Summary for Topic one
From reading other
students blogs and independent research, the general consensus is that this
simple division between digital residents and visitors is simply not enough,
and if this concept is going to be plausible there needs to be more categorisation
within these fields.
Users often fit into both
categories due to using the services at different levels of complexity. Some
users use Microsoft Outlook but not Facebook, and some use Facebook and haven’t
even heard of Outlook! Where do these people fit in? They are residents in some
fields and visitors in others.
From the variety of
personal experiences that have been shared there seems to be a pattern that the
generations above us are more focused when it comes to work, and social is very
much a secondary action.
On the other side of the
coin, on the whole my generation use the Internet for social uses primarily,
and work is a secondary consideration. This could be for a variety of reasons, but
the main one in my opinion is that we were exposed to the social development of
the internet as we were growing up, MSN messenger and Bebo (remember them?!)
and it therefore became integrated into our lives, and became the norm.
Other topics that have
been discussed are, if you are a digital resident are you disadvantaged in
comparison to a resident. My thoughts on this are definitely yes, there are
many productivity benefits from using online tools that makes everyday life
that little bit easier.
Personally I try to have
everything I need stored in the cloud, whether it is documents through Dropbox,
music through Spotify, and pictures through Flickr. This means that as long as
I’ve got Internet I’m always connected to everything I need.
The challenge we now face
is convincing others that using these services are worthwhile, and that in competitive
industries using these tools, such as cloud storage, is going to be essential to
keep the business competitive.
In conclusion this topic
has been fascinating to research and discuss, the feedback from peers has been particularly
interesting. I’m sure that this topic will continue to develop as technology is
integrated into ours lives further, and those who don’t adapt are in danger of
getting left behind.
