Networks and Communication

     As with most things, new communication technology has its pros and cons.
     New communication techology such as email, texting,  IM, and Skype have have many great great advantages that serve as proponents for their usage.  Instead of waiting weeks for such material to arrive in the mail, through the power of the internet, documents can be sent thousands of miles in seconds with the click of a button.  By utilizing video communication technology such as Skype or Face Time, the inhibition of space can be minimized as doctors can see their patients face to face.  These instant communication technologies are also helpful in the non working world.  Friends and family can communication for simple things like catching up on old times and arranging carpools or for more serious matters in times of emergency.  These functions are served in cheaper and more instantaneous ways via the likes of texting, email, and Skype.  Essentially, new communication technology offer more instantaneous and cheaper methods of communication that are utilized in many different avenues of life. 

            But these new features of communication come with a downside.  As noted in the article published by the International Journal of Human-Computer Interaction, You’ve Got Mail! Shall I Deal With It Now? Electronic Mail from the Recipients Perspective, e-mail, as it continues to play increasingly large parts of our lives, “appears to have to potential to tyrannize, overload, and enslave is users.”  I was speaking with two friends of mine, one of whom is a statistician and the other, who works in computers.  The two of them bemoaned the fact that they often spend so much time responding to emails that they feel like they cannot acually get any work done.  Email and other technologies  are so instantaneous, that we become overly absorbed in them; spending so much time and energy that we are often distracted from our other important tasks like driving and work.  Not only do they serve as distractions, but new communication technologies oftentimes bombard us with unwanted and sometimes dangerous information through the likes of spam and phishing.   These technologies have the potential to overload our lives in ways that have potentially serious ramifications. 

            Technology offers potential pitfalls, and we must work our best to mitigate them.  In concern to the dangers of unwanted information such as spam and phishing, the optimal strategy for communicatin techology users is to update the security settings on the software they are using to prevent people from gaining the information that helps promote these bothersome activities.  In regards to the issues of becoming overly distracted by new communication techology and the dangers it brings to the likes of drivers and others, the best advice I can give is to ovoid overdependence on new communication techologies and place priority on the pressing issues at hand.  We must focus on what is in front of us, and if that means putting down your cell phone while driving, then so be it.  In the end, it is up to each individual technology user to not let technology gain control of his or her life.