Technologies of data have huge impacts upon people’s leisure and work as data plays a huge part in society. The way that people rely on the internet for everyday choices means that the internet needs to be able to provide for them and so now technologies of data like Web 2.0 allow a bigger extent of browsing and a better quality of it. In this essay, I will be explaining the ways that it impacts people’s leisure and work in society.
One technology of data is called Web 2.0. Before Web 2.0, there was the early web or Web 1.0. This was replaced due to lot of issues that occurred within it. For example, people were copyrighting other businesses and there was nothing that could be done to prevent it. Also, being able to publish online and post things took an awfully long process which need lots of technical skills and was nowhere near as quick as what you see today. There was no social involvement within the early web, people could not easily talk to each other and websites didn’t have forums or comment sections to be able to form a community like they do now. The content on the internet was barely portable and so people could not have a separation in terms of form from content. In 2000, there was an internet crash and the only companies left standing were successful big ones for example Google, Facebook, Amazon etc. Therefore, Tim O’Reilly, a businessman, decided to try to restore the internet and in doing so came up with Web 2.0.
Web 2.0 is “the network as platform, spanning all connected devices; Web 2.0 applications are those that make the most of the intrinsic advantages of that platform: delivering software as a continually-updated service that gets better the more people use it, consuming and remixing data from multiple sources” (O'Reilly, 2010). Some of the principles of this software was seeing the web as a platform and being able to collective more information and data about web users. A positive impact on people’s lives was that this new web stopped the constant updated releases of software as Web 2.0 would just automatically find new ways to update the web as it changes the way web pages are used and designed. They tried to utilize the web by using the software to control what people did with it, for example; advertising and collecting details. It brought in the idea that businesses could use advertising more efficiently as they can see the data each person has been browsing and then advertise accordingly to them. This created an impact on people’s leisure positively as it made it easier for them to find things in their interest in terms of online shopping however within work and private situations, people may not want businesses collecting their details like addresses, phone numbers and bank card details. Therefore, this has a negative impact upon our work.
After the internet crash, copyrighting became more popular as Microsoft’s “entire product line rests upon state enforcement of legal monopolies of duplication” (Rudd-O, 2009) known as copyrights. Furthermore, it became illegal for other companies to sell the same product as them, only substitutes which was rather difficult due to the product being sold was Window’s software. Therefore, Microsoft then dominated the software market and ended up driving other competitors out of the business. The software company AOL was also trying to be successful in the web browser industry and dominate the web browsers by introducing the browser Netscape. However, Microsoft decided to join what was known as the ‘browser wars’ and came up with Internet Explorer, although it is now discontinued but is still maintained. This impacted people’s use of the web as it gave me them more of a choice to use however it could be seen as negative as they were not sure which to trust as both were putting each other in a bad light. Microsoft and Netscape went head to head to dominate the industry and AOL even tried to sue Microsoft for illegal monopoly at one time. AOL also dumped their crocodile mascot on top of the statue of Internet Explorer’s logo outside the Microsoft offices and used a sign saying ‘NETSCAPE NOW’. However, Microsoft still became more successful and dominated the web browser market as well. Therefore, AOL took a different walled garden approach. This meant users now had to pay to use their software which they advertised on television.
A positive impact on our work is that big companies were able to be carried over with Web 2.0. Any that didn’t were proven not to be successful and intelligent enough to be a dominating company on the market. For example, companies like Google and Ebay “have embraced the power of the web to harness collective intelligence” (O'Reilly, The Moral Economy of Web 2.0, 2009) and therefore, have survived the launch of Web 2.0. This meant they had become able to collect information from users on their websites like addresses, emails, and bank details. Also, they could access their browsing history which enabled them to advertise their products to customers who were most interested and allows them to decide which products to advertise, for example if they were viewing them before it will give them a reminder of the product so that they will go back and buy it. Google maps is an example of harnessing collective intelligence as they have addresses and directions for homes, businesses and any building. This has both positive and negative connotations as it enables people to access new places and/or find their way around but also limits privacy for people as their houses, cars and gardens are all on show to the world. Another positive impact is that it allowed the software to be on more than one device and so be on several levels. This gave range and possibilities to consumers as they could then use the web anywhere, anytime. For example, it was only on computers which were wired up whereas now it can be accessed on laptops, phones, tablets, TV’s etc.
