Can Humanity Keep Up With The Internet?
Fire. The Wheel. Farming. The Printing Press. Many think of these advances as some of the greatest in human history. Where would we be without fire? Before the wheel was invented, moving anything heavier than one could lift was either impossible or simply not worth the effort. Man would still be hunting and gathering if our ancestors had never learned to farm, and the printing press made literature widely available which increased reading and learning. As powerful as each advance in technology may have been, all pale in comparison to the impact the Internet has had on humanity. From the economy, to crime, to our sense of community, the Internet has changed society so much, so fast, that civilization has had major problems adjusting.
Today, Ecommerce accounts for a massive share of retail sales in every market, and has created entirely new thriving industries. While this benefits Ecommerce businesses, brick-and-mortar stores are tasked with the challenge of staying in business with fewer customers which often results in closures and unemployment. Newspapers are also feeling the heat from lighter internet-based news outlets that are designed to thrive in a 24-hour news cycle, breaking stories as they happen rather than relying on their loyal audience to wait for the morning edition. While newspapers’ websites are updated with breaking news, they haven’t adjusted to an advertising-based business model instead of the subscription-and-advertising-based model they’ve known for over 100 years. Even Network Television behemoths CBS, NBC, ABC and FOX have seen viewership sink like a stone alongside advertising revenue as their audience migrates to on-demand sources of entertainment on the Internet. This is especially unfortunate because much television found online lives on network websites, which means departments within the same companies are competing against each other.
Computer Crime has been a problem since the 70’s in some fashion or form, but criminals began making real strides when the Internet became an integral part of the global financial system. Personal information is stolen every day from financial and credit lending institutions or from personal computers via hacker programs like keyloggers or viruses. When a crime is committed on the Internet, law enforcement agencies must follow protocol which means sorting through mountains of data to track the location of the criminal instead of the crime. Due to obstacles with jurisdiction in foreign nations, law enforcement is continually late to the game in the world of Internet crime, and criminals are always one step ahead. The ability to interact anonymously can bring out the worst in a common man and the Internet is a dangerous place for exactly this reason.
The sudden injection of the Internet into society has shaken a lot of foundations of humanity, but none are more important than how we interact with each other. Man has always thrived on a closely-knit community of family friends for ideas, relationships and a sense of belonging. Since the introduction of Social Media hubs like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, we have ignored the need for personal relationships by retreating to our virtual social profiles where we incessantly update the faceless masses on every aspect of our lives, hoping everyone cares. If our ancestors measured their worth by the people who cared about them, we measure ours by the number of Facebook Friends we have.
Throughout human history, no technological achievement has been as life-altering, or resulted in as much upheaval in so many different facets of our lives as the Internet. As a civilization, humanity has undergone a great many chaotic transitions and endured its share of hardships, but never before has it had to contend so vigorously against a technology that increases the quality of life while, at the same time, threatens the stability we have relied on for our economic stability, safety and close relationships with others throughout our communities.
