A Networked Society: Good or Evil?

  If you have managed to get onto the computer and navigated to this exact post then you are part of a networked society - congratulations! 

  Its all good, you are reading this informative blog post without leaving the comfort of your room, great isn't it? But as this blog title suggests there are some bad sides to having a networked society and here at The Digital Bucket they will be explored and magnified against the positive elements of being connected. 

   Being part of a networked society is great for making communication easy, I bet that most of you reading this will have a profile on Facebook. This social networking site allows just that, easy communication. In a blog post last year by its creator Mark Zuckerberg, "Growing rapidly to 200 million users is a really good start..." All of these people will be connected to their friends and family's profiles allowing them to share information in seconds without even leaving the house or even the country. As Zuckerberg's creation grows its networked society becomes more and more inter-linked with all members.

  With this in mind some would argue that this is the sort of thing that is destroying 'proper' social interaction most importantly in the younger generation. No face-to-face communication is necessary when social networks such as Facebook, MSN, Skype and MySpace exist and allow anyone to simply connect and see what their friends were doing 14 minutes ago. Two famous features of Facebook is the 'Relationship Status' and the 'Interested In'. This can be seen as a controversial tag that displays sensitive information about individuals' private life. Take a look at this video from Youtube concentrating on these items:

 With the social integrity under fire it is a necessity in some global organisations where video conferencing would not be possible without being constantly in a networked society. In a past blog post by Skype itself, "Business users have always been part of the Skype family and make up 30% of Skype's global community now number at 171 million". Notice the use of the word 'community'; all these businesses conferencing together are all part of a networked society. Another advantage with businesses inter-linked together is that money is saved; in the same blog post by Skype they state, "95% [of bussinesses] claimed to have saved money and 80% claimed that using Skype increased employee productivity." So looking at this point and linking back to the title, this side of a networked society is a good and advantageous thing.

   Moving onto the more dark or 'evil' (in this case) side of the internet and indeed the networked society. Cases of people being befriended by someone on Facebook who say they are who they are actually not can have horrific consequences and that is the most popular topic to refer to. Other 'internet evils' include theft of personal details on sites such as Ebay or Amazon. Sensitive information that you enter such as email address and credit card details can be picked up by someone targeting you. Email phishing and key loggers are a few types and you'll will have had hundreds of spam emails, you know the ones, right? The iconic and world famous Viagra pills spam? Or perhaps the fact that you have just won the Nigerian Lottery?! Yes, these contribute to the bad side of being in a networked society.

  Another, bullying.This has been a constant area within school life and often leaves the target helpless and isolated. With a networked society basically involved in almost every young person's life such as Facebook or even now Youtube bullying has evolved to the World Wide Web. The thing about Youtube is that people leave comments to videos posted by others, comments that can be hurtful to different cultures around the world and because they are sitting in their small room and most probably in another country they feel it acceptable. This is why the idea of a networked society is under allot of scrutiny at the moment.

   These have been just a few insights into the good sides of some networked societies and also their contradictory bad sides. But with progression these negative elements should be ironed out for example, Facebook again have undergone heavy scrutiny by the users themselves to improve the security issues as reports of hackers and false accounts were discovered. Numerous updates have been implemented meaning that it is becoming increasingly strong; this will be similar to other networked societies where security is an issue.