Years ago, people reached each other by writing letters and sent them via runners and parrots[ . It would take years to establish a single conversation with each other. There are historical incidents where people fought wars for months not knowing that it had ended. In today’s world, the communication is done with lightning speed (literally in many cases) connecting the globe like a net made of light which we literally call the internet. With a click or soft tap on the screen, one is reaching to his family members, friends of his home country. He can check out his books online, with a cheaper rate that is available at the thrift shops at the back of his or her alley. As people are getting more dependent on the internet, many claim that the internet is not a different dimension where the world has shrunk but it is a medium where a new era of crime has ushered in the era of pirates in waterways. In the YouTube video “The Dangers of Internet” the narrator, de Botton,points out four major issues that are arising due to the internet- addiction, knowledge vs wisdom, privacy, and security. He further claims we should be very watchful about the risks. I do not agree with[ the narrator’s claims because the internet is just a tool to engage with the world around us[ . Just as the era of pirates has ended so shall end the era of cyber criminals. I think that the internet is a modern tool equipped with the ability to provide alternative ways to socialize, a great resource to verify the knowledge we obtained, and the number and nature of crimes are not something that deserves to make us feel paranoid about them . This is true that privacy concerns are still as risky as offline communication, but the hopefully quick solutions also exist in the near future . In the next few paragraphs, I will argue these four major issues are not of grave concern.
The very first thing the narrator mentioned is an addiction of internet or addiction to certain contents that are conveyed by internet or addiction of things which is made possible with the sci-fi like powers of the internet.Critics of the internet would say that for an individual to be addicted to the internet is a risk because it makes them spend too much time on the internet creating challenges in their personal relationships. Here, the critics are especially pointing at the downsides of social media. I claim that spending too much time on social media is actually helping people in their everyday sphere of communication. A research was conducted by Association of Information Systems (AIS) to identify the benefits and concerns of social media using an array of a survey questionnaire that has been sent to the participants of the research via social media. 73% of the participants reported that they use social media for personal communication purpose, 43% reported as their lifestyle, 68% reported to use it as networking purpose, 72% reported to use social media as leisure time activity, 54% reported to use social media as Business/ School/ Academic purposes. The majority of the participants uses facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Flickr as their communication site. The result suggests that this form of communication is not creating a challenge for most of the participants. In fact, the response to the survey questions regarding the benefits of social media suggests that 97 out of 122 participants thinks that social media is helping them to improve communication. Getting to know different people and their views of the world is very helpful in gaining more knowledge of people around us. Not every city in the world has a widely diverse population like New York City. For those people, getting down the street and knowing about different cultures is not happening in the offline world. This is especially the case for the underdeveloped countries and they lack the skill of critical thinkings coming up with many different ideas. New ideas are very important maintaining a business, especially businesses that have branches overseas where the members of a team are from different parts of the world, sharing their ideas to come up with the best idea of all using internet social media. This may be more engaging than a person next to you talking about unnecessary stuff. Therefore, with the cost-benefit analysis, internet addiction is not a risk and offline communication is riskier.
The narrator claims that having too much information in hand is risky as it may give people misinformation or leave people with less understanding. I think that saying too much information putting people at risk of getting less understanding or misinformation is like saying that people don’t have the ability of judgment or verifying the knowledge. Contrary to de Botton, an internet search engine is the best place to verify any information. For example, I was watching President Barack Obama welcoming the Prime Minister of Singapore live on Whitehouse’s Facebook page and reading the comments where many people are commenting “Happy Birthday to you Mr. President” (from WhiteHouse Facebook page). To check the comments, I just searched “Barack Obama” on google and confirmed in two seconds that it was not his birthday but two days from now will be his birthday. Later I shared the link to the live video on my Facebook highlighting that this is not his birthday. On the other hand, I don’t think it would have an easy way to verify the knowledge very fast by gossiping with by friends offline which might have made me stick with the unverified knowledge my friend has provided me, leaving me with information that is very hard to verify. Indeed, it is riskier to get information without verification then verified information. Critics may argue on the point that does you really understand what you have found on the internet? I believe that internet search engine, the modern tool of resources, have many different ways to make it understand. For example, if I am to understand the meaning of the word “condescending” I will simply type it into the search box and I will be presented with the meaning of the word in a split second. If the meaning does not help, I can go to image tab of the search engine, perhaps, go to the video tab to complete my understanding of the word. Many times, internet videos such as YouTube videos presents very useful visual and auditory effects to remember and understand any obscure vocabulary words. Furthermore, if you search for life advice, it is also there. Therefore, the internet, especially, the search engine is a very useful resource to verify and solidify our understanding of any information.
