COURSE MATERIAL

Subject Code: GEITE01X

Course Title: Living in an I.T. Era

Course Description:
This course discusses the ethical implications of technology and
impact of technology in our culture. It also examines
communication and information technologies with influence on
modern living, modern human relationship, and uses for personal,
professional, and social advancement.

No. of Units/Hrs.: 4 hours

Class Schedule: Synchronous & Asynchronous via NU RASL

Course Learning Outcome:

At the end of the course, the student must be able to:

1. Analyze different ethical implications and impact of technology in our culture

2. Understand the relationship between technological change and industrial revolutions
3. Evaluate how the communication and information technologies evolve and used by the
millennial generation.

Instructor: Mr. Jay-Arr C. Tayao, LPT, MIEE, MIT

Contact Information: jatayao@national-u.edu.ph

Topics: Evolution of Communication Technology & Communication System

• The World Goes Mobile

• The Facebook Effect
• Where do we go from here?
• BYOD/CYOD
• Cloud Cover

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 MODULE 6: Evolution of Communication Technology & Communication System

I. Pre-test / Activity:

II. Learning Outcomes:

1. Able to describe the world goes mobile

2. Able to explain the effect of Facebook and other social media platform
3. Able to understand the effect of technology in the society and the BYOD/CYOD
Cloud Cover

III. Content

The New Era of Information and Communication Technology

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With nearly 3 Billion people connected, the continued march of information and communica-
tion technology shows no signs of slowing. We explore mobile, BYOD/CYOD, the Facebook
effect, cloud computing and ask what the future holds for a sector where the only constant is
change.

Just 60 years ago, within living memory of many today, electronic devices used valves
(also known as vacuum tubes) to provide amplification and control functions. These
were bulky, hot, unreliable and required high voltage electricity which meant that, in
almost all cases, devices could not be easily made portable.

All this was set to change, following the invention of the transistor at Bell Labs in the United
States in 1947. The transistor did not require a heater, was smaller, lighter, more reliable,
used less power, was much cheaper to manufacture than its predecessor and, most im-
portantly, led to an abundance of portable devices which could be easily run off small batter-
ies. At the same time the concept of stored-program computers was being developed and
some practical computers had been built. No-one at the time could have foreseen the enor-
mous technical, economic and social impact that these developments would bring over the
next 60+ years. We got some glimpses from science fiction – the wrist communicator and
voice-operated computer from Star Trek, for example, are now available but not yet widely
used.

There have been enormously important developments since then, not least the miniaturisation
of electronics so that today’s microprocessor chips contain over 1billion transistors in a pack-
age a couple of centimetres square. Indeed there is several times more computing power in
any mobile phone or modern car than was used to get the Apollo 11 space mission to the
moon! Other things happened along the way – LASER light, created in 1960, is used with fi-
bre optic cables to provide very high speed communications cables; battery capacity and
weight were an issue until Lithium-Ion batteries and, for some applications, fuel-cells were
developed; the replacement of cathode ray tubes by smaller, lighter liquid crystal display
screens occurred from 1992 onwards; cellular phone technology developed in the 1980s; sat-
ellite communications developed over several decades, voice recognition software has im-
proved substantially just in the last two or three years – I could go on!

The development of the structure and protocols for the world-wide web by Sir Tim Berners-
Lee and colleagues in 1989 cannot be ignored either. Although the internet relies on many of
the previously listed developments in order to function, the simplicity, flexibility, scalability and
openness of Berners-Lee’s design were revolutionary compared with the proprietary comput-

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er networks available at the time. The world’s very first webpage can still be viewed at
http://www.w3.org/History/19921103-hypertext/hypertext/WWW/TheProject.html

All these milestones and many other contributions over the years have brought us to where
we are at today – a world where (in developed countries at least) we take it for granted that
we can have continuous access to information and communications devices which have be-
come a vital part of our everyday lives, even for young children. Ofcom, the UK communica-
tions regulator, published its 2014 survey report in August which shows that 6-7 year olds
now have a better understanding of communications technology than 45-49 year olds, and
the so-called “millennium generation” of those currently aged 14-15 are “the most technolo-
gy-savvy in the UK”.

Mobile devices in particular not only act as a phone and computing device but also seek to
make redundant many other common household items such as torches, cameras, games,
books and music systems and, with the rapid growth in sales of tablets, even desktop and
laptop computers themselves! This is having an enormous impact on the way we live our lives
and interact with each other, both personally and professionally.

