MIDTERM

Collins Agyapong

Professor Doris Cacoilo

Convergence

Digitization of the human life

We are living in a digitized world. We order food by the phone, take photos by the phone, bank online, and interact with each other on our finger tips. Technology makes cell phones function not only as a tool for calling but also capable of being used increasingly as surfing platforms. Digitization thus permeates in all aspect of our lives and Professor Dr. Thomas Hess in “Digital Living”, noted how “new cars are equipped with web access and voice commands.  He goes on to observe that “thanks to sensors in their running shoes, athletes can transmit their running speed, distance or calorie consumption directly to an online platform and thus analyze their training results. Or they can challenge friends to contests and find running partners in their neighborhood. Just how networked are our lives right now”, reinforcing that our live have become digitized. In recent times, many cell phone owners who want to burn calories have been able to do so by using their cell phones to calculate the number of steps they take in each day to achieve desired results. So digitization has over the years helped in greater revenue and integration with business applications, global interconnectivity, and supporting preservation.

The idea of digitization has led to increasing revenue and integration with business applications from across the globe. The Census Bureau of the Department of Commerce announced in August 2016 that the “estimate of U.S. retail e-commerce sales for the second quarter of 2016, was $97.3 billion, an increase of 4.5 percent from the first quarter of 2016. Total retail sales for the second quarter of 2016 were estimated at $1,201.9 billion, an increase of 1.5 percent from the first quarter of 2016.” Corporations have been able to reach out to an immense number of customers and clients through digitization of products and services made available online by just a click or a touch of the human finger. The introduction of mobile applications and its different contents also makes it possible for corporations to reach out a larger audience by engaging customers with sales and promotional mobile notifications. Celebrities on Instagram are able to reach huge endorsement deals based on the number of followers they have. In the past, it was almost impossible to quantify the number of people that follow one particular celebrity but with digitization, numbers are immediately known on platforms like Facebook, Twitter and You tube. And these numbers are what bring in revenue for brand ambassadors and the like. So businesses continue to capitalize on digitization to grow wealth and resources.

Digitization has also enhanced global interconnectivity. In the book “convergence culture”, Henry Jenkins noted that “as cyberspace broadens the sphere of our social interactions, it becomes even more important to be able to talk about people we share in common via the media”. As mobile devices become more common and essential, people are creating and navigating new norms around these gadgets’ use in social gatherings and public spaces, as Pew Research Center notes; “fully 92% of American adults own a cellphone, including the 67% who own a smartphone. As cellphones and smartphones become more widely adopted and play a larger role in people’s daily communications, their owners often treat them like body appendages.” Many people thus carry their cell phones with them everywhere they go and many people connect with the outside world through video calling applications which allows users to not only talk to the person but also see them too. Most Public Square and eateries have been filled with free public Wi-Fi, USB plug-ins for commuters and the general public. Years ago, landlines were only used to connect to the world only when one was at home or in a phone booth or at the office and only allow for voice communications. There has been tremendous impact of digitization on human lives.

Digitization also helped shaped education and supported preservation. As more and more people enroll in online courses, there is also growing demand for immediate access to rich content and easily accessed, up-to-date information from news and media organizations. The era when library close for the day are far gone. Now there are scholarly articles and books that are available online with just a click of a button and digital records offer the same functions as paper collections. Libraries, Museums, and other institutions have made use of digitization as a cost effective tool since there has been a greater potential reduction in storage space. The Newark Museum for example has collections that can be made accessible, via digital surrogates, in an enhanced format that allows searching and browsing, to both traditional and new audiences via the internet. Digitization has become a new way of engaging customers, students, stakeholders and investors into an idea or activity in a quicker and efficient way.

As technology continues to evolve, digitization will continue to play an important role in the human life by among other things, helping in greater revenue and integration with business applications, global interconnectivity, and supporting preservation of ideas and values.

Bibiography

Jenkins, Henry. (2006). “Convergence Culture; where old and new media collide.” New York University Press. P. 84

Hess, Professor Dr. Thomas. “Digital Living”. (2016) Retrieved from http://www.studie-life.de/en/life-studies/digital-living/digitization-and-networking/

Rainie, Lee and Zickuhr, Kathryn. Pew Research. (August 25 2015). “Americans view on mobile etiquette.” Retrieved from http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/08/26/chapter-1-always-on-connectivity/

DeNale, Rebecca and Weidenhamer, Deanna. U.S Census Bureau News. (2016). “Quarterly retail e-commerce sales 2nd quarter 2016.” Retrieved from http://www.census.gov/retail/mrts/www/data/pdf/ec_current.pdf