Week 4 - Information Society: What's the Difference?

-

 I have always been interested in the idea and prediction of future technological trends. In this article, I will introduce the main ideas of the report "Challenges Of The Global Information Society" by Pekka Himanen.

Pekka Himanen is one of the cited researchers in the world in the field of philosophy. He was the youngest PhD-holder in Finland when he graduated. He is currently pursuing his research and work at the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology.


In the first paragraphs, the writer illustrates 10 global trends of the world in bullet points. Currently, there are only 3 technological and economic dynamic models - “Silicon Valley model”, “Singapore model”, “Finnish model”. "Silicon Valley model" is also referred to as the neo-liberalist model of the United States. It is mainly practiced in the western world. An interesting fact is that in the year 1990, 60 millionaires were produced from the Silicon Valley area. The second model, the "Singapore model" is developed for Asian countries such as China, India. It has the purpose of attracting multinational companies to the eastern region. The third model, the "Finnish model" is based in Finland as it is more developed in terms of information society but applied in other European nations as well.


Moreover, the writer mentions the drawbacks of not living a healthy lifestyle in the information society. Many physical activities are being replaced with virtual ones. The screen time of people has increased, making the obesity rate drastically increase as well. In fact, 20% of people in this field are overweight and suffering from cardiovascular diseases.

To conclude, some of the key points are valid in today's world, however, part of them have a slight potential to exist. Overall, for an article from 2004, it has a great prediction of the future.


Resources:

http://pekkahimanen.net/bio

Himanen, P., “The Challenges of the Global Information Society”, 2004


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Week 13 - A Practical Example: the Story of Linux (Kali vs Parrot OS)

-
Image
 Linux is the most well-known and widely used open-source operating system. Unlike other operating systems, Linux has an open-source structure. This means that the person using the operating system can be aware of almost everything that goes on in the background of the computer, and can organize and develop the operating system in his own way. Whether you know Linux or not, you've probably used Linux before, albeit unintentionally. Almost a third of websites are run by servers built by Linux. Apart from that, the Linux operating system is generally used by individuals who are familiar with software and many large companies. The reason companies choose Linux when setting up their servers is because it is much more secure than other operating systems. In addition, Linux is a more flexible and comfortable operating system compared to other operating systems. There is also an incredibly large community working to improve Linux. Companies can really get tremendous help from this communi...
Read more

Week 5 - Computers and Laws I: Can Property Be Intellectual?

-
Image
 The main idea behind the book is to alter the idea of copyright legislation. In the first chapter, the writer begins the paragraph by denoting the fact that youngsters can be seen as criminals in the eyes of law because of copyrighted file sharing.  Living in the internet era, it does not seem possible to establish a rule or ban against file transferring between citizens. There is no technology to differentiate the copyrighted material and the private messages without revealing the information.  Another interesting scenario that the writer mention is that if people spend less money on purchasing CDs, they will spend the revenue to buy concert tickets which are more lucrative for artists than buying a CD. Furthermore, people in the past were not fully aware of the power of public libraries. Many people and authors were against public libraries because if people would use the same book without purchasing, the author could not earn money. However, it turned out that public ...
Read more

Week 12 - The Historical Hackerdom

-
Image
 In this forum, I will give my opinion on the book that was written by Pekka Himanen, Manual Castells, and Linus Torvalds. They come together to discuss hackers' working style, organization, work ethic, work urge, etc. To start with I will give some information about the writes. PEKKA HIMANEN: In her twenties, he received his Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Helsinki. His in-depth studies of the meaning of technological development put him in contact with academics, artists, government officials, and corporate executives. LINUS TORVALDS: While a student at the University of Helsinki in 1991, he created the Linux operating system, becoming one of the most respected hackers in the computing community. Since then, Linux has been used by thousands of users around the world.  MANUEL CASTELLS: Professor of sociology at the University of California, Berkeley. The critically acclaimed trilogy The Information Age, The City, and author of more than twenty books. I would like t...
Read more