What are the effects of the internet

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From this graph:

http://www.allaboutmarketresearch.com/images/growth2007.png

It seems to be a linear graph, and it seems to be quite recent. If trend continues, there is going to be more people using it.

What can we say? The full effect of this technology is not revealed. Of course, studies done, people seem to be more distracted than ever before. The growth of social networking sites make people more connected than ever before in history. So, is people becoming more social?

It seems the future growth of the technology will come from China, and india, since they are getting richer. Since there are more Chinese, and Indian people, would there not be more Chinese web pages, and would this not in time fundamentally change the character of the internet?

Online multiplayer gaming is very popular, but it seems there is still room for growth. I think it is growing everywhere in the world, but with the highest growth/number in China. Perhaps, gaming will one day be dominated by Chinese companies?

Google, and youtube are very popular. Can we imagine better search engines becoming more popular than google. What about movie sharing sites like youtube? Can you imagine google, and youtube still exist after 50+ years?

So, it seems the internet is still growing, and the full implication of it is still not clear. What are the effects on society, and people?

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Type: Discussion • Score: 7 • Views: 1,492 • Replies: 19

@TuringEquivalent,

Great thread, thanks for posting.

TuringEquivalent wrote:

What can we say? The full effect of this technology is not revealed. Of course, studies done, people seem to be more distracted than ever before. The growth of social networking sites make people more connected than ever before in history. So, is people becoming more social

This is a mixed bag of results. Yea, people are becoming more distracted, but the internet's only one of the factors. I've read quite a bit on this and, all in all, the distraction-factor has its main culprit in attention dividing, multi-tasking and over-immersion in such media forms. Again, there's a lot that goes into the equation.

The social factor has increased quantitatively but qualitatively it seems to have suffered. In-person social contact is best for the human; communication is MUCH more complete as is the physical presence we rely on for feedback and sense of belonging. The disembodied nature of chatting, forums, etc. can be a good thing - its all a matter of: 1) How much is too much -and- 2) Doing so to the detriment of real, vital, in-person relations that aren't created and destroyed with one click, that are (or can be) anonymous and that haven't the interpersonal investment that real-life relations tend to have.

The internet brings and makes possible a MYRIAD of good things. But as with all technological integrations into our lives, there are some drawbacks. This is an extremely important issue folks - not necessarily gloom and doom - but one that affects all of us who spend time on the net, in any way. There are two outstanding books I reviewed a while back that I'd heartily recommend, "Devices of the Soul: Battling for ourselves in the Age of Machines" and "Distracted: The Erosion of Attention and the Coming of Dark Age"

TuringEquivalent wrote:

Online multiplayer gaming is very popular, but it seems there is still room for growth. I think it is growing everywhere in the world, but with the highest growth/number in China. Perhaps, gaming will one day be dominated by Chinese companies?

Who knows. My guess is that it'll even out at that point in time where all who can and want to be in on it actually get to that point. I, myself, play a lot of World of Warcraft and the chinese presence has increased quite a bit.

TuringEquivalent wrote:

So, it seems the internet is still growing, and the full implication of it is still not clear. What are the effects on society, and people?

It depends on how each individual uses it.

Unfortunately, like all available mediums, it'll likely be used and abused whole-hog, balls to the wall without thought of its effects on our lives, relationships, sense of belonging, etc. One would hope that as the drawbacks start to take hold, people will change towards the better. Unfortunately, as all our global problems have shown us time and time again, the glut will probably go until it simply can't any more.

Good stuff - thanks

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@TuringEquivalent,

It's the same thing all over again.

Printed books swept the world providing access to information and entertainment that was was never available before.

Television swept the world providing access to information and entertainment that was never available before.

Now it is the internet which (not surprisingly) is providing access to information and entertainment that was never available before.

We have been through this before-- we will be alright.

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@TuringEquivalent,

Two quibbles about your graph.

First, it is not linear (except for the last extrapolated part). If you labeled this as linear in any math class, you would be marked wrong.

Second, there is a limit to this graph which is around 6.5 billion. Since a billion or two of these are in poverty (and some of these don't have access to electricity) it is likely that this new internet users are going to be slower to come in the future. I bet the graph starts getting less and less steep-- something like this.

http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ChBdg0jMzD3SYM:http://agriculture.kzntl.gov.za/images/veld_pic_7.gif

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@ebrown p,

ebrown p wrote:

Two quibbles about your graph.

First, it is not linear (except for the last extrapolated part). If you labeled this as linear in any math class, you would be marked wrong.

Really? You don` t think the op graph is linear? Something must be wrong with your eyes.

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@TuringEquivalent,

LOL, It could be your monitor. Question, did the picture I posted appear linear to you? (That would explain it). There are mathematical ways to measure fit. I would be pretty easy for you to do a linear regression and calculate an r^2 fit. But it is probably not worth doing since this wasn't the important point I was making.

