Technology and its Effects on Communication between People
Specific innovation
Instant Messaging & 3G
· Since the times of Pigeon Post, we used candlestick telephones, rotary dial telephones, and as technology became more advanced, we had push-button telephones, portable mobiles phones, and now smartphones, which provides so much more functions than a basic phone does (email, camera, social media, music player, internet surfing, photography)
· Not only did the mediums used changed, the methods which mass media and people pass information through are also being constantly upgraded or replaced
· What used to popular among our parents’ generation like writing letters and postcards has been eroded and evolved into instant messaging through phones and on the internet
· In the past, when people wanted information, they read newspapers. Then came radio, but as technology started to progress, people started to rely on the Internet – they used 3G on their phones to Google for information, to get directions to a destination, to check where are the best restaurants etc.
Rationale for selecting this innovation
How did it change the world?
· Communication between people today is more convenient and efficient; instant messaging allows a messages to be sent across quickly
· However, communication between people nowadays has lost its physical and emotional touch, hence causing people to be inept at face-to-face communication, public speaking, presentations, or any sort of real life communication
· People are also starting to be over-dependent on these communication technology that they no longer refer to newspapers, maps or even libraries for information, they simply refer to Google on their smartphones
Proposed Approach to Development of Paper – Gist of arguments and key points
Main points of discussion:
o How has these technology-induced changes in communication and communication mediums impacted our lives?
o Are these changes positive or negative?
o What are some of the emerging technologies that are predictable and how would they possible impact us?
Key points and relevant arguments
Positive impact:
· Convenience and efficiency of communication
o One clear benefit of technology’s influence on communication is that it has allowed us to communicate more conveniently and get messages across more efficiently
o This is done by constantly expanding the number of ways that people can communicate through, and improving on the speed of delivering messages across through these new mediums
· Overseas communication made easier
o Applications like Whatsapp make communication across countries much easier than in the past
o High roaming charges limited people to make short and succinct calls and texts to their family and friends who are overseas
o Now, with instant messaging applications, all you require is a 3G connection on your mobile phone in your own country, you can chat live with anyone at any part of the world
· Constantly-updated and easily accessible news allows people to be more informed about current affairs (double-edged sword)
o In the past, access to current news were only made available through newspapers, radio and magazines
o Now, almost everything is made accessible from the internet and hence having a smartphone makes understanding the current affairs a lot more convenient and easy for people
o However, it also swings the negative way because this increased accessibility makes people ‘lazy’
o Instead of making an effort to purchase a copy of newspapers to read, people simply ‘google’ for the related articles that they are interested in
o Instead of doing research and going to the library to source for books, people rely on Wikipedia – resulting in a waste of resources because everything’s on the ‘net’ nowadays
Negative impact:
· Loss of emotional touch through communication
o Instead of face-to-face communication, letters, or phone calls, most people, tempted by the convenience of the technology, communicate via text, instant messaging mediums, emails, or even Facebook messages.
o Most of these new mediums encourage short and concise messages which causes the loss of a personal touch to the message
o As a result, people are more estranged to each other because of the lack of in-depth communication
· Over-reliance on technology
o Today, we rely heavily on technology to get messages across to one another – SMS, Whatsapp, BBM, MSN etc
o It has become so exaggerated that children below the age of 12 are getting their hands on iPhones and iPads, when some people of my age or even older do not even own one
o These days, some do not even know what are the procedures required to post a letter
o Will the practice of mailing letters face extinction in face of the threat of technology in the future generations to come?
Emerging technologies
· Online lectures (already existing but not prevalent yet)
· Internet TV (Sony)
Hi Cynthia,
ReplyDeleteIt is quite a detailed and organized outline. Great job!
But the initial implementation of 3G was for Video Calls, which I think you didn't touch on at all in the outline. Probably you can discuss about it because it actually removes partial of the limitation of traditional text messaging.
The part about news and communication, for myself I think its shouldn't be discussed in detail as your topic is on IM. The part on news seems to be talking about the mass media moving onto the internet and giving on-the-spot up-to-date information, which can be partly transmitted through IM, but it should be a smaller segment in my opinion.
I think you can only touch on how some industries make use of IM or 3G to improve the workflow. For example, hospitals now send reminders about appointments to patients through IM which is a very good practice, and some doctors can actually do video call consultation instead of going down to the clinic or hospital. Video calls and IM probably also increases the efficiency of businesses because they can now do video conference meeting on-the-go at anytime using the 3G on the phones.
Great job and have a great recess week!
Jing Hui :)
Hi Cynthia,
ReplyDeleteI think there's some problem between the difference in technology for communication and information. Your topic is on communication between people. So the information part for example in the first paragraph:
"In the past, when people wanted information, they read newspapers. Then came radio, but as technology started to progress, people started to rely on the Internet – they used 3G on their phones to Google for information, to get directions to a destination, to check where are the best restaurants etc."
I feel that the link to communication has not been established. So you might want to improve on it.
Also under the how part on How did it change the world, you stated: "However, communication between people nowadays has lost its physical and emotional touch, hence causing people to be inept at face-to-face communication, public speaking, presentations, or any sort of real life communication."
I think if you are planning to include this statement in the case study you need to cite the reference because I think most will disagree that we are more "inept at face-to-face communication..."
The proposed outline is pretty neat so yeah..
*If you find it difficult to link information to communication, maybe you can change the topic to "Technology and its Effects on Information Dissemination" or something because my personal feel is that it's easier to link communication to information than information to communication.
All these are just some thoughts of mine so hope it helps in the crafting of your report.
Thanks and have a great week ahead. :)
-Tommy
Hi Cynthia,
ReplyDeleteI thought it was a pretty detailed outline. However, u need to be clear which area u are focusing on, either communication or passing of information. In the first part, u mentioned about telephones which is under communication. Then u moved to passing of information where u mentioned newspapers, google etc. Under your emerging technologies, i see it as a technology innovation for passing of information. Probably you can make a clearer distinction.
Regards,
Lai Mun