Reading those words made me feel a little ill. My files are backed up in real-time as I make them. I can't afford to lose a day much less a week!

We solved that problem years ago.

We have an 'alias" email address that forwards to both of us (like a "Role" account in the corporate world.)

We use it like people used to use home phone numbers. It's our email, not mine, not hers.

Signing up for a utility? Use the "our" email.
Paying a doctor bill and want a conformation? Use "our" email.
Setting up a new video streaming account? Use "our" email.
Etc. etc.

It's particularly useful for the sixty billion messages a day that come from the kids schools.

Only for people who don't know how to use a command line.

My mom used Linux, right up until she was 91 years old and had to move into a memory care facility. She liked it much better than Windows, and had far fewer problems with it than Windows.

I disagree there. Give them an icon on their desktop that starts up a graphical remote access agent and 99 out of 100 times they will prefer that to walking over to the remote compute to access it locally (provided you're not on a super slow network).

That would be a silly plan for people that don't use Windows exclusively. No need to pick the lowest common denominator if you don't have to. Windows is actually extraordinarily complex, the only people who don't realize this are the people who don't know anything else besides Windows. Being used to a thing does not mean that the thing is better than other things. It only means that you are used to it, thus more familiar. I do agree however, that if you know nothing more than Windows, you should use Windows. It kind of goes without saying that you will be lost elsewhere.

I agree with this. Unfortunately, this usually means "use the cloud" for most people, as they do not have the knowledge/experience to set up their own remote backups. But similarly, don't depend on a backup in the cloud as your only backup either. And for sure, don't consider it secure. You can encrypt it yourself to help rectify that, but then we're getting back to a concept that users that are totally dependent on third parties (cloud services) for their computing needs would not be able to implement on their own. So for the generic computer user who can't set up their own remote backups, they need to accept that most likely other people will be able to see whatever they backup to the cloud.

I had to deal with something similar not to long ago. The home modem went out on December 30th. No videos, no online games, tech got pushed back to the mid 90's. I was quite happy. The kids, being addicted to various electronic games, weren't. Now, if I could just arrange for the cable to go out...

FWIW, I do have the number for the local red cross in my evacuation document bag as part of my emergency contacts. Dead tree media is still the most reliable in a crunch

Just today, I walked into the bathroom and said, "Alexa, turn on bathroom lights." And they didn't come on!!! I was unsure what to do, standing there in the dark. I said it three more times just in case I had slurred my words. But still, standing there in the dark was I. Panic crept in, until I remembered I had a flashlight in my pocket. I made a beeline down to the router for a reboot. Then I quickly traversed all across the house testing for sanity ... "Alexa, what time is it?", "Alexa, what's the weather?", "Alexa, turn on Christmas tree.", "Alexa, tell me a joke.", "Alexa what's on my grocery list?"

All seemed well, so I had a cup of tea to settle my nerves. What a harrowing experience!