The Changing Role of the Internet - Term Paper Example

1.0. The changing effects of internet to individual Internet plays a significant role to our present technology especially with variety of information any individual may need from school to offices or even for personal use in relevance to every individual’s needs. In terms of the broad dimension of communication, internet also plays a very important role in virtue of correspondence most especially with documents or tri-media. Individual advancement may be co-related with technological advancement in such a way that internet access may have a positive and negative effect to every individual (Nomura, 1997-1998) 1.1. For the reason of own personal consumption or benefit, positive effects may include as follows: 1.1.1) Direct Access to Information - individual may have a direct access to information related to world news; in the case of students’ research for school requirement or present development in the process of learning gained from teachers in the school; in the case of employees’ presentation in line with their work may be easily found in the World Wide Web. 1.1.2) Enhances Networking – individual may develop networking among contact groups that may beneficial to his job or any opportunities leading to good results; in the case of cultural groups, same nationality will tend to communicate in a manner of understanding each other or the feeling of cultural belongingness may be develop through chatting; in the case of distant communication, families, lovers, friends, acquaintances, employees or employers tend to have a conference call or VoIP. 1.1.3) Opportunity to Self Expression – any individual has the opportunity to express oneself and be able to share other’s expression through a homepage, forums or blogs; in the case of any individual having the opportunity of meeting people in the net to express and share views of life that may interest to both. 1.1.4) Psychologically Advantageous – there are individuals who prefer to talk or communicate through typing instead of talking therefore decreases individual inhibitions; for deaf and mute individuals, there are already computer tools for communication accessibility gaining the possibility of more networks; for blind or visually impaired individuals, has the opportunity to communicate with the advent of Braille notebook computer or Braille keyboard for more chances of personal achievement. 1.1.5) Increases Individual Interaction – establishes relationship among friends and family through an increasing individual interaction; intimate relationship will be develop in the process of interaction among friends and family; there are cases that a friend or a family member cannot express his/her emotions towards a friend or a parent unless expressed in the environment of the internet. “The results of these studies showed that internet communication was a supplement to face-to-face interactions with friends and family as opposed to a replacement”, (Mentzer, 2003). 1.2. The possibilities of negative effects of internet to individual are as follows: 1.2.1) Stolen Personal Identity – chances of having your personal identity be stolen and the probability of mistaken identity due to personal information accessible to the internet is vulnerable. 1.2.2) Unprotected Obscene Sites – individuals or children has the freedom of browsing obscene materials of pornography and violent links that may have adverse effect or influence to your development and there were no strict universal laws that would protect any internet user from such. “Though Singapore's government now started controlling and policing those obscene material on the web, there is a question to be raised: doesn't the regulation offend the freedom of speech? The same question has also been raised from the United States when the obscene pictures on the web were prosecuted”, (Nomura, 1997-1998). 1.2.3) Increases Crime over the Web – there is no doubt that there are many crimes committed over the net like hackers who stole credit cards or even any individual has the chances of getting information and supplying false information for the sake of privacy intervention with its own vested interest. This action may lead to an individual to commit offensive crimes against any person or even to any private institution and organization. “It actually happened a few years ago: a guy from Brazil stole through Internet military secrets from the Department of Defense in U.S.A.,” (Nomura, 1997-1998). 1.2.4) Increases Plagiarism of Knowledge – the widespread tendency of plagiarism is already increasing because academically, students or individuals tend to find many information from the net that are mostly copy pasted which greatly affected the academic institution and other organization yet there are also original information that will be copied and pasted; this action will eventually lead to an individual to fraud and crime. 1.2.5} Psychologically Disadvantageous – any individual has the chance of having less social interaction or social development will be impaired due to lack of social interaction; it has a negative effect for any individual in a family communication where children tend to find more comfort through the internet than the family ties; this situation holds true like in the case of my nephew who has develop a fear with exposure to many people since his only acquaintance was his family and too much exposure to the net, recently he was already afraid of going to a school where many students like him will enroll whereby he preferred an online schooling than going to the academic institution; in the event internet will lead to addiction but it is still debatable if internet will be classified an addiction or not. “Some researchers, like John M. Grohol, claim that it is simply people trying to escape their problems in an online world and cannot be classified as an addiction”, (Mentzer, 2003). “Other psychologists, including Jennifer R. Ferris, believe that Internet addiction is a true psychological disorder with definable symptoms. The symptoms are comparable to any addiction, withdrawal, loss of relationships or job and significant time consumption”, (Mentzer, 2003). Above all these positive and negative effects to the individual using the World Wide Web, it is very crucial decision to undertake on how to handle things in a proper perspective with regard to internet. It is then for people to realize if using the internet will be beneficial or detrimental to own personal development. Bottom line is every individual will be given the freedom to choose and it is within his/her own power to abuse or to develop it positively for his/her own good. Therefore, it is very important to handle all these things in a manner that internet is more beneficial rather than detrimental to every individual. 