Living in the era of the informational society is not easy. Because of the reassessment of the economic, political and cultural values within the globalized environment of the XXI century, it has become necessary to adapting towards a completely new set of principles that rule the economics, business, finances and even culture.
As a result, the need to study information as a phenomenon and come up with the concept of information management emerges.
By using the skills acquired and trained in the process of studying the ISys 100 course, one can not only learn the specifics of information acquisition, distribution, and management in the XXI century but be able to use these skills of information management to their personal advantage, as well as to the advantage of the present-day economy and business sphere.
Before going any further, it is necessary to define the key concepts that the course has to offer. To start with, one must mention that the ISys 100 course is traditionally represented as the unit that introduces people to the opportunities that technology of the XXI century has to offer.
Allowing students to embrace the role that technology plays in the lives of the XXI century people, the given course teaches the basics of information and technology and provides comprehensive data regarding the modern methods of knowledge management and information processing, mainly the computer-assisted ones.
Thus, the role of technology in people’s daily lives is explained thoroughly in the given course, thus, allowing for using technological advances to their full potential.
When it comes to defining the positive effects that the information technology can have on the people attending it, one must mention the fact that it has redefined the pace of lives of modern people.
In addition, seeing how the latest technological innovations are exposed to vast discussions and help people sneak a peek at how the [present-day media actually works, one might argue that IT helps people get rid of the fear that technology makes them dependent on computer-assisted communication.
For example, the recent research regarding the use of the Internet among tourists has shown that most people prefer to spend their vacation in the places where they can have Internet access – and, in fact, they do, therefore, turning the entire idea of a vacation into surfing the Net:
“The finding of the higher incidence of Internet access for VFR trips versus pure leisure trips could suggest a more likely setting for retained behaviors than more unfamiliar environments” (MacKay & Vogt 2012, p. 1397).
There is no secret that in the present-day world, new forms of media, especially social networks, have changed the landscape of communication impressively. As a result, a number of people are afraid that technology will oust traditional communication.
Offering a fairly simple and understandable user interface, Information Technology, in its turn, shows that these fears have little to do with reality once modern media is used responsively, and, more to the point, shows how to be responsible in using it.
Another effect that the Information Technology has on the people using it, the possibility of acquiring information literacy should be mentioned.
Defined traditionally as the skills of acquiring, distributing, processing, analyzing and utilizing information for specific purpose, as well as using different types of media, including both traditional and new ones, for attaining data, information literacy has become a necessary part of being a valuable professional in practically any field, from IT sphere and business down to industry and trade.
According to the list of options that the Information Technology provides to its users, the latter will be capable of locating, assessing and using the available sources of information to their advantage. The given skill is of special significance in the era of globalism, when the oversaturation of markets with various products will lead to tangible complexities in making the right choice.
By defining the most credible information sources with the help of the information literacy skills acquired in the course of learning to use the Information Technology of the XXI century, one will be able to choose the right product.
The significance of information literacy, however, comes into the open not only in the field of economy, but also in business, finances, culture, and other aspects of people’s lives where the abundance of information makes the choice making procedure complicated.
Though definitely being of huge importance for an average citizen, information literacy is not the only set of skills that the economics course offers students to attain in order to make not only their professional life, but also their everyday existence more comfortable and pleasant.
Basic computer literacy, which is also an important constituent of the economics course, defines people’s capability of critical thinking, which is crucial not only for their academic performance but also for their ability to form an opinion, as well as their resistance to being manipulated by the people using and bending information to their advantage.
In addition, information literacy as “the ability to find, evaluate, and use information efficiently, effectively, and ethically to answer an information need” (Lanning 2012, p. 2) is the skill that protects people from the politically committed information that bombards them on a daily basis in order to make them give up their own point of view in favor of particular political or economic goals.
With the help of information literacy, people will be able to differentiate between the credible and less credible sources, their skill of defining the veracity of a particular information source being increased radically after cognizing the nature of Information Technology.
The unbelievably large amount of education opportunities that open in front of the people using the opportunities provided by Information Technology to the full, therefore, should be touched upon.
More to the point, the Information Technology of the XXI century allows for defining the link between technology and globalization, as well as the effects that both have on the lives of ordinary people.
Indeed, even though the significance of globalization has been discussed amply enough to recognize its effect on the economical and financial processes within a particular state and to have the concept of globalization on everyone’s lips in both traditional and new media, the role of the given process in everyday life is still rather vague.
The Information Technology, however, makes the pieces fall into places by showing that technology does affect everyday life, and acknowledges that these effects are not necessarily good. Moreover, the Information Technology teaches how to handle the disadvantages that technology combined with the effects of globalization brings into everyday life.
For instance, the communication issue, which has been mentioned above and which, probably, is by far the most controversial aspect of globalization, is explored rather well during the course. In addition, such important issue as security ion the era of globalization is also explained very well during the course.
Indeed, when most of one’s personal information is stored on an external carrier, such as a flash drive, or, which is even less secure, is contained in a database, it is crucial to make sure that the data is secure enough.
Seeing how globalization presupposes that information sharing becomes the guiding principle for cooperation between partners and friends, data leakage and the following identity theft becomes disturbingly plausible.
Therefore, the issues regarding technology and security in the age of globalization, which have been discussed vastly over the ISys 100 course, have been of great help for the people attending the lectures.
Needless to say, new types of media and the availability of information have led to creating new challenges and new opportunities. However, mostly because these types of media are so new, the chances that the provide people with remain head-scratchingly vague.
