How Technology is Changing the World

Technology has changed the world of today. The social world, work world, and just the world in general now completely focuses and relies on technology and technological devices to function. Technology has spread to the social world because many people form and maintain their interpersonal relationships through social media. It has almost become a requirement for people to be on social media to actually be included in their interpersonal relationships (Packard, 2013). What this really means is that a whole new set of skills is required to successfully manage interpersonal connections with others (Packard, 2013).

Furthering that are the new skills that are required to remain as a viable employee in the workforce of today (Shea, 2010). Technology has changed how workers communicate with each other, how work is accomplished, and even what work actually needs to be completed (Shea, 2010). For example, e-mail communication has become one of the most prominent forms of work communication (Shea, 2010). Without the skills to communicate effectively through e-mail, a person may not be able to contribute to the working world of today (Shea, 2010). That exemplifies how a generation of people that are not willing to adapt to technology and learn to use the necessary skills associated with technology will likely not prosper in today’s working world (Shea, 2010). Even more than that, many of the jobs required today are technology related and thus require people to have the skills necessary to obtain those jobs. This has caused people to have difficulty competing in the workforce of today, if they do not have the technological skills necessary to do so (Shea, 2010).

The negative effect of this is that it can be creating a generational gap between those that are able to use and fully adapt to the technological world and those that are not (Shea, 2010). This can be seen both socially and professionally. Socially, the general population keeps in contact with each other through social media. If people do not use social media, then they are losing out on those interactions, which can lead to the gap between those using technology and those not using it (Shea, 2010). Even more noticeable, and probably more important, is the professional gap that occurs between those that know and understand new technology and those that do not (Shea, 2010). Technology is rapidly changing. Those that do not or cannot adapt to that, are likely to become no longer necessary in the workforce (Shea, 2010). They will no longer be a necessity to a company that is fully digital, now (Shea, 2010).

Technology is literally changing the way our brains function (Keegan, 2012). Because of that, to successfully navigate both the social and professional world of today, people have to adapt and learn the new skill sets necessary (Keegan, 2012).

References:

Keegan, S. (2012). Digital technologies are re-shaping our brains. Qualitative Market Research, 15(3), 328-346.

Packard, A. (2013). Digital media law (2^nd edition). West Sussex, UK: Wiley-Blackwell.

Shea, B. (2010). How the Internet changed everything. Crain’s Detroit Business, 1, EO50.

 

The videos below were created to explain how technology has changed the world. This first video was created in 2008. Though that makes the video already six years old, it still holds some interesting information about how new technology has influenced the world.

 

This second video is actually the updated version of the first video. This was created in 2014 to update the facts that were released six years ago. Watching these videos one after the other is particularly interesting because people can see what facts have changed and what facts have not changed over the last six years.

References:

Mesjms. (2014). Did You Know 2014 [YouTube Video]. United States.

Skikull, R. (2008). Technology- Changes [YouTube Video]. United States.

The World of Social Media

Social media has created a new outlet for people in many aspects of life. First, it is fairly obvious how social media has influenced personal life. Social media has created a way for interpersonal connections to be created and maintained all from behind a computer or phone screen (Petric, Petrovic, & Vehovar, 2011). This allows people from all different parts of the world and types of lives to meet and connect on social media (Petric et al., 2011). It also allows for people to keep connections with others that move away (Petric et al., 2011). That is the positive aspect of social media; it allows for connection. This does require people to learn new skills in order to use social media as a way to create interpersonal connections, though (Paus, 2013).

Professionally, though, social media has had a much more complicated presence. The positive side of social media for professional use is that it has provided companies a free way to market and reach audiences that are attracted to social media (Petric et al., 2011). The advent of social media found audiences being pulled from companies because they were more interested in spending their time on different social media platforms. This meant that companies needed to adjust or be left behind (Kolodzy, 2013). Companies began using social media platforms as a way to market themselves (Kolodzy, 2013). This proved to be profitable because using social media websites are free, but can provide an outlet for wide audiences (Kolodzy, 2013). Because of this, companies needed to learn to use social media to their advantage (Kolodzy, 2013).

A good example for what kind of skills communicators needed to learn to advance with social media can be seen through the dissemination of news information. Social media caused a huge hit to be taken by newspaper companies because people no longer wanted their news in that form. Many companies took to creating online newspapers. While that has been somewhat successfully, news companies still needed to do more (Kolodzy, 2013). This resulted in a necessary change for newspaper companies, which was to integrate news information with social media (Kolodzy, 2013). Instead of fighting with social media to get users’ attention, news companies worked through social media to get users’ attention (Kolodzy, 2013).

