Survival of the Digital Citizens

By: Kevin G. Corpuz

If you’ll be stuck in an island, what is the thing that you can’t live without?

Cellphone. Tablet. Computer. Name it.

Agree or disagree? But, really, this is the common dilemma happening to most people nowadays when their phones’ batteries went empty, when their laptops got busted, when their selfie-photos in instagram were corrupted, when their twitter status weren’t updated, when their FB accounts were hacked and all of the other unfortunate episodes in their lives that involve the tragic failure of being techie.

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) have become so pervasive that we cannot imagine a world without them (Sadath, 2012).

Well, it is an undeniable fact that as time passes by, technology is improving rapidly, and in the advent and evolution of two of the most important inventions in the history of technology – the cellphone and computer, people at this time has made them as the turning-wheels of their lives.

ICT is a very rapidly changing field. People may not ask what gadget last for decades or a lifetime, rather, what is the next, improved, better, faster, more powerful ICT product appears on the market? (Moursund, 2005) 

Old and young, rich and poor and all people who came from all walks of life definitely owns a cellphone or a laptop and brings it anywhere they go and use it on a daily basis. If years ago cellphones started out as just a simple device that only had numbers and people used them for emergencies and computers are only at home, now it’s more than that.

Who could stand to last a day without thinking about your left cellphone or laptop at home? Certainly, you would miss your portable MP3 player, your addictive game app, your modern pocket calendar, your handy dual-camera, or your personal touch screen notepad.

To answer people’s needs and convenience, cellphones and gadgets continue to gain many features. (Cox, 2003)

However, there’s a rising concern that bothers the society today, and even the old cliché goes well with this bugging question: “Are ICT gadgets rescuers of human’s boredom and dreadful confinement of the traditional things?

Way back then, students and so other would have had no options but to work hard just to meet the deadline of their assignments and researches, in which many of us were found inside the library to look for important details about the requirements or else, to renegotiate an extension. 

Nowadays, researching is not a tedious work at all even the deadline for submission is mere hours or minutes away because of the “copy - paste” mentality. (Wittel, 2001)

Students surf the internet for information and once they found it, click…click…click…copy…paste, and …print then …submit. There, the product of intellectual dishonesty just to comply with the requirements and survive the day’s deadline.

But what if there is no wi-fi, broadband or any type of internet connection?

Internet has created a new realm of opportunity, but only for the lucky few. This new world has opened up to the individuals fortunate enough to be able to access technologies. The internet currently reaches less than 10 per cent of the world’s population. (Castells, 2001)

Even you have the high-en technologies visible on your own hands, but without connectivity, it may be practically useless. How much if you are really don’t have at least a single trending gadget now.

Now, who could confidently say that a techno-savvy individual could last an hour in an island without thinking to whom to send an electronic S.O.S? Who could definitely confirm that a phone-person could last a peaceful day without worrying about his or her confiscated phone? It’s just like an empty battery of a cellphone before it lost its Wi-Fi signal. It is now hard to imagine how people would manage to live their lives without android cellphones, tablets, computers, i-pod, i-pad or any gadgets anymore. Though every gadget comes with a purpose, it only depends upon the individual how to control its use and learn how to cope with its effects. Let’s just say, that’s the way how the survival of the digital citizens goes.

                                           

Bibliography  

Castells, M. (2001). The Internet Galaxy; Reflections on the Internet, Business and Society. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.

Cox, M. (2003). ICT and Attainment. Annesley, Nottinghamshire: DfES Publications.

Moursund, D. (2005). Introduction to ICT in Education. Eugene, Oregon: The Free Press.

Sadath, A. (2012). Information and Communication Technology: Standard X. Poojappura, Thiruvananthapuran: KBPS, Kakanad Kochi.

Wittel, A. (2001). Toward a Network Sociality. New York: The New Press.