Computer illiteracy may sound like the inability of a person to effectively use a computer but a significant portion of this gap in knowledge stems from a deficit of jargon and computer language needed to describe the functions of a computer. I don't mean to say that people are computer illiterate if they don't know HTML but that people without experience with computers have a hard time explaining what they need to do on a computer because they lack the appropriate vocabulary to describe it. I experience this a lot working in a computer lab; when "download" or "upload" becomes a panacea for any function on the computer. For people without means to express what they need done on the computer it's like being in a country where you don't understand the language. This is when I have to act as a translator. I have to interpret the function they're describing to me and guide them through a process using non-technical language.
It's easy to be dismissive of someone without computer experience and a lot times I see people assume anyone that hasn't learned basic computer skills by now is an idiot. I know that many times a person's trepidation about computers stems from being treated like an idiot by everyone when they ask questions; but it's still reasonable that person could have made it to 2013 and have very little computer experience. You wouldn't treat a person that doesn't speak the same language or dialect as you like an idiot and, likewise, because so much of the gap--initially--between the computer literate and the computer illiterate is a dearth of computer-related language, you shouldn't extrapolate about their intelligence or competency based on their computer skills.
