When I first started w/ computers (an Apple //e) a lot of friends wondered what it was good for, and thought that balancing their check-book would be their main use. I would explain that you buy a computer WHEN you have a problem that a computer will actually HELP with. Check-book balancing isn’t sufficiently challenging (but Quicken probably is a lot more interesting now than a spreadsheet was then). Now, of course, I mostly use my expensive laptop to browse the web, read email… and listen to music while I do programming.
When I first started w/ computers (an Apple //e) a lot of friends wondered what it was good for, and thought that balancing their check-book would be their main use. I would explain that you buy a computer WHEN you have a problem that a computer will actually HELP with. Check-book balancing isn’t sufficiently challenging (but Quicken probably is a lot more interesting now than a spreadsheet was then). Now, of course, I mostly use my expensive laptop to browse the web, read email… and listen to music while I do programming.