I wish I never told anyone I worked or studied tech. Especially older family and friends, because their requests for help are relentless.
A lot of friends are chill with it, and I don’t mind doing a little bit of help, but sometimes people are who are OFFENDED when you don’t want to help. In the same way a contractor friend won’t remodel your home for free, I am not going to fix every single issue you have with your computer for free. I’m happy to give advice, but i’m not going to work for hours without pay to fix everything.
My father in law was a proctologist - and also a man I didn’t really enjoy spending any time with. One day during one of those strained compulsory family dinners - not sure which, maybe Thanksgiving - he turned to me and said with this false jovial air:
“Hey, you’re a computer guy. I have this problem with my Windows laptop. Could you take a look?” and proceeded to unpack his laptop, which he had brought along, clearly to have me fix it.
So I got up, started undoing my fly and said “Sure! Hey, I have piles. Could you take a look?”
He got up and left without a word, and never came back. His wife kept visiting though, thankfully. She was lovely. But I got rid of him for good that day. But I did have to face the music with my wife 🙂
My dad taught me all about motorcycles, cars, lawnmowers, model airplanes, tools, general home repairs, and really an incalculable number of other things. I don’t mind giving him a hand with his PC or iPad once in a while.
It’s not just tech shit. Basically, you should never let anyone know that you’re good at something. Ever. Because then you become the fixit person for that thing.
I’ve been using Linux as an out. “Oh you’re having a windows problem? I got rid of windows 10 years ago, so I can’t really help you with that”.
I do the same thing but leverage networking instead of Linux.
“Sorry, I dont actually know much about computers, but let me know if you want advice about port trunking or configuring a VLAN”
Oh I have questions. I’m not going to ask because thread and because I’m smart enough to know it’s not an easy problem, but that sure wouldn’t be the escape you think it is if we were friends lol.
I hate networking issues. But I’ve replaced every foot of cabling, every networking device, and my ISP and I still get intermittent 2 minute network drops a few times a day. I am to the point of suspecting a rogue smart device is doing something malicious. I need a networking guru friend to annoy.
Total shot in the dark knowing basically nothing about the situation, but if your house is over 10 years old and you also have cable internet, you might have a MoCA filter somewhere along the coax line(They can be outside too)
They were installed all over the place to prevent interference between cable TV and cable Internet, but sometimes they cause problems getting a stable internet connection
Disconnect everything physically plugged into the router and change the WiFi password.
Add your devices back one at a time until the dropouts start again.
If they start immediately then you’re looking at a modem/router issue (most likely). If they start after adding a device, remove that device and check the network stability again.
When the network drops happen is your modem showing that it’s still connected to your ISP or is the modem in a disconnected state?
See that’s dangerous though because networks are black magic to most users. Even more so than the computer itself.
My out has been unfortunately true. I got into the corporate IT game. I really have no idea what’s going on in the consumer space if it’s not something I personally deal with.
Which means that when someone asks questions about getting a virus or how to do any little task, I tell them that normally I’d wipe and reimage without a second thought, or tell them to call the help desk.
My mum just does not believe me when I say ‘I don’t know, I don’t use this software’. When I say I have no idea how to get word to do what she needs because I’ve used nothing but latex for close to ten years, clearly I’m just trying to get out of helping, right?
She’s not the only one, either. They always expect you to figure it out. Especially egregious: I didn’t customize my CV for a teaching job. It said I can code a bit. Guess who became the windows support for the older teachers?
The best antidote against being asked tech questions is not to use standard tech 😄
- “Windows? No idea, but if you let me install linux on your computer I could help you out in the future”
- “iPhone? Sorry, got an Android. Can’t help you out.”
- “Printer? Nobody, not even Zeus can help you there…”
Similar, I take another system I’m familiar with and use it as an excuse. I know how to program a Cisco router, but heck if I know what an iPhone is, I can’t use them at work. Virus? That’s what the help-desk is for. Look, I work with fax machines, telephones, and video conference systems. The platform I work on is so secure that if we mess with it at all, it disables and we have to have them sent back and pay a lot of money to get them fixed, and I’d lose my job.
Granted, if it’s something simple I’ll help, but I’m not about to troubleshoot aunt May’s login issues for Amazon from 300 miles away.
There’s a lot of cringey responses in this thread. Just be a nice person and talk to your family and friends in an open and honest way.
Firstly, this happens in any profession. I’m a tax consultant. People always want to talk to me about tax.
Thing is, 100% of the time people will understand if you say “I don’t really know very much about that particular thing I’m sorry.”
When someone says “my wifi isn’t working” they’re not necessarily saying “please will you come over and fix my wifi”, often they’re really saying “what should I do to solve this problem” and the answer is usually “turn it off and on again, update adobe reader, if it’s still not working take it to whatever shop.”
If someone directly asks you “please will you stop what you’re doing and come fix my x”, which never actually happens, then you just deal with it as appropriate. “Sorry nan I have a lot going on right now, you’ll have to take it to the shop”.
And if someone says “hey, can you come fix my computer,” and when you show up she just lays in bed and looks at you longingly from there, that means you really got to fix the computer and then leave so she can get some sleep.
“please will you stop what you’re doing and come fix my x”
This actually happens quite frequently. It’s rare to leave a family party without a follow up appointment to look at a persons tech.
Thing is, 100% of the time people will understand if you say “I don’t really know very much about that particular thing I’m sorry.”
“Yeah but you know tech so you must just be sand bagging”
