The Digital World

The twenty first century marked the start of a new era of technological advancements. Although technology has evolved through the ages, the new developments have certainly brought technology unto a higher pedestal, creating more and more opportunities for people all over the world. The world went back to its usual state- borderless. Communicating with people in other parts of the globe has been made easy with a simple click of the send button. The internet has also certainly provided students with other avenues to obtain information for their school work.Not only that, editing pictures, videos, music, etc. has also been possible through the different advancements developed. Years ago, we were so used to using hearing our favorite music from cassette tapes placed inside portable cassette players. But nowadays, digital music, Ipods, mp3 players, and the like have been introduced. True enough; a digital world has been created together with the coming of this millennium. Widespread Use o f Internet Appliances The introduction of internet appliances in the market is seen to be another avenue by which producers could increase their revenue (Mandelstam, D. , n. d.)According to the study made by Hambrecht’s and Quist’s Internet Group, the development and production of internet appliances shall increase in the 2000s (Pastore, M. , 1999). As a means for increasing their revenue, the producers of internet appliances have connected their products to the internet to be able to receive positive feedback, knowing how popular the internet is nowadays and of course, the fact that these appliances could be accessed even from a distance. More or less, we should be expecting more internet appliances in the near future as anything is possible in the modern times through technology (David Strom Inc., 1999).Digital Counterfeiting Digital imaging is another technological advancement brought about by the twenty-first century. The editing of pictures through a program such as Photoshop has somehow evolved to the forgery of Identification cards (csrc. nit. gov, n. d. ) as well as the faking of US dollar bills (books. nap. edu, n. d. ). Obviously, digital counterfeiting is continuously being used as another way to commit crime by those who have continuously abused the benefits being brought about by the advancements in technology (Miller, 2000).Benefits and Risks of New Wireless Technology Wireless Technology, as its name implies promises one thing: internet connection without the wires (hp. ca, n. d. ). Wi-fi enabled hotspots are seen in every part of the country, in coffee shops, malls, airports, schools, etc. allowing people to check their emails or access the internet wherever they are, thus cutting the possibility of failing to read a very important email message or failing to attend to something important.Just like mobile phones, sending messages over the World Wide Web and researching would be hassle-free and very easy. In the office setup, manag ers would have an easier time in setting up networks without moving wires (hp. ca, n. d. ). It would help in lessening the rigidity of the office environment that often leads to the raising of IT costs and reduction in productivity (hp. ca, n. d. ). In summary, wireless technology offers an efficient, effective and convenient way of accessing the internet, for companies and for individuals.Unfortunately, disadvantages come with these benefits. In a report published by BBC news (April 28, 2007), the head of the government’s committee on mobile phone safety research Professor Lawrie Challis released a statement with regard to the potential health risks that wi-fi internet could bring (bbc. co. uk). Research shows the dangers of pollutants such as lead and UV radiation when using wireless internet. In addition to this, wireless technology is constantly becoming a threat to security and privacy as well.The Ernst &Young survey showed that most companies do not have protection agai nst intrusion from third parties, seeing the wireless technology as another avenue to commit internet related crimes (Beckley, 2005). Computer Gaming One of the causes of internet addiction is internet gaming. As the gaming culture continues to arise, these games become more and more addictive because of the use of the stereotype of the game player (Cover, R. , 2006). Although internet addiction is one of the many disadvantages of computer gaming, violence is yet another negative value planted in the young minds of children (Myclopedia, 2004).The violence being taught maliciously by these computer games could affect our society as this may release the aggressive behavior within us (Harris, J. 2004). The addiction of the people in these computer games would help in further deteriorating the values which should be considered as more important such as socialization with real people. Spam and its prevention and ramifications The direct effects of spam could include the consumption of co mputer and network resources, which could again, lead to the congestion of mail servers.It is also costly for individuals who devote much of their time and attention in canceling and disregarding unwanted messages without deleting the important ones. Spam comes from different senders. One of the most common brought about by spamming then is the impossibility to disregard these kinds of messages without ignoring the valuable ones. Because of the many emails an