Introduction
Technology plays a major role in our daily life. The computers, multimedia, and other electronic devices have become part of our daily life. Internet has been branded the current and future media. It is becoming more and more crucial to everyone in the society. Many people refer to internet as a wondrous creation. The world today is in a situation that it cannot move forward without internet. It is fully obsessed with it. But how has this technology affected the way we live today? This is the question that this essay seeks to answer. There is no doubt that internet has enormously the way people do things. Communication has become almost entirely dependent on internet. Most of the world’s presses are channeled through internet. In this paper, the positive and negative impacts of internet will be dealt with.
Positive Impacts of internet
Through internet, many new ways of communication, congregate, and share information among people in the society have been created. For instance, the social media like facebook and twitter revolutionized the way people interact in the world (Kedem, 2000). Prior to internet era, interaction between people of distant places in the world used to be scanty. Today, people communicate effectively with people from different parts of the world in real time.
Field of business has also changed significantly with invention of internet. Websites enable people to conduct businesses on line. People from all over the world are capable of purchasing items online. For instance, Amazon.com trades almost 100% of its products online. This shows the crucial role that internet plays in business.
Education field has also been revolutionized through internet. Students are able to get help online regarding their studies (Kedem, 2000). They can buy books online and get tutoring services for a fee and in some cases free of charge. Books, journals, articles, newspapers, and other learning materials are available in the internet. Universities are also able to offer various courses online. Students enroll for courses online and they attend all classes online. This reduces the cost of running institutions. One is able to obtain a degree course from a university located in another country.
Cheap way of communicating is created. Phoning somebody in a different country is very costly sometimes. Internet offers a cheaper and effective way to communicate. Sending an email costs very little compared to calling someone to give the same information. People are, therefore, able to communicate and interact at a cheap price with their families and friends in other countries (Nicholas and Rowlands, 2003). On this aspect, there is also online gaming. One is able to play with people from different parts of the world. One is able to share knowledge with others.
Internet creates employment. Many people today rely on online jobs to earn a living. There are many companies in the world who offer jobs online to people from any place in the world. For instance, online writing jobs have been a source of income to several millions of people. This reduces operational costs for the company. They do not have to set up offices where employees can work from. Instead, employees are able to work from their homes and submit completed work via email or upload via company websites.
Opposing views about impact of internet
Internet also has drawbacks. According to Katz and Rice (2002), it can also be used for destructive and harmful purposes.
In the education field, some believe that internet has had a negative effect. For instance, the cases of cheating in schools have increased due to internet. Students can secretly carry internet enabled devices into the examination room (Neemuch, 2009). They use them to browse answers from the internet. This is a high level of cheating. If internet was not available, level of cheating in schools would have reduced.
There is also a complaint that internet has caused reduction in employee productivity. Employees spend a lot of time in the internet interacting with friends instead of concentrating on their duties. This has led to poor performance in many cases. Some companies try to deny employees access to internet during office hours so that they cannot waste time chatting online.
Internet has also caused moral decay in the society. It has increased access to unethical things like pornography. These materials are made available online and even children have access to them. There is no restriction on who will access them. This has caused moral decay in children.
Internet has created new form of crimes. People share a lot of personal information in the internet and sometimes it is risky (Temmel, Theuermann, Ukowitz and Vogrin, n. d). People have devised ways of illegally accessing information of others and use it to do fraudulent activities. For instance, internet banking exposes people to risks of losing their money through hacking. Privacy is disturbed as one shares more and more personal information online. Personal details can also be hacked and used to conduct illegal businesses. This exposes one to the danger of being prosecuted if it is proven that their details were used to commit a crime.
Addiction to internet is also very possible. Overuse of internet caused addiction that is dangerous to one’s life. Just like addiction to drugs and alcohol, a person addicted to internet will find it hard to stop it. This will expose one to join bad activities like online gambling that can cause huge lose to family or personal properties.
Insomnia is a condition when one spends a lot of time on something and does not get enough sleep. A person addicted to internet will spend long hours on the internet and does not sleep well. Enough sleep is good for one’s health. This condition is harmful to one’s mental growth and physical development. Young people stay up to late night chatting with friends at the expense of sleep.
Internet has led to reduction in mental capacity of students (Purdy, n. d). Every time students are given an assignment, the rush to internet to look for solution. This is a dangerous move that makes students not think but over rely on internet. The chances are that schools will be producing students who cannot do anything on their own. They become lazy to an extent that thinking creatively for them is a problem. The employers will also have a problem. They will be employing graduates with better grades but who cannot work. This poses a danger to the future of many economies. If students cannot think creatively, it means that productivity will reduce significantly in future. Companies will be hiring people who cannot perform in their job.
In conclusion, it has been proven that internet affects lives positively and negatively. However, people can control the way they use internet to mitigate the negative effects.
References
Katz, J and Rice, R. (2002). Social Consequences of Internet Use: Access, Involvement, and Interaction. London: MIT Press.
Kedem, C. (2000). The Social Impact of the Internet on Our Society. Web.
Neemuch, C. (2009). Bad effects of Internet. Web.
Nicholas, D and Rowlands, I. (2003). The Internet: Its Impact and Evaluation. Oxford: CRC Press.
Purdy, R. (n.d). The Internet: Boon or Detriment to Society? Web.
Temmel, M., Theuermann, M., Ukowitz, E and Vogrin, T. (n.d). The impact of the Internet on our daily life. Web.