terms despite the fact that they use it regularly. Some may have an idea, while others just don’t care. Problem is, these are the things we really need to know when we use the internet so I took the liberty to “translate” for the senior readers what phishing is all about and how nasty it can get!
Phishing is a scam primarily made to steal your valuable information. Usually, it steals your login info and then uses it to hack your account. When you say hack, it is an unauthorized use of your account wherein the supposedly “hacker” takes full control of your account. The hacker, or the person behind it can now send mails, post images and just do whatever it is you can do with that account. In mild cases, it just uses your account to widen the phishing attack, however, your personal information is now made vulnerable, and not to mention, accessible.
I, myself, once fell for a phishing scam. This, I think, was the first batch of its kind using social networking sites. A friend mailed me a link to a video with me on it. I believed, at that time, that it really came from her since I never encountered phishing attack in a social networking site before—all I knew is that it only confines itself to emails. I clicked and was led to a log-in page which looked like the real thing. I thought it was only an error so I just faithfully typed in my details. The next day, I found out that my account sent comments and messages to my network without me knowing it. Basically, that’s how phishing works although they so often change platforms. Last I heard, they attacked Twitter and many users fell for it—seniors included.

What I really love about computers and the internet is that it makes life so much easier for everybody. I virtually live inside of it, every single day. It’s where I conduct my work, reconnect with my family and friends, shop for my stuff and yes, window shop without having to contend with someone else’s watchful eyes, pay my bills and meet new friends along the way AND take note, I really made some friends off them!
So there’s this one time when I stumbled upon a genealogy site which helps a person find his roots without ever setting a foot out the door. They have these family trees of different sizes and shapes available for you to download, print or just play around. However, they reminded me of my childhood years when making your own family tree was a requirement and hunting for pictures was just so funny! Aside from that, there’s a forum there where you can place inquiries about your long-lost relatives from far away lands and someone will answer you soon, making it a very interactive place for those who are longing for someone to talk to about the hardships of tracing one’s family history. I even found some heart warming stories there such as why they are doing it and how they are faring. Technology indeed made it easier for us to gather information, data, photographs and other stuff which will make our family heritage clearer and nicer for the generations to come! Here are some ways to preserve your family history and hope someday someone further down in your family free will thank you for spending a little of your time doing these things!
·    Photo albums. I still go for the old school type of photo album which you could touch and feel, even though there are a couple of websites out there that allow a member to create his or her personal album. I suggest you take the extra mile by doing both just so you’ll be able to have a backup copy if one of them messes up.
·    Take pictures. Gone are the days when you need to take a roll of film to Wal-Mart and wait for an hour for it to be ready for you. These days, most home printers can handle quality printing needs for photos you have just taken. No need to hassle yourself and waste time. Just point those digital cameras and shoot, then print right after!
·    Always have your camera with you even if there’s no particular reason for doing so. Digital cameras of today are designed to be handy and compact, some even smaller than your palm and sits perfectly inside your pocket. Bring them to family gatherings such as weddings, reunions, and birthdays.
·    Create a family book. You can either have it bound by a professional publishing house or if you are good at photo manipulation or perhaps a software you can use for such activities, you can save it on a CD and make multiple copies for your family members.
·    Join online genealogy groups so that you too can help others find their roots. Who knows, maybe it’s your 3rd, 4th, 5th cousin who will turn up there next!

I would like to put emphasis on the word “elderly” since I don’t think seniors would have any use for basic computer tips. Nonetheless, I have been receiving several requests from elderly groups trying to get me to teach them basic computer usage and how to deal with “first time” confusion and whatnot hence this post.

Fortunate are those who have patient grandkids to teach them how. Some of the older adults I’ve talked to complained of having impatient daughters and sons who easily give up before they even start. I can firmly attest to the fact that most of these elderly people are curious what’s in the worldwide web for them and if given the chance to do so, they would like to join too. They only need someone to hold their hands during those first, crucial months and that’s exactly what I hope this post would do! Here are some basic, handy tips on how to maximize your computer usage:

