91-year-old geek helps keep elderly independent

Written By Unknown on Sabtu, 28 September 2013 | 21.43

Silicon Valley entrepreneurs are finding their next big idea in the elderly capital of America. While the world's biggest firms have struggled to develop products targeted at older consumers, a group led by former Apple, Microsoft and eBay employees have unveiled Lively.

The system of tiny sensors helps the elderly maintain their independence, letting farflung relatives know whether they take their pills on time or exit the house. Lively marks the first result of an effort by Sarasota, Florida -- which boasts the highest concentration of elderly people of any large US county -- to transform the region into a test market for companies eager to tap into the $8 trillion buying power of seniors.

The Institute for the Ages, a Sarasota nonprofit, played a key role in Lively's creation, connecting the San Francisco-based company with residents who provided feedback to improve its product. They included Bill Tavolga, a 91-year-old self-described tech geek who helped Lively's developers find bugs in the system . The outcome was a tool that helps shrink the 350-mile (560-kilometer ) distance between Phyllis Bek-gran , 89, and her son by letting him know when she doesn't pick up her TV remote.

With the massive baby boom generation beginning to move into the ranks of the elderly, companies are trying to front-run the trend by figuring out the next hot products for seniors. So far their search has remained largely unfulfilled because of a marketing conundrum : Graying boomers, even more than previous generations, don't want to be identified as elderly.

The idea for the Institute for the Ages emerged after Scope, a nonprofit community group whose name stands for Sarasota County Openly Plans for Excellence, sought advice from hundreds of residents on the topic of aging in 2008. Tavolga, a former marine biologist, wasn't shy about pointing out the system's flaws.

"I added a sensor on the front door," Tavolga wrote to Glickman in a Feb. 26 e-mail . "Works OK, but I cannot change the name from 'Custom #4." Three days later: "OK I found out why the label change would not take. It would not accept 'Front Door' as two words." Sensors throughout Tavolga's home often failed.

"The Medication sensor is still red-face" online, which indicates inactivity , he wrote. "This time I took my pills before 7 a.m." On March 26, he noted that it needed to be "strongly shaken" in order to register."It was fun; for one thing, I'm a computer geek," recalled Tavolga, who e-mails his "sweetheart" every morning from a Samsung tablet, reads books on a Kindle and updates the online music archives of a local library twice a week.


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