Information & Communication Made Easy by Technology! Blessing or Curse?

Information & Communication Made Easy by Technology! Blessing or Curse?

Over recent years the Internet community have witnessed the arrival of some unique Internet applications that have revolutionised the way we communicate, get and consume information. Since the arrival of Google in 1998 meant that search of information has been possible, today it has been further innovated to ensure that the type of information that we consume is of high quality by sophisticated algorithms, and also by the means of social networking, social book marking, and social news sites.

The arrival of facebook has meant that lost friends from early childhood have got together, the video sharing site Youtube is the second largest search engine where almost every thing from unedited videos to professional videos all gaining millions of hits. The explosion of blogs has also changed the political and media landscape creating huge challenge for both the media and politicians. It has also meant that recent innovation have created a fantastic platform for electronic commerce to blossom, 100% new online businesses and business models have been created also boosting the traditional brick and mortar businesses allowing them to trade online.

The Guardian “According to a recent report, the Internet is worth £100bn to the UK economy, more than 7% of national income.”

Once described as the baby boomers and now considered as the laggards have also been forced to accept and adopt the change. This is only due to today’s information age of business being done in a fast manner, making the Internet the primary tool for fast communication and information base. Those that adopt change quickly have got the opportunity of being in the know about how to use technologies to their advantage.

One of the changes we have witnessed in politics is the impact of the Internet on Obama’s bid for the White House where he changed him self from a politician to rock star, celebrity, and much more relating to all walks of the American life and communicating his message on all kinds of level through social media. Along side the campaign trail with Obama’s team was Rishi Saha, now head of New Media for the Conservative Party.

In June 2010 an event was held at London School of Economics about The Value of Networked Journalism organized by BBC College of Journalism & POLIS, which I attended and got a chance to meet Rishi personally to exchange ideas. Speaking at the event Rishi Saha discussed how the Conservative Party mounted an Obama-style campaign for the General Election making the Internet and particularly social media the favorite tool, which had secured the Party huge revenue (Online adverts, Affiliate Networks, etc) from the campaign rather than spending huge sums on campaigns as they did in the past. He also discussed on how they managed to re-engage the distrusting and alienated community back to politics & elections.

Since my interest in technologies and new media started to grow in me, one of the things that constantly comes to mind is if we the Eritrean youth with our unlimited capabilities become early adopters of the technology and use it in an organized, appropriate & effective manner, then we would be able to take some of the weight of our governments offline media efforts by supporting it online. Once this can be achieved the Eritrean laggards will have no problem of adopting the techniques late. On my next article I will put focus on how Eritrean professionals in every field could blog about general issues or specific issues relating to their field concerning Eritrea and its citizens to give expert opinions, views and analysis.

The timing of this article also comes handy before the month of December on what we could do to once again express our views to the UNjust sanctions that was imposed on Eritrea. We should start our preparations in an organized manner to collectively make a huge noise about our anger and rage. Along side this we should also think about our 20^th Independence Anniversary and the type of creative media we could use on the Internet to celebrate our hard won Independence. But how do we go about addressing this? Last night I was visiting a wise Eritrean man where our conversation took us to the use of technologies amongst the Eritrean Internet community, where he said;

“It’s good that Eritreans have found a medium of communication such as paltalk and facebook, but spending too much time arguing and discussing online is a waste of time occupying their precious time that could be spent on much more fruitful aspects of life. Rather the youth should use the technology as a means of getting together then meet in person organizing meetings & forums, and turn their abilities in to tangible actions and gains that are of use to them selves and their country. Once they carry out these meetings then they can go about again to use these technologies to expedite the progress of their aim!”

One of the top priorities to all Eritreans on the Internet is to understand and take extreme caution about the huge presence of the Ethiopias’ minority regime agents presenting themselves as Eritreans. It has been long since the woyane leaders in Ethiopia opened a huge department that focuses on every Eritrean walks of life, the agents have very detailed knowledge about Eritrea and its citizens on almost about the history, lifestyle, culture, and much more. There intention is to deliberately manipulate the Eritrean Internet community, and portray the image of Eritrea that we do not know and make it look like it has come from Eritreans (maybe the type of Eritrea that they talk about exists some where in Tigray!)

It is almost impossible to know or understand who you are communicating with and from where you receive information from, hence we should all be aware about the quality and reliability of the information we consume.

We should not be trapped in the futile actions of the minority regime in Ethiopia and should not waste our time responding to them, the other important and crucial aspect is to address the issue of privacy. Many Eritreans on social media and particularly on facebook that I have come across have got open access to their accounts, also accepting and adding people to their friends list. This gives access to the other party of your personal information including photos of you and your loved ones that could be downloaded. Eritreans, especially the youth who are allowing for this to happen are making their biggest compromise in their life. As a young person we might be very relaxed about things and enjoy life to the maximum, for instance we share photos of our mad nights out and we exchange a word or two which we shouldn’t say but we are all young and human and are bound to make certain mistakes that are inevitable, but do we need to make certain controls to our mistakes?

In my opinion as Eritrean youth we all have the obligation of serving our country and people, looking at a historic point of view it is the youth that has been the active stakeholder in serving Eritrea. This means that while serving our country we are exposed to shouldering responsibility, at any given time we are bound to even occupying higher positions, but if our private lives are being compromised as early as today then tomorrow these errors can be damaging for the nation. There are people out there with malicious intent and can get hold of our digital footprint, then they can use it for ill perceived political gains by making alterations to it!

It is no doubt that Information & Communication have been made easy by the use of technology, but making it a blessing or curse is really up to us!

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