The World Goes Mobile

Whilst portable telephones using conventional radio technology have been used in industry
and the military for many years, there is no doubt that the single development which made
mobile communications available to the general public is that of cellular phones. The idea of
hexagonal “cells” for communicating with phones in vehicles was first proposed by engineers
at Bell Labs in 1947 (coincidentally the same year and organisation as for the development of
the transistor) but the technology did not exist at the time to implement their ideas. The first
hand-held cellular phones appeared in 1973, and became more readily available during the
1980s. We are amused now by pictures of them and they were awkward, heavy and with little
talk time between charges but they were, nevertheless, at the time life-changing. Previously if
you needed to be contacted urgently you might carry a pager and have to find a landline tele-
phone if your pager was activated, but with a cellular phone you had instant voice communi-
cations wherever you were. This is so common to us now it is hard to remember what daily
life was like before they were invented.

Developing countries in particular, without the highly integrated fixed-line infrastructure pre-
sent in developed countries, have embraced mobile wholeheartedly. According to figures from
the ITU (International Telecommunications Union) the number of fixed-line telephones de-
creased by approx 20% from 2005 to 2014 across most geographies, whilst the use of mo-
biles increased substantially, by 50% in developed countries but by a whopping 400% in de-
veloping countries. Across the world the ITU estimates there are currently 95.5 mobile-cellular
subscriptions for every 100 inhabitants, a figure which has almost doubled in 7 years. There
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is no doubt that this new-found mobility of information access and presentation will be a key
plank of the next round of life-changing and largely unexpected innovations.

The Facebook Effect

Just to take one example of the impact of new technology on the world let’s look at Facebook.
The phenomenal growth of Facebook and the story of its founder Mark Zuckerberg have been
well charted in books and film – it is just 10 years and 6 months since “The Facebook” first
went live to a small group of students at Harvard University. According to the company’s lat-
est quarterly report in June, daily users now number 829 million with those using the service
at least once a month totalling 1.32 billion, of which just over 1bn are mobile users. The total
world population is approx 7.25bn, of which 40.4% – around 3.0bn – are now internet users,
according to the ITU. To sum this up, astonishingly, 1 in 7 people worldwide are using a mo-
bile device – phone or tablet – to access a service dreamt up by a Harvard student 10 years
ago. In many geographies Facebook is the most widely used social media site.

For some years Facebook was a “cool” place for teenagers and college students to share pic-
tures and messages and this drove its meteoric growth. More recently their parents and
grandparents have joined the service to more effectively keep in touch with family and friends
near and far, sending some of the teenagers elsewhere to find their own “space” at sites such
as Instagram, WhatsApp and Snapchat. Currently the fastest growing segment of Facebook
users in maturing markets is the over 50s (80% increase in users in this age group in North
America over the last 3 years). Zuckerberg is not daunted by these maturing markets; in Feb-
ruary this year he said “In 2014, we’re going to focus on deepening our relationships with mo-
bile operators around the world and working to develop new models for internet access”.
“Helping more people get connected is important to developing the global knowledge econo-
my.” This is not the first time Zuckerberg has made bold claims for his brainchild. In his book
The Facebook Effect, David Kirkpatrick recalls Zuckerberg’s assertion that Facebook “would
create ‘a more open and transparent world’ where people would be held to the consequences
of their actions and be more likely to behave responsibly”. There is much debate over whether
Facebook is able to achieve this, and to what extent this openness is in conflict with the users’
need for privacy but there is no doubting that it is a bold and altruistic vision. Indeed Kirkpat-
rick reveals numerous conversations where Zuckerberg refused to take advertising revenue in
the early years believing that it was more important to deliver his vision of more open com-
munications to a growing user base than to take on advertising which could make the platform
less attractive to users – at one point he and his family stumped up $85,000 for new servers
to meet demand. Accessing Facebook requires internet availability and, as we have seen, this
is increasingly being effected through mobile devices. This is key to Zuckerberg’s vision of
bringing the internet (and Facebook!) to the 4.25million people who do not yet have access.
Can technology really be the catalyst for radical social change? Zuckerberg certainly believes
so!
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Where do we go from here?

