We are living in the information society

-The concept and related notions-

What is actually an information society? If it is a society with a lot of information, what kind of information can you find, and where does this information come from? I interpret the concept as a society where information is easy to get. We can understand this if we look at some related notions.

First, what kind of information can we find? Almost anything! The thing that holds us back is human curiousity. How do we find this information? We can search on the internet or call someone with mobilephones. It has never been this easy to know this much. But can we remember everything we learn? With all this information, we need something to help us remember. And there are a lot of things to choose from: computers, mobilephones, iphone, macbook and ipad. All these devices are designed and produced to make our weekdays easier.

Think about how much money that are in turnover? With an even stream of new models, new updates and new devices, the digit must be high. The firms produce, and we pay for the new models. After thinking about this, I have one thought. What happens to old models? Shall we accept this development or shall we think about the environment? Envirofone is one example of a firm who wants to save the planet.

Where do the agelimit of these technological devices go? Is it ok to let an 8 years old child use a mobilephone? 88% of all ten-years old in Norway got their own mobilephone. The number one reason for letting their children have a mobilephone is because they can contact them with it. You can say they need to have information about where your child is, and what it's doing.

Many occupations are affected by the information society. If some of the occupations use new technology, others have to follow. Because when someone developes a new device, the old ones are often useless. One example of this was when a magazine started to use computers to write articles. And journalists started to use better cameras. Other firms who produced printers and related devices had to keep up with the technological development. And that is one of the attributes with the information society. Everything happens so fast. Even the politicians can't keep up.

Science and research are some of the things that has had a big development. Everything from diseases, the human body, the universe and nature has been researched. CERN started it's particle accelator in 2008 when they wanted to experiment on particles. This was a major breakthrough for sciense.




Many newspaper wrote about this event, and a specific newspaper wrote an article with a title counting down to the end of the world! This lead to unnecessary worrying about the machine making a black hole who could devour the earth. A girl in India killed her self to avoid this, so we have to think about how appropriate the information is.

A positive aspect with the information society is the endless knowledge. We have the opportunity to know more than any generation before us, and we have to juse this the right way. Too much knowledge isn't that good either.


We can confirm that the information society consist of a lot of information. We can find almost anything we want, and the development of devices is ongoing. New updated models are important to keep the consumers bying, and we are challenged by questions about environment and agelimits. Occupations, research and science have had a great leap in the information society.

Framtidas studentliv

Korleis kan framtida bli for dagens unge? Dagbladet.no kom med ein artikkel om dette 25. jan 2010. Her står det blant anna at mobilen er eit verktøy som skal avlaste hjernen slik at ein slepp å huske, ein kan bruke internett på eksamenar og ein kan sitje heime og studere via nett.

Også går straumen.
Kva skal ein gjere då? Kva er vitsen med at unge skal slå opp det dei lurar på, viss dei ikkje kan husker det dei nettopp lærte? Eg såg ein episode av Etter katastrofen på NRK1. Etter at eit virus har utrydda nesten heile verda må dei gjenverande finne ein måte å overleve på. Der stod dei igjen med alt dei eigde, utan straum, vatn, mat eller kunnskap om korleis dei skulle gjere noko. Hovudpersonen fekk eit råd om at ho burde begynne å lese bøker.

Bøker er det hjelpemiddelet vi har brukt i hundrevis av år for å lære ny kunnskap. Før der igjen lærte dei ting ved å lytte, memorere og gjenfortelle. Vi kan altså seie at opp gjennom tida har vi lagt mindre vekt på å huske ting. Og no skal altså elevane ha tilgang til nett og mobiltelefon heile tida.

Det finst jo også positive sider ved ein slik internettilgang. Tenk på all den kunnskapen ein får tak i. Ein kan ha forelesinger med nokre av verdas største foredragsholdere. Kunnskapen er uendeleg.

Men er det så bra å kunne sitje heime i Noreg og ta fag i USA? Treng ikkje framtidas studenter sosialt samhald? Ikkje alle lærer like godt av å lese/høyre fagstoff. Ein treng nokon å diskutere eller samhandle med.

Utviklinga av teknologien har gått fort dei siste 50 åra. Internett har gitt oss all kunnskap vi kan drøyme om, men vi må passe på å ikkje bli for avhengig av å heile tida søke opp det lurer på. Noko må vi klare å huske.

Då er det berre å ta imot framtidas nye digitale verktøy og håpe på at straumen ikkje går.

About the blog

This blog is a task in the course ICT in society and work life. I have called it youth of today because I want to write about children and teenagers in todays society. The technological development is neverending, and how is this affecting them.

Four of the posts will be around the thematic areas:
information society, the information society culture, educational implications about ICT and ethics in ICT. Other posts are just thougths about articles found on the internet. I will try to write all of the posts in english.