Yahoo Tech has a boomer writer. I did not know that. I now have her in my feed reader or reed feader. Isn’t that interesting, feed reader or read feeder or reed feader. Homophones…learned from Smarter than a Fifth Grader… Miss America was a charmer…

…snaps out of it…

The Yahoo Techie, Robin, writes the Consumer Electronic Show isn’t for old men.

That’s when it hit me. Most of the products deemed “boomer-worthy” are targeted at an infirmity. Not that there shouldn’t be technologies that address loss of hearing, dementia, loss of sight, etc., but there has to be more to it.

In other words, the CES targeted Elderbloggers. Or Suburban Hippie who is feeling – for a fleeting moment – like an Elderblogger.

But then Robin points out the things she liked:

• The Cue r1 radio. It’s an iPod docking station and radio (AM/FM). I don’t have an iPod and prawly won’t get one because I have hearing aids and I love my Pandora.com when I’m at the computer.
• GPS’s. The Cobra 5000 and Magellan Maestro 5310. Factory installed GPS is pretty much standard now isn’t it? It’s probably not as good as these, but good enough?
• Presto, prints emails and attachments without requiring a PC connection. It is one of a handful of products targeting older folks specifically. (emphasis mine: boo, hiss, “older folks” bah!) Boomers grew up with computers and for most of us, email was the first app we learned to master.
• Creative’s InPerson Wi-Fi VideoPhone.   I would love a video phone that is smooth and good screen size and resolution. We had Skype video, but it wasn’t acceptable and after the fun wore off it was tedious.
• Home Heartbeat from Eaton sounds like it would be a medical application, but it’s a wireless, totally modular home control system. Pssfyeah. Right. Not in my lead-lined, wireless-blocking, abode.
• Aigopen is one of those scanners that you can hold up to any content in a book (text or image) and it will read the text aloud. Only works now on Aigopen books at the present. But when if it hits mass market: you better live alone or be prepared for headsets.

So out of the thousands of gizmos and gadgets at CES, a boomer could only find a handful that targeted the richest demographic group in the U.S.

Imagine that: so all the talk by marketers paying attention to boomer needs isn’t making it to the designers or engineers.

Figgers.

hat tip