As the Danish physicist Niels Bohr famously quipped “Prediction is difficult, especially about
the future!” We already know that 60% of the world’s population do not yet have access to the
internet, mostly in developing countries, yet more than half of these already possess a mobile
phone. It will not be long before these handsets and/or networks are upgraded to include in-
ternet access, with whatever is necessary to make it relevant for those communities, especial-
ly with powerful individuals such as Zuckerberg actively seeking to make this happen. Google
are in on the act as well – in June this year they announced Android One, an initiative to bring
mobile technology to emerging markets, which will debut in India.

Already technology advances have led to fierce competition, sometimes appearing from un-
expected sources – Japanese manufacturing in the 1970s; Indian computer programming in
the 1990s; China in multiple areas over the last decade or so. Marketplace websites such as
PeoplePerHour and Elance, where freelancers can offer their services to others willing to pay
for a task to be completed, are truly worldwide with contributors from every corner of the
globe bidding for work. With living costs much lower in some developing countries, rates as
low as $2 per hour are being offered by some. With many more such users likely to come
online this could have a profound effect, both positive and negative, on established business-
es the world over. With such access enabled in developing countries, barriers to entry in cer-
tain markets may be lowered bringing new competition but also, as these areas gain addition-
al income, may provide new markets for existing businesses.

BYOD/CYOD

Within companies the proliferation of employees’ mobile devices has caused issues – from
concerns over the presence of devices containing cameras in areas which threaten company
security through worries about personal privacy to more tangible vulnerabilities such as com-
puter viruses. Companies have developed BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) policies to man-
age these risks. Very recently concerns have been raised about the possibility of a mobile de-
vice being hacked and the microphone and camera being activated by an app without the
owner’s knowledge or permission. Thus far this seems to be a theoretical rather than actual
possibility, but business owners need to have a thought-through policy on the use of such de-
vices in the workplace. Some companies are moving to a CYOD (Choose Your Own Device)
policy whereby the company provides a choice of mobile devices, which have all been config-
ured to conform to the company’s IT security and connectivity policies. Further challenges will
be coming – wearable technologies such as Google Glass (see www.google.com/glass) could
bring many benefits (although how many people will be able to effectively view data through
one eye whilst using the other to participate in one’s surroundings, much like an Apache heli-
copter pilot, needs further exploration). Watch-phones are now available from a number of
manufacturers at prices as low as $50 and are likely to become more widespread in the next
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year – Apple have just launched their long awaited “Apple Watch” which will add further cred-
ibility to this market. Voice-operated computers have been demonstrated with various levels
of success – the key challenge has been getting sufficient processor power to reliably recog-
nise and interpret the voice in real-time. Industry watchers predict that, by 2020, computing
devices will be routinely operated by speech removing the need for keyboards.

Cloud Cover

Until recently many organisations preferred to hold their data in their own datacentres rather
than in 3rd party owned datacentres accessed via the internet (so-called cloud compu-
ting). However, cloud computing is gaining in popularity, as CIOs begin to recognise the ad-
vantages. At a recent user group meeting in London, UK, the CIO of a large law firm stated
that, within 5 years, he expected all the London law firms to have dispensed with their data-
centres in favour of cloud computing. With the rollout of 4G mobile technology now underway
and further improvements in the availability of Wi-Fi connections, one of the main disad-
vantages of cloud computing – the requirement for users to have continuous internet access –
is becoming less of a barrier.

There are a number of other key considerations not covered in this article – how to utilise the
vast amounts of data now being collected; how this data may be abused; the many personal
and societal effects of new and emerging technologies. These will have to wait for another
time. We have come a long way in 60 years, even the next 6 are hard to chart accurately. As
has been said many times, the only constant is Change!

IV. Activity
Creating a Video Blog about the Evolution of Communication Technology
& Communication System

• The World Goes Mobile

• The Facebook Effect
• Where do we go from here?
• BYOD/CYOD
• Cloud Cover

V. References:

1. https://www.slideserve.com/darrel-levy/the-impact-of-technology-on-communication
2. https://www.bwmonline.com/2014/11/05/the-new-era-of-information-and-
communication-technology/

SM Baliwag Complex, Dona Remedios Trinidad Highway, Brgy. Pagala, Baliwag, Bulacan
(+63) 927-533-0342 – (+63) 923-949-5265 admissions-nubaliwag@nu.edu.ph