2.0 The changing effects of internet to Society Technology is continuously changing. These growing changes bring social and economical consequences on different aspects of our daily life. In the last decade, some of these changes were difficult to cope with. In the future, these changes will happen faster, with less time to prepare. Thus two aspects of this changing technology emerged that is “Positive and Negative impact” on the users. Our approach is to avoid wrong choice otherwise our technology will destroy us The Internet has influenced different aspects of society. It is important to understand what the consequences of the diffusion and high use of the Internet are for people’s lives. People were isolated, depressed and lonely. People who use internet remain cut off their environment and lose face to face relations which are strong by spending time in virtual reality with unknown people, which results in weaker relations. Second school of thought supports the mixture of people and they become more social, have chance to meet variety of people of their interests without any time and space barrier. 2.1. The Internet Today: Causes and Effects 1996 was the year of Internet. We constantly saw and heard the word "Internet" everywhere last year. Currently, Internet is now changing the concept of nation, the means to communicate with people and even your view of life. Then what should we do to deal with it? Can we be only a fanatic of Internet or be an anti-Internet? First, I'd like to show the positive effects that Internet has caused; then, I will move on to the negative side. Maybe you can come up with many positive effects of Internet. First, you can get the latest news on the web anytime everywhere. It must be interesting if students make a good use of the web because what teachers teach you is not always the latest thing. You can have an opportunity to keep in touch with things new and what's happening in the world now. This was not possible a decade ago. Second, Internet is changing the concept of organization or system like a nation, an ethnic group, a company and a network of people. Imagine you are Japanese living in Sweden.......you can't speak Swedish; you don't have any Japanese friends living your neighboring city. Maybe you'll become nervous because you can't get any Japanese news other than the letters from your friends. You don't have enough money to call Japan since its too expensive. Once you get on Internet account, your problem will all be gone! You can chat with your Japanese friends on the web at a low price and can get any information that you want. The borders between countries are fading by Internet in this way. Third, in case of company, you can say what you want to tell your boss or a company president by sending E-mail directly. Consequently, the relationship among people in the company is changing since you don't need someone to communicate with your superior anymore. The working style is also changing; you don't have to go to the company everyday because you can do your work at home and send what you've done by E-mail. You can have more free time and can change your lifestyle as you like. Fourth, concerning a network of people, Internet helped to connect and gather volunteers after the big earthquake had rocked the city of Kobe in 1995. The homepage made by one of the volunteer posted lots of information such as what refugees in Kobe need and which shelter needs helpers. Fifth, Internet is a good means to express yourself. You can make your homepage and introduce yourself there. Then some people who saw your homepage would be interested in you or your information offered on the homepage and would contact you. It can be someone from unfamiliar country that you've never been to. Isn't that kind of a great meeting? Maybe you want to found your own company on the web. It's possible now. Internet is very useful if you have something that you want to do or express. Now I'd like to state the negative effects of Internet. First, an infringement of copyright (or piracy) on the web is one of the most controversial problem that Internet has caused. It is very hard to protect the copyright since you can get any information on the web any time. You can draw some pictures offered in someone's homepage into yours and you can copy everything that is shown on the web-which you're supposed not to do so. Second, subversive materials posted on the web are also a big problem. It's obvious that subversive materials like porno or the picture of a dead body are not good for you nor for children. It can happen that innocent kids cruising the web to find a toy company's homepage stumble across the place where many horrible pictures are posted. Though Singapore's government now started controlling and policing those obscene materials on the web, there is a question to be raised: doesn't the regulation offend the freedom of speech? The same question has also been raised from the United States when the obscene pictures on the web were prosecuted. Then, how should we protect our children from those subversive materials on Internet? Is there any way to measure the degree of the obscene materials? To make matters worse, there is currently no universal law that can supervise those problems. As you know, since Internet is worldwide, all countries must cooperate to restrict something on the web; otherwise, you can do it in the country where the law is not enforced. Third, you have to be concerned about the crime on the web. Because you can offer some information anonymously on Internet, some people can also trespass upon your privacy through Internet by spreading some information that you want to conceal Furthermore, a crime on the web can sometimes be very serious. If you are a computer specialist, you could steal secret information like the military secrets of another country. Fourth, as some people say, the Internet is a box of waste since most of the information which is offered on the web is junk. All you do on the web is just wasting your time. In addition, E-mails sometimes bother people; you can't write back to a hundred mails! Some mails may even have nothing to do with you. Dealing with E-mail could waste a lot of your time. Thus, the Internet, which was first created for military use, causes both positive and negative effects today. Nevertheless, you just can't complain all the time about the negative effects of Internet. You know that it's too late to stop the expanding of Internet. You won't be able to live without it. What is now demanded for us is to deal with both positive and negative side of Internet--and, hopefully, to change its negative effects for the better (Nomura, 2000). 