Teach grandparents the way to connect online

In celebration of the Grandparents' Day, Bayan Telecommunications gathered some grandparents on September 12, 2009 to be oriented on how to use the internet and make it easy for them to connect online. This event, held at Cyberzone of SM North Edsa in Quezon City, gave everyone the chance to meet and greet Lola Techie, the popular persona on TV, a grandmother who is very tech-savvy.

Internet has become an integral part of our daily lives. What better way to conect with our loved ones is through the internet. The elderly must not be left behind because even they must keep up with the trends of online communication such as the internet. But a lot of the elder ones are technophobic and wouldn't bother to try learning how to connect with their families, relatives and friends here and abroad. With this realization, Bayan Telecommunications (Bayan) introduced an internet-savvy character, Lola Techie, in TV commercials that still air nationwide.

Lola Techie proves in this TVC that once seniors go online, they are just as enthusiastic as younger users—proving untrue the notion that the World Wide Web may just bore the elderly out of their wits.  In fact, Tessie Moreno, the cool grandma who plays the part of Lola Techie in the TV commercials, shares that the Internet has also changed the way she communicated with her friends and family. 

I was assisting this lola to locate the answer on the internet for the questions the host had asked.


An effort that further proves Bayan’s commitment of letting the Filipino voice be heard, the Lola Techie TVC seeks to reach more Filipinos nationwide and encourage the younger Filipinos to teach their Lolos and Lolas how to use the Internet.  It also wishes to open the minds of older Filipinos that going online can be quick, simple and a lot of fun.

An informal poll, conducted by Bayan Communications with grandchildren via Plurk and Facebook social networking sites, revealed that given the chance, 87 percent would want to continue communicating with their grandparents.

The same informal poll revealed that 81 percent of Filipinos are close to their grandparents, and that 57 percent still visit from time to time.

However, in this fast-paced world where everything happens so fast and tasks have to be juggled simultaneously, the weekend lunches with lolos and lolas seem to be happening fewer and far-between, and even the occasional phone call gets to be neglected.

More people, usually of the younger generation, educated, single, either studying or at the prime of their careers, are using the internet – specifically its more cutting edge applications like instant messaging, social networking, and blogging.

The Nielsen study also predicts that the Philippines will have over 35 million internet users in 2012, from a little over 20 million this year.

As an additional treat, those will join the Teach Lola project will get one month free upon subscription to Bayan DSL Plan 899 with a maximum speed of 768 kbs. For more information log onto www.teachlola.com & www.bayan.com.ph.