A lot has been told about Internet’s effects on human life and societies. Web 2.0 has increased a bit more this fascination on the power of the WEB. Very revealing and fantastic thoughts and observations are made around these topics. Threw the WEB people are communicating like never before, this phenomenon has triggered new ways of developing software, sharing ideas, having fun, etc.

As a professional web developer I’ve found myself in the middle of several discussions about the advantages and disadvantages of this arising technology. I to think it’s really fantastic to have the thousand times discussed access to the information, typing on Google about virtually any topic and most of time being able to found useful information about it is fantastic. I do think it’s great that “any  body” or at least those with internet access can post a video on YouTube and eventually have more public than big TV stations. I do enjoy reading blogs from people around the world. Etc. I use Wikipedia on every topic I unknown almost as much as Google. But besides all this terrific things I always add and argument to the conversation that as far as I can tell has not been not properly observer nor discussed.

The more evident effects of the web are related to the amount of information and its sources this is really valuable but there’s and other effect as important as been heard and access information.  It’s the effect of having people realize that they can think and have a voice. Watching internet as only as an information and communication phenomena a blog with thousands of visitors and accurate and meaningful post for those visitors may be more valuable than a blog with no visitors (like this one at the time this was posed) but both may have triggered a very similar event on the bloggers mind. They had have to ask themselves, what do I have to tell? Similar things occur if people have to create a Facebook or LinkedIn profile or even evaluating a product at Amazon. People are benign encouraged to THINK ABOUT THEM SELVES IN RELATION WITH OTHER PERSONS this thinking encouragement is as important as the more commented effects of the Internet. But its effects and consequences may take longer and may be harder to identify.

Mass media predecessors from press to TV have created “informed societies”, with all these technologies people gained access to information. Each technology and improvement helped to spread knowledge like ever before but always creating “informed” societies. Internet and particularly Web 2.0 is congruent with the informed society but for the first time ever is a mass media with a new huge effect on society besides spreading information it’s creating a “thinker’s societies”. Internet gave people the opportunity to express them self’s like never before (cheaper and simpler) but at the beginning that was analogue to post an ad in the classified newspaper adds, people need to be willing to say something to trigger the process. Latest Web development challenge individuals every now and then with the question ¿What do you have to say? I can be by asking you to fill the messenger what I’m doing line, or a Face Book profile, in a fast voting survey, ratting a youtube video or threw a  large opinion form about site or any topic, one way or another people is getting small but constant demands that force them to think a bit.

To prove my points try to find a group of kids playing happily anywhere. Chances are that most of them have no thought about the CRISIS but have heard about it. As soon as you ask them ¿What do you think about the crisis? Practically all will think about it regardless they have done it before or not. So the mere fact of asking causes thinking.

So according to me Internet is creating “thinking societies”

RSL

Please go ahead and tell us ¿What do you think?

The unstudied effect of Internet.

by Ruben Schaffer is licensed under  Creative Commons