This column is not about the rampant discourtesy cell users are The implication is that many PC owners don't use their computers as a communications center. Why? One major reason is they are too complex for novice users to deal with when something goes wrong. And, of course something always goes wrong with PCs. Cryptic error messages appear on the screen without giving a clue as to what to do about them.

Regularly the screen turns blue and the computer freezes. At other times programs mysteriously cease to work. For those of us using PCs everyday these are minor inconveniences. We know the PCs peculiarities and how to cope with them. For novices however, the reaction produces symptomatic stress approaching madness.

Why is it kids can cope with PCs while adults, fully competent to control most aspects of their lives, go nuts when their PC hiccups. They may call a friend or relative to ask for help or just say "bull puckey" and shut the PC down for a long rest. Maybe a PC savvy friend will come by for a visit and beat the offending beast into submission. Or maybe not. In either case that PC user is not likely to rush out and buy the new Octanium VI super powered computer. They couldn't care less about buying a new machine when the present one is unused and gathers dust.

When PC industry pundits wonder why sales have slowed they don't have to look too far for answers. Only 17% or so of households use their PC every day to connect to the Internet. A good percentage of the other 83% are sorry they presently have a PC let alone have the urge to buy the latest and greatest new model.

If I am right, all someone would have to do is invent a PC that didn't quit working most every day. You wouldn't think of buying a car that did that. We expect reliable transportation not everyday error messages displayed on the dashboard while the engine quits. Why doesn't someone design a computer that is reliable and given all its power, even fixes itself? One that recognizes errors made by users or application programs and then corrects the errors automatically, rather than just halting operation and freezing. One that doesn't require a technical background just to setup and operate.

I'll tell you why. Programmers and computer designers are intellectually compelled to produce new features and capabilities whether you need or want them. It's an imperative for them to design options and doodads without regard for overall simplicity or usefulness. They pile new features on older features used by only a tiny fraction of users. They design neat new goodies while blithely eviscerating or ignoring the really useful features you use everyday. That leaves novice users with a fancy piece of expensive PC hardware that can run almost any kind of program to solve almost any kind of problem but does so at the expense of simple reliable operation.

A couple of years ago, when money to start new companies was abundant, a few startups embraced a good idea. Their premise was that PCs were indeed too complex and their capabilities too great for everyday simple tasks such as email and reading web pages. They perceived that people don't go out and buy a huge multipurpose machine to do all their household tasks. You buy a toaster to make toast. A mixer or blender to mix food ingredients. A vacuum cleaner. A clothes washer. A refrigerator. Etc. Why not an email appliance that simply receives and sends mail?

It would be a neat little box with an easy to read screen, a normal sized keyboard, and a jack to plug the phone line into. When turned on for the first time it would ask for some simple data about you; the phone number you are using, and the email address you wish to use to get and send mail. If you sent such a device to a grandparent they could unwrap it, plug it in, and start to productively use email.

The reasons to develop an email appliance were sound and well reasoned. The reason you never heard of any such devices is simple. They ended up costing as much or more as a PC and the designers could not undo the weight of baggage of 20 years of PC development. They could not find a way to give us a simple, reliable, inexpensive device that delivered only email and web pages. Others had already decided that we needed huge disk drives to store all the stuff we ever looked at and that we needed to have online computational abilities provided by java and the like. The resulting products were failures.

Now that PC sales are way down, it is the time to send a strong message from the technically disadvantaged. Simply stated, "we of the 83% of non Internet connected PC users won't use your machines . ever. Your computer designers must focus energy on simplicity and reliability, and when you deliver that for $300, you will get rich."