Aloneness has been a theme of 2020 when the global COVID pandemic struck. It hit seniors everywhere hard. They may not be able to rely on the family to see them in the best of times, but seniors always had local community centers for playing games like chess & checkers, and cards. But with social distancing in place and family staying away, puzzles and solitary games have become stale. Seniors are going back to the community centers but are looking for fresh ways to stay young in the mind –– and to connect to others the way most of us find virtual friends on the Internet.
So companies like the social networking site Televeda is attempting to show seniors that while Zoom might have its limitations, there are new ways of playing online together and friends can be across states and cities. The company is planning on setting a Guinness World Record for online Bingo. The will connect 80 senior centers from 20 states so thousands of lonely souls can play together.
It’s clearly an idea for a relatively young tech company that wants to compete with Zoom get a great pilot case for its ability to scale to thousands of users, something that Zoom doesn’t do so well. But still we give creds to companies that build new business models around social causes and taking care of seniors is a great place to start.
Televeda issued the statement: Social isolation is a serious issue, and now more than ever it’s important to make people feel like they’re not alone. All participating organizations have received tech training from Televeda and access to its live social care network of virtual classes from leading health & recreational providers.
This has been helpful for civic centers to provide ongoing socialization opportunities for their members despite budget cuts and layoffs.
Mayank Mishra, Founder of Televeda: “We had to get creative on ways to raise awareness on this important issue. What better way to do that than through a bingo event for the books? The world record attempt is a great way to get the community together. We need all the help we can get to overcome the digital divide and make socialization more inclusive for everyone.”
And this is true. Covid isolation has made the digital divide even wider. And while many young grannies have figured out Instagram and TikToc, most are left in the digital dust. Guinness records and new online teleconferencing tools can bridge that divide.
Who doesn’t want to be part of something big? Guinness has always captured the spirits of young and old alike and we have a few records or more brewing in the Middle East region – most notably Egypt winning the Guinness World Record for its wastewater treatment plant and Israel and Lebanon with their hummus wars. We particularly enjoyed the open water race by Israeli vegan seniors who wore red Speedos for their Guinness attempt.