·    Email messages are not to be trusted especially if you did not expect it to come. The most popular route of phishing scam is via email, usually in form of warning messages about your account, both online and offline ones. When this happens, never click on the provided link, instead go to the site directly and check your account. Never give out passwords no matter how authentic the request looks like.
·    For visually-challenged seniors, there are three ways to instantly enlarge any web page if it’s giving you a hard time reading. One, you can press Control and plus (+) or minus (-) simultaneously. Two, if you have a mouse that has a roller on top of it, press control and roll up and down. Third, you can locate the “view” option at the top of any web page, click on it, select “Zoom” and take a pick between “zoom in” and “zoom out”.
·    Google can also solve mathematical equations for you. It can also convert currencies and simple centimeters to meter, inches or feet. Just remember to use computer lingo each and everytime!
·    Don’t forget to empty your recycle bins once in a while. In a way, it helps in saving accidentally deleted files so you could restore them. The problem is, it requires manually emptying it even if you deliberately deleted a file!
·    Always have a backup copy for everything you do in the computer. It may not have occurred to you yet but backup files are real lifesavers as dependable systems do crash.

Now that you finally gave in to your peer’s constant harassing, you find yourself staring helplessly to your supposedly profile page, not knowing what to do. Honestly, as much as Facebook is fun, it is equally complicated. On average, a person with no Facebook experience whatsoever in the past will spend at least half of the day before he can be left to his own devices. Of course, if you are to observe a child of three, an hour of tinkering would do.

What makes Facebook fun—and complicated—is that it can do more than add friends and post pictures like the old ones do. It can multitask and freakishly enough, it can even suggest friends whom you really know and not just random ones as if it has been stalking you all your life. But, the crowning glory of Facebook, and the most interesting of all, is its live feeds.

Opening a Facebook account is fairly easy. All you need is a valid email address and off you go. Make sure that you are using a VALID email address since Facebook will ask you to confirm via this email address. Now, moving on to the basics..

Since there will be millions upon millions of potential viewers, you might want to consider how much information you are willing to share. When using social networking sites, make sure that your safety and privacy come first. Also, don’t ever post pictures that you might regret seeing in the future since photo theft is very common in Facebook. Keep your private photos, well, private. You don’t need them to be in Facebook anyway. Privacy settings can be adjusted according to levels. It is highly advisable for you to go all “only friends”. This way you won’t risk being viewed by somebody you don’t know.

Search for your friends by doing an advance search. Upon finding them, hit the “Add as Friend” button and wait for their confirmation. You can also browse through your friend’s list for other people of interest. Furthermore, it is not unusual to receive a friend request from someone you don’t know since many online marketers are trying to penetrate Facebook via this route with no apparent success. If this happens to you, just hit the reject button, he won’t find out that you did anyway. If he persists then your last resort would be to block this person from having any connection with you.

Wall posts are those you write in the “what’s on your mind?” box. Be extra careful when posting in this little box since the whole Facebook community will be able to read it. Keep it simple and don’t communicate with someone using this option, instead send them a direct mail or write on their “walls”. Walls are what you see when you hit the profile button. That is your wall.

The first page you will see upon logging in is the live feeds. In this page, you’ll see your friends’ activities such as when they befriended someone or just won the poker game. When you opt to publish an activity, it will also appear on the live feeds, along with many others. Video posting, pictures and even editing your profiles goes straight in that page, notifying your friends of your movements. Speaking of your live feeds, it’s okay to comment on someone else’s activity if you wish to. In an event when a person is already cluttering your live feeds with too many annoying posts, hover your mouse just far opposite of your friend’s name until the “hide” button appears then choose what exactly it is that you want to hide.

Communicating in Facebook is the easiest of all. You can do the wall post from your own to all or directly to your friend’s wall. You can also send direct mails which will land straight to their inboxes and won’t be published to the live feeds or you can chat with them real time. Chatting with your friends in Facebook does not require rocket science, just find the “chat” box below, hit on that and check who’s online. If you don’t feel like chatting right now, choose offline.

It is okay to experience a couple of hit and miss posts. You can remove them from your wall anyway. It can be a bore during your first few days but as your friends increase in number and your live feeds roll like crazy, you will soon find yourself checking your account every hour of the day! Happy Facebooking!

It seems like everybody has been tweeting and it’s not about birds! One short trip to your favorite hairdresser and you’ll surely encounter the words “tweet”, “tweeting” and “twitter”; worse, you’ll have someone asking you of your Twitter ID! If you are not familiar with this free social networking/micro-blogging service that has been taking the world by storm, then it’s easy to get yourself embarrassed by the situation at hand for the Twitter community has their own “special” language to get by.