The real point is that we have been through this before with the printing press, with radio and then with TV. The internet is just more of the same.

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@ebrown p,

ebrown p wrote:

LOL, It could be your monitor. Question, did the picture I posted appear linear to you? (That would explain it).

The graph you posted are not based on any empirical data, and thus, not relevant. The graph i posted do reflect the data, and it is linear.

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@TuringEquivalent,

Fine, it's a line if you say it is a line.

What about the other point... that new technologies that gives people unprecedented access to information and entertainment have come along many times in our history, and in this sense... the Internet is just another instance of the same trend.

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How are the statistics defining growth in internet access/usage?

If a region of the world only accesses the internet via cell phone, is that still counted in the statistics as internet usage or must it be accessed with a computer of some type?

People in many regions of the world have access to the internet via their jobs but have no way to access it outside of work. Are the statistics and analyses distinguishing between the growth of business and personal use of the internet?

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That which is being forgotten in the comparison to television and books is the interaction. It is not just a passive entertainment media. It is interactive, in asynchronous time and real time, sometimes simultaneously. It is having potentially profound effects on our communication etc... that TV and books didn't have.

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@GoshisDead,

Gosh, you are describing the telephone.

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@ebrown p,

ebrown p wrote:

Fine, it's a line if you say it is a line.

The data is best approximated by a linear line.

2 Replies

@TuringEquivalent,

Look Turing, I am a math guy.

If you want to continue this little mathematical squabble, then why don't you do a linear regression. Post the line (mx + b form is fine) that you think best approximates this data. I propose we use all of the data, except for the extrapolated data (the four points on the end) which aren't real data.

I will then do a exponential fit (or even a polynomial fit would probably work).

We can then calculate which fit is best. Do you agree to using r-squared to determine fit for our little competition?

If you really think this is worth pursuing, then we will solve this little mathematical disagreement mathematically. Otherwise this tit-for-tat is kind of silly.

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@TuringEquivalent,

Am i really describibg the telephone? I suppose voicemail could be called asynchronous. However there are no forums for telephone message comentary, telephone bloggism, telephone forums, party lines could equal chat rooms but are so cost ineffective that they didn't make much of an effect on the telephone industry etc...

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@GoshisDead,

Sure Gosh,

The point is that each new technology allows us to communicate in ways that were either prohibitively difficult, or impossible before.

The social changes brought about by the printing press, where all of a sudden most everyone had access to printed information (where before this information was only available to the very wealthy) were at least as severe as we are facing now. Political pamphlets caused upheaval, education was revolutionized and information was democratized.

The social changes brought about by the telegraph were also transformative. Now people could send information over long distances in minutes, rather then days... and newspapers now carried up to date information from around the world.

Radio... television... both of these media had huge social impacts.

So yes, the internet is better, faster and more advanced then anything before it.... but so was the printing press. The internet is just the next step in an ongoing progression of communications technology.

Humanity will adapt.

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@ebrown p,

Agreed. not necessarily about the better part.
Noting that the type of interaction a user has with the internet is different and cannot be straight analogous to radio, books, television, etc...

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@ebrown p,

ebrown p wrote:

Look Turing, I am a math guy.

If you want to continue this little mathematical squabble, then why don't you do a linear regression. Post the line (mx + b form is fine) that you think best approximates this data. I propose we use all of the data, except for the extrapolated data (the four points on the end) which aren't real data.

I will then do a exponential fit (or even a polynomial fit would probably work).

We can then calculate which fit is best. Do you agree to using r-squared to determine fit for our little competition?

If you really think this is worth pursuing, then we will solve this little mathematical disagreement mathematically. Otherwise this tit-for-tat is kind of silly.

If you want to do that using excel, fine, but the best approximation is a linear line.

1 Reply

@TuringEquivalent,

TuringEquivalent wrote:

If you want to do that using excel, fine, but the best approximation is a linear line.

Yes, linear is the best kind of line.

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I am a sci-fi cyborg. I can walk around and wonder about something and almost instantly find out the answer. I can know where I am and what's around me. I can sit in a park and listen to a university lecture or watch an orgy, or buy a book from Japan, write, send and receive a message. I can pay my bills and change my insurance company, apply for a job, or write a symphony. I can record what I see and hear, and I can share those perceptions with the entire world in seconds.
Wow.

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@TuringEquivalent,

TuringEquivalent wrote:

What can we say? The full effect of this technology is not revealed.

The full effect, and full potential, of this technology is not known.

TuringEquivalent wrote:

It seems the future growth of the technology will come from China, and india, since they are getting richer. Since there are more Chinese, and Indian people, would there not be more Chinese web pages, and would this not in time fundamentally change the character of the internet?

There are already websites in Russian, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Arabic, etc.

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What are the effects of the internet

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