As a result, most of these opportunities pass unnoticed in everyday life. If it was not for the introduction of Information Technology into the lives of ordinary people, these chances would have never been discovered, after all; thankfully, the course exists and outlines the major chances that every single common person can put to use in their daily life.
For example, with the advent of the Information Technology it has become obvious that technology makes the routine actions that take quite a big chunk of people’s everyday life impressively less time-consuming.
Indeed, with the introduction of technology into people’s lives, it has become possible to save time for more important activities, i.e., studying, work and leisure, while such procedures as information acquisition and transfer are performed on a much faster pace.
Several A-sheets of notes of lecture material, which would have taken several hours of re-writing a few years back nowadays take a few seconds of scanning and sending to a particular person or even group of people; as a result, people may have more time to spend on studying, getting ready for the test, learning new information or simply taking rest.
Another impressive issue that the Information Technology sheds some light on and that it has introduced into the lives of millions of people, knowledge economy deserves a proper mentioning.
While the concept of knowledge economy does not actually constitute a part of any person’s everyday life, it has had a distinct effect on the way in which people all over the world perceive knowledge in general, since it involves “learning to express ideas well in both writing and speech, knowing how to find information and synthesize ideas” (Hoffer 2012, para. 5) and, thus, demands that knowledge should be viewed as a tool and not an end in itself.
Though clearly coined in order to provide more room for further studies of the impact of technology on economy, the term “knowledge economy” can also be traced in everyday life of ordinary people.
While the idea of transforming knowledge and education into the subject of trade and economic relationships might seem somewhat weird, it still creates the premises for reconsidering the values within the contemporary society.
Indeed, education options have never been as numerous as they are now that the Information Technology has erased boundaries between most states all over the world.
It literally “brought a new dimension in the field of education” (Application of Information technologies in our daily lives 2013, para. 5). As it has been stressed in a recent article regarding the new challenges and chances in education,
We can each type of information to stay home if we need. Famous books in the world are available and easily accessible via the Internet.
Every day we are now new information and using information. It is now used in the e-banking system. We conduct our operations online banking. At this time, it also has a huge impact on the area of treatment. (Application of Information technologies in our daily lives 2013, para. 5)
With the advent of information technology, people no longer take knowledge for granted – quite on the contrary, knowledge has finally gained a status of a valuable object that is worth acquiring. As a result, the concept of education is being fully restructured in the present-day society.
By explaining the economic value of knowledge and education to an everyday person, one has made it possible to introduce the idea of lifelong learning as a viable idea to a common man. Therefore, it could be argued that information technology has given a new meaning to education.
In many ways, new technology combined with the principles introduced by the globalization process has created the environment for lifelong learning, which does not necessarily concern education.
With the help of new technology, people have learned how to acquire the necessary information fast and where to get it from; moreover, the necessity to train new skills was recognized after the introduction of technological innovations, which the latter should definitely be credited for.
No matter how controversial some of the aspects regarding new forms of media might be, it cannot be doubted that they have breathed new life into learning in everyday environment.
It would be wrong to claim that technology has had only positive impact on the lives of modern people; quite on the contrary, there is enough controversy about new media and the way in which it shapes people’s lives.
According to the recent researches, due to the increasing significance of networking in people’s lives, the rates of live conversation have dropped dramatically, which mean that social networking has ousted real-life interactions almost completely.
Although the negative effect that modern media has on people’s communication skills has not been technically proven yet, the fact that people prefer virtual communication to real one can be interpreted as a rather disturbing sign.
However, the conflict of live communication vs. social networking is not the only issue that technology.poses to the modern society; apart from losing the skills of socializing, people also face the threat of becoming too dependent on the technological advances of the XXI century; therefore, what nowadays serves as a tool for making everyday life more comfortable will most likely be turned into crutches for people of the future to walk on instead of embracing what they are capable of on their own.
More to the point, some of the options that present-day technological advances offer to people for everyday life are somewhat pointless in that they add little to the actual experience without providing any valuable knowledge.
Taking one of the latest innovations that have been on everybody’s mind since the announcement of the project being in development, Google Glass as an element of the XXI century IT seems rather redundant.
True, the idea of a wearable computer (Google, Inc. 2014, para. 1) does sound awesome, yet the given gadget does not actually differ that much from any other computer except for the fact that it can be attached to a human half of the time. Therefore, it makes people more dependent on technology rather than it eases the process of information acquisition.
Information Technology is by far one of the most efficient methods of learning about the potential of knowledge management in the XXI century. It helps people realize that information is not the end in itself, but the tool that can be used for a variety of purpose.
By displaying the plethora of purposes that data can be utilized for, as well as the methods of data acquisition, processing and distribution, the course assists the people living within the realm of the informational society in learning to use the available data to their advantage and train their skills in technology in order to process and distribute the data in question as swiftly and productively as possible.
The source of the greatest challenges and at the same time the biggest store of opportunities for modern people, Information Technology helps recognize the significance of information and define its potential, which students can use not only in the process of studying but also in any other part of their lives, including professional and personal growth.
Reference List
Application of Information technologies in our daily lives 2013. Web.
Google, Inc. 2014, Welcome to a world through Google Glass. Web.
Hoffer, B. 2012, ‘Preparation for work,’ New York Times. Web.
Lanning, S. 2012, Concise guide to information literacy, ABC-CLIO, Santa Barbara, CA.
MacKay, K. & Vogt, C. 2012, ‘Information technology in everyday and vacation contexts,’ Annals of Tourism Research, vol. 29, no. 3, pp. 1380–1401.