individuals usually receive, and because most of them are spam, they tend to delete everything including those that of vital importance to them.The simplest way to avoid this problem is through filtering. Popular email hosts nowadays offer filtering as one of their services. If a certain individual receives too much mail from a certain sender, all she/he has to do is block that certain address. Thus, all email messages that would come from that particular sender would not be delivered to his/her inbox (Gnus Manual, 2003). One w ay of discouraging spammers is through charging each and every mail being sent all over the world (Boushka, 2006).Also, new filtering systems should be developed that could help in slowing down the servers of these spammers as well as helping in bouncing back spammed emails to their senders. Although the Bayesian way of filtering is considered to be the most effective way to combat SPAM (Graham, 2003), new efforts must be done in order to enhance this considering the flaws present in the system. The development of new email protocols should be given importance- protocols that would no longer be susceptible because of spam (Boushka, 2006).Electronic Surveillance and Personal Privacy Wiretapping and electronic eavesdropping has been two of the most popular methods being used in criminal investigation (Landesman, n. d. ). These new forms of technology are being placed secretly to monitor the activities of criminals, and hopefully catch them in their act (Maclin, 2007). Aside from these , new surveillance videos have been installed to monitor employees’ work in a certain company to ensure that they are doing what is expected of them, and are not committing any felonies (Sinrod, E.J. , 2001).Though these may be advantageous to some, the increase in the production of electronic surveillance poses a threat to the privacy of the people being placed under these surveillance systems. In the next five years or so, more and more electronic surveillance devices could be developed that would not be noticed by the general public but could actually monitor their personal lives (Kaplan, C. S. , 1990). Ethical Use of Computer Information from Data MiningData mining is the extraction of protected information from larger databases that definitely helps companies in their gathering of very important information (Anderson. ucla. edu, n. d. ). It is of course, very useful for the science professionals and even for the businessmen as they do get their profits from the vast amou nts of information that they obtain. Data mining tools do predict trends and behaviors that could be of great help to anyone in research. However, some businessmen take advantage of data mining and even go beyond as online marketing which is not very different from SPAM (Exa, 2002).Somehow, these profit oriented individuals have violated the ethics of data mining by advertising online, spamming the accounts of people holding email accounts, and even sending out copyrighted information (Thearling. com, n. d. ). Health Dangers of Using Computers and the Internet The computer can be seen as one of the causes of many accidents. Usually, small kids could cause fire and get badly wounded for spilling a drink on the computer. Thus, children should be taught on how to properly use the computer to avoid accidents such as this (allpctips. com, 2006).In relation with this, too much use of the computer could affect the health of its users. These health related problems, cited by the Royal Socie ty for the Prevention of Accidents are the following: Repetitive Strain Injury, Strained Eyes, Stress and the worst, Epilepsy (RoSPA, 2007). In order to prevent these, one must be able to organize his or her work properly to minimize his or her time in front of the computer. Also, users must know when to take their short breaks in order to relax themselves during long periods of being exposed to the computer (Herbert, 2006).Environmental Impact of Widespread Computing Widespread computing requires a lot of energy and somehow contributes to the pollution of the environment (Kohler and Erdmann, 2004). It is also very damaging when a certain place does not have proper waste disposal (Bolton, 2003). Widespread computing could lead to problems that could contribute to the pressing problems that our world is facing nowadays, on the account of the threats of global warming, brought about by the pollutants that harm our ozone layer.The chemicals emitted as waste from pervasive computing cou ld even add on to this problem. In the same way, the increasing consumption of energy, could be tripled just because of widespread counting (Williams and Kuehr, 2003). Internet Addiction Internet addiction ruins real-life relationship and could bring about personal, family, academic, occupational and financial problems as being too engrossed with the internet puts people in seclusion, making them more and more distant to real people (Illinos Institute for Addiction Recovery, n.d. ).The reason why most people tend to be so addicted to the internet is because they find it as an extension of their social life- through the different chat soft wares, social networks such as friendster. com and myspace. com, etc. (Grohol, J. M. , 1999). Obviously, internet addiction has been more common to the children and teenagers who are so enthusiastic towards the new world that was opened to them through the World Wide Web (bewebaware. ca, 2007).