Social and cultural effects....

Greetings to all!! I would have to say that the most important social and cultural effect of technology is access. Technology has provided a means of interacting that is comfortable, convenient and efficient. In previous years, everyone was not able to have access to the same amount of information as the next person, now we are able to connect virtually anywhere. Public libraries, universities, coffee shops, personal computers and offices all over the country are equipped with Internet, making it accessible by everyone no matter race or class. While it’s great that we now have the unprecedented freedom to virtually connect at any time, there are also great consequences that come with this new found freedom. Social networking sites like Face book have made it possible for us to expand our social circle and connect with people from all over, but it also takes up hours and hours of time. According to the Levy article, Face book has an “astonishing growth of 3 percent per week”, and he even starts the article by telling us about a woman who “felt lost” because she couldn’t sign on for a couple of hours. She admitted she was addicted and I totally agree! I’m not a member of any social networking site, because I have seen what it can do to you, I have watched my friends sit on it for hours and get absolutely nothing done. The Chou et. al article on addiction, said that in a study done by Brenner that nearly 80 percent of respondents “indicated at least five user-related problems such as failure to manage time, missed sleep, missed meals etc”. This is a cultural problem, because we are eliminating the interpersonal relationships and establishing virtual relationships. The Chou article suggests that people get addicted to the internet because the applications are “simple to use”, I don’t think this is a reason for addiction, I think that as a people we are just generally nosey (in the case of face book anyway).

Turkle's article on identity also made several good points. Turkle pointed out that it is becoming harder to tell the differences between what is “specifically human” and what is “specifically technology”, we are essentially living our lives online and the lines are continuing to blur. Instead of establishing relationships face-to-face, we are going on line to establish relationships and even “better versions” of ourselves with websites like second life. I think that the availability can have a major effect on our culture if we don’t learn to practice some restraint.