3.0. The changing effects of internet to Business Today, the Internet is changing the very definition of trade. It has given businesses the ability to cheaply and efficiently showcase their products and services worldwide. Company size is of less importance because large or small; they all have access to the Internet as a communica- tion medium. By making information easy to acquire, the Internet gave suppliers the ability to bi-pass layers of middlemen. Because of this, middlemen had to take on different and more sophis- ticated roles as consolidators, aggregators, logistics providers, and retailers. The Internet gave us the ability to accomplish things faster and more cost effective than ever before. What’s magical is that the same opportunity is available to every business, of any size, in any industry (Andaya, 2008). 5.0. Analysis Internet may or may not isolate people from the real world depending how they use Internet. On the other hand, it is facilitating people to make face-to-face relations stronger by remaining in touch with them without any gender geographical, racial or societal barriers. It is not only helping people to bond in friendship but also emerged as source to bridge different kinds of people from a little to a greater extent. 6.0. Related Cases 6.1. A more recent case is that of the administrators of a pro-jihadist internet forum, who on 27 April 2007 used an internet chatroom to facilitate a live interview with a purported Palestinian member of the Islamic State of Iraq, Abu Adam al-Maqdisi. Forum participants were able to ask Maqdisi questions about the progress of the conflict in Iraq, including how they could hijra (emigrate) to join the fighting, or whether there was any assistance they could provide the group from their current locations. Maqdisi provided much useful insight into the activities of foreign fighter networks in Iraq, including their current need for recruits specifically willing to engage in so-called 'martyrdom' operations. However, clearly aware of the need for operational security, he was careful to avoid divulging too much information of potential use to any counter-terrorism forces who may have infiltrated the meeting. To meet many of the needs of a diversifying movement, jihadist leaders have looked to the internet as an efficient tool that can be used in multiple ways to meet core mission requirements such as recruitment, communication and the dissemination of strategic guidance and orders (Drennan & Black, 2007). 6.2. Computers and the Internet are definitely affecting the way we entertain ourselves. The most basic example is card games. If the computer can deal out cards on a screen with the click of a button, why would anyone want to deal out a deck of cards manually and have to clean them up afterwards? On the Internet, you can gamble with on-line casinos, place bets on a horse race, or even watch movies. People can do all of these activities in the comfort of their own home. No gas money is wasted or time spent driving around to find entertainment so people are happy. The inevitable outcome of this magnificent invention is going to change the world. Society is happy about the way things are changing. Cheaper is better, less time consuming is better. With the choice of having a computer and being on-line, there is almost nothing you cannot do. This remarkable idea of the Internet is going to revolutionize the way we live in the future (Effects of Computers and the Internet on Society, 2003). 6.3. Computers can calculate and figure out things much quicker than the average person. This process cannot only save time, but money too. Stock trading is now on the Internet, along with banking and any other type of business you could imagine. The world wants thing to be quick and easy. The best answer to that is to have a computer do it for you. In the future, hundreds of millions of jobs will be taken away from honest hard-working employees and will be given to computers. No matter what choices we make, or what plans we change, these outcomes are going to become real. Why would a business pay someone to take phone orders, when a computer can do it in less time and make it both cheaper and easier for the business and the buyer? (Effects of Computers and the Internet on Society, 2003). 7.0. Conclusions The results suggest that, in general, majority of the users do agree with the potential of the Internet as informative source for general public and realize the effort involved in effectively utilizing this valuable resource. To put in a nutshell, the usage of Internet has its pros and cons. Hence, it is up to the public to utilize the Internet service. Cyber authorities must take precaution to stricken up the cyber laws to take action against those disrupted the internet traffic or virtual criminals. Besides that, they should carry out campaigns as well to encourage more people to use Internet as it benefits mankind 8.0. Bibliography Andaya, D., 2008, ‘The Internet Effect’, Computer World Magazine 2007, Philippine Internet Commerce Society, Available at: http://www.pics.org.ph/?p=45. Drennan, S. and Black, A., 2007, ‘Jihad online – the changing role of the internet’, Jane’s Intelligence and insight, Available at: http://www.janes.com/news/security/ terrorism/jir/jir070719_1_n.shtml. ‘Effects of Computers and the Internet on Society’, 2003, Available at: http://www.takingitglobal.org/express/panorama/article.html?ContentID=1742 Nomura, K., 1994-2000, ‘The Internet Today: Causes and Effects’, Available at: http://www.tsujiru.net/compass/compass_1997/reg/nomura_r_3.htm Kristin Mentzer, 2003, ‘Psychological Effects of the Internet: Advantages of the internet’, Available at: http://iml.jou.ufl.edu/projects/Spring03/Mentzer/advantages.htm ‘The Evolution of the Internet and It’s Effect on the Society’, 2007, Available at: http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/218359/the_evolution_of_the_internet_and_its.html?cat=15 Read More