How the internet has changed our lives
...put into print. With the advent of the Internet, anyone who has something to say can be heard by the world. By letting everyone speak their mind, this opens up all new ways of thinking to anyone who is willing to listen. Moreover, the Internet is an information resource for you to search, gathering new data on key search aspects of your market. Perhaps most importantly, the Internet offers a new way of doing business. A virtual market-place where customers can, at the push of a button, select goods, place an order and pay using a secure electronic transaction. Businesses are discovering the Internet as the most powerful and cost effective tool in history. The Net provides a faster, more efficient way to work colleagues, customers, vendors and business partners- irrespective of location or operating system harnessing this powerful resource gives companies strategic advantages by leveraging information into essential business asset. A language is a living thing, and few things have wreaked as much havoc on our language as computer technology. Approximately 30 million people world-wide use the Internet and online services daily. The Internet is growing enormously and rapidly in all areas, and an increasing number of people are finding themselves working and playing on the Internet. The people on the Internet are not all rocket scientists and computer programmers; they're graphic designers, teachers, students, artists, musicians, feminists, Rush Limbaugh-fans, and your next door neighbors. What these diverse groups of people have in common is their language. The Internet community exists and thrives because of effective written communication. If you cannot express yourself well in written language, you either learn more effective ways of communicating, or get lost in the shuffle. "Netspeak" is evolving on a national and international level. The vocabulary once used only by computer programmers and computer manipulators called "hackers," has spread to all users of computer networks. The language is currently spoken by people on the Internet, and is rapidly spilling over into advertising and business. The words "online," "network," and "surf the net" are occurring more and more frequently in our newspapers and on television. Most Americans feel bombarded by netspeak. Television advertisers, newspapers, and international businesses have jumped on the "Information Superhighway" bandwagon, making the Internet more accessible to large numbers of not-entirely-technically-oriented people. As a result, technological vocabulary is entering into non-technological communication. Acronyms and abbreviations make up a large part of Net jargon. FAQ (Frequently Asked Question), MUD (Multi-User-Dungeon), and URL (Uniform Resource Locator) are some of the most frequently seen. Netspeak will continue to grow, change, and become more a part of everyday communication. As with other writing systems, netspeak sometimes fails to convey certain nuances of the message. Clues for sincerity, seriousness, and commitment are absent in written text, but are to a large extent, being reconstructed in netspeak. What is unique about netspeak is the attempt to overcome the shortcomings of the written medium, as they pertain to the background knowledge of the speech. There are two factors contributing to the solution of these problems. First, current communication software enables the "speaker" to write the interaction in a complete and simple fashion as never done before; e.g. keeping records of all message to you, in the inbox, and all mail that you've sent out, the outbox. Furthermore, the speaker can respond to a message, by fully or partially repeating the content, or even by in-line repeat-with-commentary. What emerges from all this is something completely new to the world of communication. The future is limited only by our imagination. But no matter how great and significant the effects of the Internet in our lives might be, there are some considerable consequences and drawbacks: Psychologists now recognize Internet Addiction Syndrome (IAS) as a new illness that could ruin hundreds of lives. Internet addicts are people who are reported staying online for six, eight, ten or more hours a day, every day. They use the Internet as a way of escaping problems or relieving distressed moods. Their usage can cause problems in their family, work and social lives. They feel anxious and irritable when offline and craved getting back online. Despite the consequences, they continue using regardless of admonishments from friends and family. Special help groups have been set up to give out advice and offer links with other addicts. Internets Anonymous and Webaholics are two of the sites offering help, but only through logging onto the Internet. Another considerable drawback of the Internet is that it is susceptible to hackers. Hackers are persons that have tremendous knowledge on the subject and us...