At 96, Bill Sleeper is featured in a Best Buy commercial, touts tech-savviness
Nov 13, 2012, 7:09 PM | Updated: Nov 18, 2012, 9:23 am
Bill Sleeper jokes about putting QR codes on his walker. If someone were to steal it and scan the codes, he says, they would get a message that the mob would be coming after them.
Sleeper’s sense of humor and tech-savvy aren’t unusual in Seattle, but with his age, he has definitely become someone who sticks out in the tech scene, even leading to a part in a Best Buy commercial (with a GeekWire shout out.)
Sleeper gives presentations to seniors, as well as their children and grandkids, about how to start integrating tech into their life. He encounters a lot of negativity: seniors who have been convinced they can’t do it, and sometimes an impatient family member.
“I used to show them all this and scare them off,” Sleeper said. Now he goes a little easier on the newbies. He gets a smartphone in their hands, sets up their email and contacts, because most importantly he wants them to be connected to people so that they continue to use it.
With free courses offered about apps in the app store and online, it’s becoming even more accessible to his generation and just as important, for kids too.
“It means the geniuses aren’t lost anymore.” The opportunities afforded to kids with knowledge at their fingertips are more able to find their calling, in engineering, in science and in math.
And in his 90’s, Sleeper is ready to help educate the young and old alike.