Among all the points the narrator has mentioned, the privacy concern seems reasonable to me. Cookie trackers are pulling out all the information from a user’s web page to provide the user with the type things he/she likes, the personal choices he/ she makes in his/her life, and much more. It is very troubling but true that hackers can get access to many of our very secure information and abuse us with the information using cookies. Cookies are very vulnerable in this way, but some websites require cookies to verify the user credentials in order to send the desired web page requested by the user’s end. In this way, cookies are used to verify privacy. Asides from that, most of the cookie trackers use the information from cookies to provide the user with information on something the user often wants to see or something that the user has in mind to do in the future. As for example, I purchased electronics kits from amazon and the next thing I might have in my mind is the book to build something with the kids. As I scroll over some post on Facebook, I see some books that might be helpful to continue my electronics project which is very helpful. But the fear is that what if a hacker out there tracks my cookie and session id and get my login credentials. Every internet browser has private browsing option in which cookies are not being stored, no history is being recorded for the sites the user has visited. Private browsing is a solution to the problem but still who knows which hackers from which part of the world are watching.
Internet crime, as the narrator mentioned, is one of the biggest risks of the internet. He claims that cyber bullying, child abuse, child pornography is increasing on the internet. These are all risks of using the internet but I think it is much riskier to get raped or get sexually assaulted in public than a victim of internet crime as being physically assaulted results in higher cases of suicide, murder, or suffering from mental disorder. According to RAINN, the largest anti-sexual violence organization of the nation, claims that the number of victims of rape and sexual assault is 288,820. Among the victims, 94% of women who are raped experience post-traumatic-stress-disorder(PTSD) symptoms two weeks after the following rape, 33% women contemplate suicide, 13% attempt suicide, 70% sexual assault victim experiences moderate to severe distress, a larger percentage than for any other violent crime. On the other hand, according to an IC3 annual report by FBI, crime due to threats for the violation and confidential fraud/romance adds up to 27,000 which is much less than the number of victims of public assault. The statistics illustrate that internet crime still did not reach the point to become as dangerous as rape crime. Internet pornography may even have led to less actual physical assaults as people are satisfying their libido by means of porn.
Critics, the parents’ generation, as well as the narrator, de Botton (46 years old), may warn about the risks of the internet, but today’s teenagers’ view, as well as the statistical analysis, shows that the internet is actually a much safer and efficient way of communication. It also contributes to research with a vast amount of information available to build judgment and a quick way to address any issue that may arise from the internet. If the internet is causing risk and providing a solution, that sums up to nothing. If we add the benefits of the internet to it, we get a positive outcome. and these benefits outweigh the risks; risks found on the internet are also found in the offline world, and these issues are far more severe than the risks on the internet. What we must realize is that the internet is merely a medium. It is much easier now to report crime and make criminals known to the masses due to the internet. To be able to locate these criminals exemplify the benefits which outweigh the negative aspects found on the internet.
Works Cited Page
Annual Reports-2015." Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3). Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2015. Web. 05 Aug. 2016
Boyd, Danah. It's Complicated: The Social Lives of Networked Teens. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print.
Hongjiang, Xu. "Benefits and Concerns of Using Social Media- User's Perspective." Benefits
and Concerns of Using Social Media- User's Perspective. N.p., 19 May 2016. Web. 18 Aug. 2016.
The School of Life Channel. "The Dangers of the Internet." YouTube.2014. Web. 05 Aug. 2016. narrated by Alain De Botton
"Victims of Sexual Violence: Statistics | RAINN." Victims of Sexual Violence: Statistics | RAINN. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Aug. 2016
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