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The Power Of The Mouse
Every era of chronicled history has been underscored by the technology used during it. The successes achieved in no small measure during each one of these have been underpinned by the technology used. The twenty first century has ushered in a new revolution. Thanks to the advent of the Internet, information is just a click of a mouse away. The plethora of information available today has no parallel throughout history. Be it in the form of data, news or the web log of a solitary explorer somewhere in outer Mongolia who chronicles his journey, nothing is beyond one's reach. In fact as I write this piece about the power of the Internet I find it amusing that Microsoft word tells me that I am semantically incorrect when I begin the word Internet in lower keys! Yes, a norm that is usually reserved usually for proper nouns and words like I and God is applicable to the Internet as well! That by itself is a fitting tribute to the veneration that the Internet truly deserves! The world today is truly held together with optical fibers, where a mesh of networks and sub-networks where each one can effectively be reduced to a link in the entire web. We find ourselves inextricably linked to any other point in the network."The flat world " concept as propounded by Thomas L.Friedman speaks about how the concept of the state or nation has become obsolete. How the World Wide Web has reduced us to global citizens in a world without boundaries, a world where thoughts and knowledge flow free, unfettered by borders, unencumbered by excise duties. A world envisioned by Tagore when he spoke of a world where the "head is held high and the mind is without fear". In this global village that the erstwhile, much fragmented world has metamorphosed into, awareness has become has the one true religion, the only path to salvation from the ignominy of ignorance ,from the abyss of exploitation. The growing phenomenon of Social networking sites has brought people closer than ever before. The six degrees of separation theorized earlier may soon be revised thanks to how much the Internet has shortened the social graph. A graph that now expands virally. When citizens of myriad countries interact seamlessly over the Internet they realize how much alike they are and how petty their differences . Even terrorist organizations have taken the battle for the minds of the young and the impressionable to cyberspace with every major terrorist outfit worth its AK-47 having its own website, replete with its pernicious agenda and messages of hate and destruction. A relatively newer concept called Crowd sourcing which has recently come to the fore is defined as "the act of taking a job traditionally performed by a designated agent (usually an employee) and outsourcing it to an undefined, generally large group of people in the form of an open call".The compilation of Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia written and edited by its users, is the best-known example, but there are many others. The Library of Congress asked users of Flickr, a popular photo-sharing site, to identify unknown people in its old photo collections. Within days, distant relatives and acquaintances had identified hundreds of people in the pictures. Volunteers have helped astronomers sort millions of galaxies in the "Galaxy Zoo" project, in which participants are asked to classify images of galaxies, captured using telescopes, into one of a handful of categories. (This is something that software is bad at, but humans find easy). Crowd sourcing has also spread into some unexpected areas. Wanted for War Crimes, a website put together by Aegis Trust, an anti-genocide campaign group, lets users report sightings of war criminals implicated in the Darfur conflict and mark them on Google Maps. Companies are also beginning to take notice. Google is sending satellite-positioning devices to India and enlisting volunteers to chart the country's roads on Google Maps. A survey of marketing bosses conducted by the Marketing Executives Networking Group found that 62% have used crowd sourcing in some form. This makes sense because asking the public for ideas is much cheaper than hiring consultants or doing market research. An online campaign today can generate global hysteria and waves of popular support. The Internet has truly given a voice to the voiceless, a crutch to the feeble. When atrocities committed in Darfur are beamed across the world via YouTube, it instigates protesters and lobbyists across the world to take up arms for the cause of its people .The Tibet struggle for self determination has for a long time been waging a silent war against Chinese atrocities over the Internet. In fact what many would consider to be the seat of temporal power of the world, that of the President of the United Sates has acknowledged the tremendous power that the Internet commands by the fact that most of the campaigning for this times Presidential elections were conducted online. The power of the Internet manifested by the click of the mouse has empowered people in more ways than the gun ever could. Each and every one of us who is connected to the Internet has been elevated to positions of power like never before; the power to inform, the power to educate, the power to assist. This does not seek to destroy, instead, it consolidates and strengthens. Thanks to the mouse, we now have the weapon to BECOME the change. To protest against injustice, to champion the cause of those who can't. The power to create. This power does not corrupt .It edifies and enlightens. The click of the mouse is the gateway to a veritable Rabbit's hole, or the red pill that Morpheus promises in The Matrix, will show Neo how deep it actually goes. A promise of release from the imprisonment of our minds. A brave new wonderland! Article Directory: http://www.articledashboard.com To read more aboutTechnology and intenet visit The ViewspaperVoice of Youth. |
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