The way you use Twitter is very different from the traditional social networking sites we’ve grown so used to. Of course, it still requires a photo of you so you’ll be recognizable to your friends, in case they are hunting you down. Aside from that, you supply basic information about yourself in Twitter’s profile page, just enough to make new friends since it’s a very open community and new relationships are bound to form. You can also change your Twitter background, if you happen to be very experimental with your pages. What sets it apart is that the services seemed too limiting when in fact, it has one hundred and one ways of use for interested parties. Also, Twitter has been kind enough to allow different applications to access their sites making it so convenient to use even your two-year old grandchild can do it! It can also be linked to almost all social networking sites so tweeting will never be a problem.

Before we shake our tail feathers and just to give seniors who would like to dabble with Twitter an idea, it’s not always love-at-first-sight for Twitter. Some users go AWOL for quite sometime right after signing up only to revive the account months later. The usual problem is lack of friends. You see, if you don’t have someone to talk to in Twitter neither do you make friends that easily, it tends to be a tad boring there. Here are some basic Twitter tips to jumpstart your own little community:

·    Active participation is the key to a Twitter success. Survey shows that the most followed profiles in Twitter are those of opinionated people even if they are a little off the edge. Unless you prefer to stalk people, it is best if you already have an existing community there to join i.e your friends, family etc.
·    Your bio can be built overtime but most importantly is that you need to fill it up with something right after signing up. How else would your neighbor know it’s you if you don’t make yourself known? For safety reasons, do practice basic precautionary measures like never giving away your personal details. Like stated earlier, Twitter is an open place where everybody can view your profile—even to somebody you barely know.
·    Granted, Twitter is not a home for your lovely photo collection and users are given a limit of 140 characters for each tweet hence the importance of links. This community is most interested in clicking i.e following links to wherever it leads so give them that instead. Share your loot, and you’ll be loved. By the way, don’t just share, use URL shorteners.
·    Marketers find Twitter to be very useful. In fact, it was said that most conversions or sales come from the Twitter community. Due to this, more and more online marketing efforts are thrown at this side of town by the minute leaving a little breathing room for ordinary people like us. You can either scream “keep off the grass” or use them to your advantage. It’s your call.
·    RT means retweet. It’s okay to grab someone else’s tweet just as long as you give credit where it’s due.

Basically, that’s it. In time, you’ll eventually learn to walk the walk and talk the talk. Meanwhile, test your tweeting powers and bug your friends all day long!

If seniors are having a hard time maneuvering their way around the internet, it is not entirely their fault. Eyes maybe failing, cognitive functions could be a little bit impaired but most definitely, these are not the only reasons why seniors commit one too many mistakes when using the internet. It can also be blamed to the usability a website may possess.

It was said that the senior group is amongst the top three internet users, alongside women and teens. It only goes to show that the complexity or modernity of computers never hinders a senior to use them frequently—and for many reasons, that is. Like any other new and shiny things, it can be learned and seniors are definitely eager to learn!

According to the same study mentioned earlier, it was found out that email application is the most popular among seniors. In fact, it is the first thing they check upon waking up in the morning. Running close on its tail are news, research and online payments. Amazingly, a new trend is making waves, the ever popular social networking.

Among the most visited sites by seniors are Google and Facebook. When it comes to gaming, women over 55 prefer games from sites like Game House and Pogo. And what do these sites have in common? One word: simplicity. Their simple, user-friendly interface charms seniors mightily and in a way, earn their loyalty. Preferences have nothing to do with seniors’ eyesight or their ability to concentrate and comprehend things but it seems that busy, giddy web designs have a lot to do with it.

Web designers who assume too much from their visitors have a lot to learn. When it comes to website usability, seniors must be the right group to approach as they know exactly what they want and what works perfectly for them. Poor design makes it hard for seniors to explore the site even more, discouraging them from discovering your site’s real potential. No matter how good your content is, when its texts are barely readable and links are hidden like it’s a game of finders keepers, then you must know your website will not be on any senior’s bookmarks.

