A generation ago, literacy meant reading and writing. Today, a person can read fluently and still be locked out of essential services if they can't navigate a government portal, spot a phishing email, or fill in a basic spreadsheet.
That's the quiet redefinition happening across workplaces and communities: digital competency has become a baseline requirement, not a bonus skill. Job applications live online. Banking lives online. Healthcare scheduling, tax filing, and even basic customer support have moved behind a login screen.
This matters most for the people least likely to have had formal training — small business owners managing their first website, older adults navigating new banking apps, or early-career workers expected to "just know" tools nobody taught them. Treating digital skills as literacy, rather than as a specialist IT topic, changes how we teach them: patiently, practically, and starting from real tasks rather than abstract tutorials.
That's the same principle behind the beginner computer training I run — meet people at the task they actually need to do, and build confidence from there.