The Impact Of It On Society In Terms Of Living, Working And Socialising
IT stands for 'Information Technology'. Those two words, according to the Harvard Business Review, were first used in an article published in 1958 by Harold J. Leavitt and Thomas L. Whisler, and as a term it has since become widespread around the world as IT is undoubtedly one of the fastest growing international industries. To support this statement, we will take a look at the most significant developments in IT in the last 50 years.
IT is the use of computers to store, process, manipulate, create, secure and retrieve data or information of any type. It is considered to be a part of (and sometimes used synonymously with) ICT-information and communications technology. So it all started with computers.
The first ever general purpose computer was built more than 50 years ago (ENIAC-1946). It's worth mentioning that it filled a 50-foot long basement room and weighed 30 tons, whereas today I took a computer with me in a shoulder bag, and it is quite probable that you have one in your pocket. Computers, laptops, tablets, smartphones: we can't imagine our personal or professional lives without them.
Barcodes: The first retail product sold using a barcode scanner was a pack of Wrigley's chewing gum in 1974. A barcode scan is fast and error-free, and we need it for more than grocery shopping. It is a user-friendly and inexpensive tool that can help any company to be more efficient.
Internet: From a Cold War defensive measure, through research and educational networking to the internet we know today, the internet began life in 1962. The term www was invented by Tim Berners-Lee from CERN in 1989, and the internet was fully commercialised by 1995. It has come a long way, but it's a technology used by over half of the world's population due to its advantages in communication and information sharing. Email, video conferencing, chat rooms, e-commerce, learning, banking, etc. are all available to us just because of the internet.
Social media – Facebook started in 2004 and then Youtube, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Flickr, Meetup, Snapchat, etc. followed thereafter. There are over 3 billion social media users around the world, and the number continues to grow. Social networks give us than a great opportunity to connect not just with friends and family but also with potential customers.
Robotics: The term “robot” comes from the Czech word 'robota', which means 'forced work or labour'. Most robots today are used for repetitive actions or dangerous jobs. We have robotic manufacturing and medical robotics, and we also use them in agriculture, the military and even in space. VR (virtual reality) and drones aren't just for the gaming industry. Amazon is working on a drone delivery system, and in Africa they are used to deliver medical supplies. In the fitness industry, VR can make people feel more motivated to work out.
We can say that IT has transformed many industries-agriculture, healthcare, retail, transportation, energy, manufacturing, etc. , but to fully understand how it can help manage and develop our businesses, we should examine how IT has changed society in terms of living, working and socialising.
Many businesses are using the effect of IT on society in their favour. The book Computers, Phones, and the Internet: Domesticating Information Technology states that TV broadcasters understand the ability of television to 'kill' time or 'steal' time from activities that its users actually prefer doing. Knowing that viewers will typically (and maybe not deliberately) continue watching their channel, they broadcast unproven shows after highly popular ones.
However, research shows that the internet use is replacing television viewing. In what other ways does the internet affect our lives?
First, we can take a look at image number 1. It shows the daily Internet activities of U. S. adults on a randomly selected day. Results are from the Pew Internet and American Life Project. We can see that the most popular activity is viewing emails. The internet greatly helps users to stay in contact with friends and family members in ways that were not possible before. It helps to preserve old friendships after moving away (high school friendships, for example, after moving to college). There are concerns, though, that internet usage and the ability to communicate through chat rooms, social media, Email, and SMS actually takes people away from face-to-face interactions, causing dehumanisation. On the other hand, someone can claim that interacting with strangers online improves real-life relationships because it transforms a naturally shy person into a confident and outgoing one, or that online communities created by groups of people sharing similar interests have a positive effect. Socialising online refers especially to teenagers. However, it should be pointed out that one of the major IT issues in society is cyberbullying. It can lead to low self-esteem, self-harm and even suicide. However, beyond social media sites, teenagers like surfing the web for fun, listening to and downloading music and learning about the world. IT has dramatically changed the teaching and learning process. Students can find an enormous amount of knowledge online and can take various online courses. Those online courses are accessible to anyone and they can help improve performance at work, at school or in everyday life.
According to the Pew Internet Project, lots of internet users go online for healthcare information. As a result, patients usually spend only 10 to 15 minutes with a general practitioner because they come to an appointment already well-informed and knowing what questions they would like to ask. In this regard, we can see that online healthcare information is changing the way people interact with the health care system.
I have already stated that IT has transformed many industries, but we should examine how those transformations have changed the way people work.
50 years ago, jobs for men usually involved physical work. Technology has helped to produce more sedentary and mental work. However, it doesn't necessarily mean that we have to sit in the office from 9 to 5. Nowadays, we can work from anywhere, even from the comfort of our homes; we just need to turn on a computer. Automation is reducing human intervention to a minimum. UNIMATE was the first industrial robot designed by George Devol in 1954 and was installed by General Motors in their automotive plant in 1962. Modern industrial robots are becoming more versatile. Cobots-collaborative robots-can work alongside humans. Amazon also started to engage them in 2012, and without cobots an Amazon warehouse worker would have to walk between 7 to 15 miles per shift. A spokesman for the company said in 2015: ''We like to think of it as a symphony of software, machine learning, computer algorithms and people. ''
Construction Robotics, for example, has developed a bricklaying cobot called the Sam100, which can lay around 2000 bricks a day while working collaboratively with masons, reducing lifting by 80%. That's an example of IT reducing physical labour. Computers have even made it possible for artisans to express themselves more than ever before. For instance, using CAD-computer-aided design software- in the jewellery industry helps jewellers create pieces they couldn't create by hand before.
At the end of this presentation, as an exploration of the impact of living in the information age on individuals, we should imagine a family living 50 years ago.
Mother is reading a book that she borrowed from the library while cooking a dinner from her cookbook. Father is reading a DIY magazine and their teenage daughter is outside playing with her friends. Now imagine the 21st-century family. Mother is reading a Kindle while cooking from bbcgoodfood. com. Father is on his phone checking reviews of a drill he would like to buy online. Their teenage daughter is posting images of herself on Instagram because she has a new haircut.