Though this has been successful, it has caused new skill sets to be necessary for journalists. A journalist now needs to know how to get an audience’s attention on Twitter by being able to post headlines in 140 character or less (Kolodzy, 2013). A journalist now needs to know how to get an audience’s attention on Facebook by posting interesting pictures to go along with the written story (Kolodzy, 2013). Finally, a journalist now needs to know how to get an audience’s attention on YouTube by posting a video along with news information (Kolodzy, 2013). All of this has caused new training to be completed by communication professionals for them to remain vital in the professional world of today where social media is only becoming more and more integrated (Kolodzy, 2013; Paus, 2013; Petric et al., 2011).

References:

Kolodzy, J. (2013). Practicing convergence journalism. New York, NY: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group.

Paus, V. (2013). New media and leadership: Social media and open organizational communication. Manager, (17), 73-78. (this one is a stretch but can be used here because it talks about interpersonal communication between teams and through social media)

Petric, G., Petrovcic, A., & Vehovar, V. (2011). Social uses of interpersonal communication technologies in a complex media environment. European Journal of Communication, 26(2), 116-132. (this discusses the interpersonal side)

This infograph depicts how social media is affecting the workplace. It provides percentages of how much social media usage is being used in the workplace both personally and professionally.

 

This infograph shows how social media is being used across the world. It exemplifies how social media is being used in all parts of the world, but how some use it in different ways. What is particularly interesting about this infograph is the fact that looking at the future in the United States shows trends of common usage of the hash tags conflict, war, and terrorism. On the other hand, many other counties will be using the hash tags environment and green.

 

This infograph shows the relevance of social media both in general use and in professional use. It particularly shows how corporations are using social media as a way to connect with their customers. It also explains what type of social media is more popular for companies.

References:

Adams, D. (2013). How technology changed our workplace communication. Bit Rebels. Retrieved from  http://www.bitrebels.com/lifestyle/technology-changing-workplace-communication/

Social Media Facts. (2013). Core Vision Technology. Retrieved from https://corevisiontechnology.wordpress.com/tag/whatsapp/

Wallace, D. (2011). Digital Technology: Global Game-Changer for Social Change. Infographic Journal. Retrieved from http://infographicjournal.com/digital-technology-global-game-changer-for-social-change/

Information Overload - Deciding What is True

With the ability of anyone to have Internet access comes the ability for anyone to post information on the Internet. This has created a new necessary skill which is for people to be able to distinguish what is true and what is not true on the Internet. This becomes particularly difficult considering that even news stories that are reported on the Internet are not always reliable (Gunter et al., 2009). From journalists, to anyone reading news information posted in the Internet, it has become a necessary skill to be able to check the sources that are posting that information (Gunter et al., 2009). There are so many ways that people can post information that may or may not be true. A prime example of this is blogs. Blogs have been a result of new technology. Many people do post true and factual information on blogs, but how does one go about establishing if a blog’s information is true and factual (Gunter et al., 2009)? This is where the new skill sets come in.

            For example, this blog post itself could be false, perhaps what is being written about is not accurate information, even though it is presented as such. What would be necessary for readers to substantiate the claims made in this post would be to research the topic, and read the sources referenced in this blog (Gunter et al., 2009). These are all news skills that have to be learned by any communication professional and any person that wants to know the facts of an idea.

            Before the technological age when a newspaper was the only way that people could receive the news, there was no need to fact check what was being written about (Kolodzy, 2013). Furthermore, even if people did want to fact check what was being written about, there really was not a way to do that (Kolodzy, 2013). Now, though, different information can be given to different parts of the world (Sylvie & Chyi, 2007). Because of that, it has become a necessary skill for people to fact check the information that they are given (Sylvie & Chyi, 2007). This is particularly necessary for those in the communication field, such as journalists, whose careers rely on the factual information that they post.

            It is extremely easy for false information to circulate on the Internet, so being able to establish what is true and what is false is a necessary skill.

References:

Gunter, B., Campbell, V., Touri, M., & Gibson, R. (2009). Blogs, news and credibility. Aslib Proceedings, 61(2), 185-204.

Kolodzy, J. (2013). Practicing convergence journalism. New York, NY: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group.

Sylvie, G., & Chyi, H. I. (2007). One product, two markets: How geography differentiates online newspaper audiences. Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, 84(3), 562-581.

This infograph covers information about social media. It is particularly interesting to see the information about blogging and other types of social media used by companies.

This infograph shows who bloggers are. It also shows how many of them are blogging for fun or professionally.

References:

 

Goodwill Community Foundation (2014). What is a blog? GCF Learn Free. Retrieved from http://www.gcflearnfree.org/blogbasics/1.2

Van Den Beld, B. (2011). The future of marketing: Blogging and social media. State of Digital. Retrieved from http://www.stateofdigital.com/the-future-of-marketing-blogging-and-social-media/