Changes that matter Most

So, what should we expect in 10 years from today? Well, 10 years ago, what did you expect to see now? Did you expect the word “Friend” to become a verb? Did you expect a twelve-year-old to stay up texting until 2am? Did you expect 140-character messaging systems enabling widespread revolutions against decades-old dictatorial regimes? The next 10 years will be an era of unprecedented connectivity; this much we know. It will build upon the social networks, both real and virtual, that we’ve all played a role in constructing, bringing ideas together that would have otherwise remained distant, unknown strangers.

Truly, the biggest changes we’ll face will not come in the form of any visible technology; the changes that matter most, as they always have, will occur in those places we know best but can never quite see: our own hearts and minds.

The Internet gives us a closer relationship with culture

The printed word is not dead. But we are seeing the decline of the novel or long pieces of written word. We are clearly in the midst of a cultural transformation. The decline of the book is part of a broader shift toward short and to the point, cultural bits of information—written words, music, video. These bits have never been easier to record, store, organize, and search, and thus they are a growing part of our enjoyment and education. In many ways, this abundance of content forces a conciseness not seen before. A tweet makes you think precisely about how to fit the maximum information into 140 chars. It may seem as if we have entered a nightmarish attention-deficit culture, but our culture of the short bit is making human minds more rather than less powerful. For youngsters, Google is more likely to provide a formative cultural experience than novels. There is no question that books are becoming less central to our cultural life. The mass migration of intellectual activity from print to the Web has brought one important development: We have begun paying more attention to information. Overall, that’s a big plus for the new world order. Multitasking is king in this new world order. Multitasking is not a distraction from our main activity, it is our main activity. There is a deep coherence to how each of us pulls out a steady stream of information from disparate sources to feed our long-term interests. With the help of technology, we are honing our ability to do many more things at once and do them faster. We access and absorb information more quickly than before, and, as a result, we often seem more impatient. If you use Google to look something up in 10 seconds rather than spend five minutes searching through an encyclopedia, that doesn’t mean you are less patient. It means you are creating more time to focus on other matters. In fact, we’re devoting more effort than ever before to big-picture questions. The Internet is supplementing and intensifying real life. The Web’s heralded interactivity not only furthers that process but opens up new possibilities for more discussion and debate. Anyone can find space on the Internet to rate a product, criticize an idea, or review a new movie or book. The measure of cultural literacy today is not whether you can “read” all the symbols in a Rubens painting but whether you can operate an iPhone and other Web-related technologies. One thing you can do with such devices is visit any number of Web sites where you can see Rubens’s pictures and learn plenty about them. It’s not so much about having information as it is about knowing how to get it. Viewed in this light, today’s young people are very culturally literate indeed—in fact, they are very often cultural leaders and creators.

Technology hasn’t made us hermits

Contrary to popular belief, technology is not leading to social isolation and people who use the internet and mobile phones have larger and more diverse social networks, according to a new study. All the evidence points in one direction. People’s social worlds are enhanced by new communication technologies.
It turns out that those who use the internet and mobile phones have notable social advantages. People use the technology to stay in touch and share information in ways that keep them socially active and connected to their communities.The study found that six per cent of Americans can be described as socially isolated – lacking anyone to discuss important matters with or who they consider to be "especially significant" in their life.That figure has hardly changed since 1985, it said.
It found that on average, the size of people’s discussion networks is 12 per cent larger among mobile phone users, nine per cent larger for those who share photos online, and nine per cent bigger for those who use instant messaging.The diversity of people’s core networks tends to be 25 per cent larger for mobile phone users, 15 percent larger for basic internet users, and even larger for frequent internet users, those who use instant messaging, and those who share digital photos online.