The worldwide web indeed has given us a wider scope in life making it possible to access tons of information just by simple web manipulation called “web surfing”. Bear in mind that this fun activity need not exert too much effort since one will only need a computer and an internet access. It can be done anywhere, anytime. The best thing about the internet is that it caters to all, young and old. It can also get you to places and through it, we are able to accomplish tasks that are otherwise hard for us to do back then.

Some of the finest points the internet has been giving us are:
·    Being able to pay your bills and do bank transactions through online banking.
·    Connecting you to your loved-ones without ever worrying about communication bills and such.
·    Online games for stress-free afternoons.
·    Online shopping saves you time, energy and gas. You don’t need to go far to buy your essentials. Just find a reputable supermarket or grocery website and place your order there. Some even provide free delivery service for your convenience.

Like stated earlier, these are just some of the things the internet can give you. See how easy—and tempting—it can be for seniors to take advantage of these services? Unfortunately, unscrupulous people are quick to get wind of it all and sadly, they consider seniors to be their most vulnerable targets. This makes it doubly hard for senior surfers to move around freely and without worries.

Identity theft in general is when a thief assumes an identity, stolen from another person, hopefully not you, and uses it to his or her advantage. Scarily, it can happen even in our normal, living world but with the advent of the internet, identity theft is now easier and faster to do. Losing a wallet can turn your life around in just one day especially if they fell into wrong but expert hands. One account I heard, after discovering about her lost wallet, which she guessed went missing for about two days prior to the discovery, she quickly called her bank, credit cards and others. Much to her dismay, the thief already did some damage and more. There had been online purchases charged to her account—and they are not cheap, mind you. And because she failed to notify the bank beforehand, she is now making some negotiations with the credit card company for payment terms.

In the internet world however, there is a threat known as phishing. This too attempts to collect your personal information which you stored in your system. These are viruses which you inadvertently downloaded through sites, both reputable and not. Apparently, they record your keyboarding activities and send it to a remote site which will leave your information to their mercy. Hacking is yet another way to access your online accounts and it is usually done by someone you know. Even scams-disguised as emails can easily find their way into your inboxes waiting to be clicked. Nothing beats right information to prevent identity theft from harming you. Read about them and be aware of these unlawful activities.

Personalized photo calendars make a great bonding activity for seniors and their grandkids. It can also be the perfect gift to give your elderly loved-one this coming holiday season. Personalized gifts like this are both delightful and inexpensive. They are sure to touch your loved-one’s heart! What more if one will be able to see cherished pictures of their families and friends all year-round? All the more better right?

Starting a personalized photo calendar project is easy, especially if you have a computer—better if you have an internet access since some of the best softwares for this can be downloaded for free over the internet. In doing so, you can save time and energy while producing quality results thus avoiding the “hit and miss” part of doing it manually. If both are out of the question, then you can still make your own personalized photo calendars the old school way—cutting and pasting, that is.

·    Scour for family photos that might be hidden in nooks and crannies of your house. If you intend to give this calendar to someone specific such as your grandmother or grandfather, make sure that you include pictures of those closest to their hearts and not of someone they barely know. Have them scanned if you will be using a computer for this. You can also use artworks and medals which they might have missed attending. One idea that could work is aligning the photos to correspond with a certain month. For example, your birthday is in May so put your picture in that month complete with inscriptions of the exact date.
·    Digital photos should be prepared prior to fitting them in your personalized calendar. When doing this, you will need an image enhancer such as Adobe Photoshop or even the one that comes with your computer setup. With them, you can rotate, enhance, crop and resize your photos.
·    Like stated earlier, there are software programs you can use to help you with your photo calendar ventures. They are easier to use since most of them will only require a user to upload photos then drag-drop them to your heart’s desire. For first time users, take advantage of free templates available for you to use.
·    The idea behind customized photo calendars is to make it as personalized as can be. Experiment with fonts, colors and layouts to help “personality” to come out. You can never go wrong with this so never hesitate. Get your creative juices flowing now. Don’t forget to hit that preview button before printing so you know what it looks like. Also, saving your work in a disc or USB can help you retrieve your original work in case something goes wrong.
·    If you are in doubt about printing your work, you can always bring it to photo shops to have it printed for you. It may cost you a little over your projected budget but it saves you a lot of trouble since printing a double sided page can be disorienting at times.
·    Some photo shops also do binding jobs. If yours do, then have it bound there as well or you can take it some place else for binding.