Support And Opposition to Internet Resources
The internet is one of the most significant things human beings have ever invented. Undoubtedly, It has impacted society. Nonetheless, it is loved and hated in equal measure. Proponents praise its positive effects, especially on the education sector, whereas opponents continue to raise complaints about its invasion of privacy. Proper use of the internet can lead to enormous gains, such as improvements in literacy skills, whereas its wrongful use can result in harmful activities such as data theft.
The internet has indeed affected the way individuals communicate. Its system connects several computers and the individuals who use them. Thus, it is not only a technological fact but also a social one. The electronic revolution has elicited the linguistic revolution. For instance, Netspeak is something entirely new. It is neither written speech nor spoken writing. The world is gradually shifting from face to face communication and is now embracing virtual connection. Such methods of communication present a vast potential for the enrichment of individual languages.
At the onset of the internet era, most people were skeptical, believing it would surely lead to a deterioration of literacy skills. Critiques argued that the youth were using abbreviations, in mobile applications such as twitter, to create a new language because they did not know how to spell words correctly (The RSA, 2010). However, David Crystal explains that young individuals leave out letters because it is fashionable; thus, one must know that the letters exist to feel trendy about leaving them out. Furthermore, the individual argues that people who are good at texting are also the best at spelling; a person who texts several is likely to have improved literacy scores in their school tests. “The sooner you get your mobile phone,” says David, “the better your literacy scores,” (The RSA, 2010).
David also mentions that different forms of internet resources evoke the development of different styles of English. For instance, the style one uses when texting differs from the technique used when they are blogging. Moreover, technologies impact languages in specific ways. For example, during the early days of twitter, the mobile application would ask people to state what they were doing when they were twitting. The question was very introverted as the response would always be in the first-person pronoun. Years later, the application started inquiring about the events happening around its users. Subsequently, the answers to these questions had to be in third-person pronoun (BritishCouncilSerbia, 2013). Additionally, tenses also changed quite frequently. Twitter suddenly transformed into a news reporting service from its initial purpose of serving as an online diary, resulting in a fundamental change in linguistics. Crystal says, “The software in the technology makes individuals think in a different way” (BritishCouncilSerbia, 2013). Thus, every aspect of the internet influences the way people use language.
A section of people is, however, uncomfortable with the interference of internet resources to privacy. Companies that track every aspect of individuals’ online lives can get personal data through their mobile phones since they can access the sites people search on the web and even the emails they send to colleagues (Andrews, 2012). Every information fed into social media sites is chronicled and evaluated by data aggregators who provide the information to companies. Such actions are done without the consent of the internet user. Unfortunately, there is almost nothing the individual can do concerning the issue. In the offline world, if a person copies another individual’s documents without consent, they would be guilty of trespass. However, the law is rather less protective when similar offenses occur online.
Scraping is a newly invented method of stealing data that is gaining popularity amongst data aggregators. It involves copying data from websites through screen-scrapers. Web scrapers can make thousands of web searches in seconds. Thus, web vendors can hardly differentiate between ordinary consumers and aggregators accessing data to steal it. Search engines also gather and analyze people’s data through their search queries. Some allow advertisers to set and access cookies on the users’ making them more vulnerable to information theft.
Behavioral promotion is also among the leading forces behind the theft of personal information. Advertisers have an undying hunger for private details about people’s habits and passions. The form of promotion involves tracking people’s online activity to provide personalized advertising (Andrews, 2012). Businesses use the practice to align their ads to the interests of the consumers. Nonetheless, the careless use of private data has been used to harm internet users. Most social media sites are incapable of securing their consumers’ personal information. In some instances, identity thieves pose as businesses and are allowed access to several consumers’ financial records.
Web-lining also affects people’s credit limits. For example, some people have complained, citing instances where their credit limits were lowered because they shopped from firms whose customers had poor repayment histories (Andrews, 2012). Besides influencing opportunities offered to individuals, web-lining also affects the type of information people see. Additionally, behavioral advertisements increase stereotyped groupings. For instance, when young women are continuously shown fashion articles instead of financial trends, they are likely to ignore any stock savvy. Thus, promotions make people stick to societal conformities.
In conclusion, the internet is like a double-edged sword; it has impacted society positively and negatively. For instance, in linguistics, it has helped shape different languages, including English. Students are improving their literacy abilities by constantly reading and writing through the internet. Nonetheless, the internet has also led to the theft of private information, which is sometimes used to harm internet users.
References
Andrews, L. B. (2012). I know who you are and I saw what you did: Social networks and the death of privacy. Simon and Schuster. https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=XCtKe6Mjx-0C&oi=fnd&pg=PA17&dq=George+Orwell……Meet+Mark+Zuckerberg&ots=0GfWjN4MsT&sig=wPHYwpjBSdKbQQEB55WrIUIACmQ
The RSA. (2010, June 28). David Crystal –Texts and Tweets: myths and realities [Video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/Boj8VYzDAy8
BritishCouncilSerbia. (2013, November 30). David Crystal- The Effect of New Technologies on English [Video]. YouTube.