Another technology of data is what is known as Big Data. This software has the social physics which intend to create the use of data on a massive scale. This is so they can not only understand society, but also use the knowledge to be able to control society as a whole. The software has three key attributes which help to analyse the date as its being collected. These are volume, velocity and variety. Volume is the amount of data being collected, for example; in the year 2000, there was 800,000 petabytes being collected and then 1.8 zettabytes in 2010 and then boosted to 30 zettabytes in 2018. Velocity is the repeated observations on the internet and of the data over short timescales, for example; the continuous monitoring of different websites. Variety means that a data collection which is contemporary can occur simultaneously from a wide range of sources. “the power of Big Data is that it is information about people’s behaviour instead of information about their beliefs. It’s about the behaviour of customers, employees and prospects for your new business.” (Pentland, 2012). Another key characteristic of Big Data is that its exhaustive so it manages to capture an entire population or system. Also, it is extremely detailed and thought out and so has high resolution. Its relational which means there is an ease of it conjoining different datasets. Lastly, it’s also very flexible and therefore this makes it easy to add different and new fields. Some examples of the way Big Data is used are; GPS, transport, city design, crime and border control, advertising, health, security/terrorism, online dating and alga rhythms, weather reports and the web. Big Data has a positive impact on our leisure and work as it has enabled so many more systems in society to educate, inform and protect us.
“In business, economics and other fields, Professor Brynjolfsson says, decisions will increasingly be based on data and analysis rather than on experience and intuition. ‘We can start being a lot more scientific,’ he observes.” (Winters, 2015). There are two studies which are being questioned how they can be linked together in terms of society, as they will give a more scientific approach to Big Data. Epistemology is the study of theories of knowledge, for example; scientific method, theories of truth and scepticism. Ontology is the study of being or what exists so, what is an individual? In sociology, these studies would be used to try to form a society and figure out how they relate to each other and what makes us say that. “This is a world where massive amounts of data and applied mathematics replace every other tool that might be brought to bear. Out with every theory of human behaviour, from linguistics to sociology. Forget taxonomy, ontology and psychology . . . We can throw the numbers into the biggest computing clusters the world has ever seen and let statistical algorithms find patterns where science cannot.” (Anderson, 2008). There have been claims that Big Data could be an epistemology due to the fact that it can capture a whole domain and that it uses such intricate detail, therefore offering full high resolution. Also, it has no need for a priori theory or hypothesis. The data can speak for itself and does not need any human interaction or framing, which allows it to be quicker, easier and also cheaper. It gives specific knowledge in a domain or context for example; google maps. “Social physics helps us understand how ideas flow from person to person through the mechanism of social learning and how this flow of ideas ends up shaping the norms, productivity and creative output of our companies, cities and societies” (Pentland, The Return of Social Physics, 2017)
Another way that the technologies impact people’s leisure and work is when a technology has issues or negativity within it. For example, a problem with Big Data is that it will have difficulty accounting for change if it needs it. The scope and investigative method of epistemology has been criticised due to the amount of questions coming from it, for example; how does it relate to ontology in order to create and sustain a society. Also, any question that is asked will always have a statistically significant answer which can then only be answered with an experiment to get a realistic answer. Also, it impacts people due to the privacy of data being limited and that they are getting access to people’s information without them even being aware of it.
In conclusion, technologies of data impact our leisure and work both positively and negatively. For example, Web 2.0 makes it easier for businesses to attract consumers through advertising techniques as they can access the products they are browsing. This is good for work and also leisure as it makes it easier for consumers to find what they are looking for. Big Data, another technology, also has positive impacts however an example of a negative one is that people may not be happy with how much data is being accessed that they would rather consider private. Although, a lot of the data is being used to help and protect. For example; GPS systems, security and weather reports. Therefore, the technologies are impacting in multiple different ways.