The History Of A Blessing Or A Curse

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

FOUNDATION YEAR

INTERNET

A BLESSING OR A CURSE

INTERNET: A BESSING OR A CURSE

Internet is a local area network which itself is a combination of networks that allows us to access data anytime, anywhere in the world. According to Wikimedia Foundation "The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of user world wide".(Reference link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet ). It’s a global network that connects millions of computers worldwide. Some people mix it up with "World Wide Web" (www). Actually both are different in concepts. Internet is a network while www is a tool that helps us to connect through other networks using a unique IP address of every network. According to Wikimedia Foundation "The Internet is not synonymous with World Wide Web. The Internet is a massive network of networks, a networking infrastructure. It connects millions of computers together globally, forming a network in which any computer can communicate with any other computer as long as they are both connected to the Internet. The World Wide Web, or simply Web, is a way of accessing information over the medium of the Internet. It is an information-sharing model that is built on top of the Internet." (Reference: http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/I/Internet.html ).

Internet was first used in 1950 to send a message. In 1982 concept of internet protocol (IP) came into being that allotted every network a specific address through which every network could easily connect to another network. In 1995 internet was commercialized from commercial traffic use to local level. There are very interesting facts about internet usage. According to http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm there are 2,405,518,376 users of internet throughout the world. 27% users are from Asia. Internet is used in a million of ways. Every user has its own purpose of using it. It is a source of immediate information, communication, business, studies, policy matters, culture, chit chat, sports, entertainment and many more.

Internet is becoming an instant source of immediate information. We can get news updates anytime anywhere in the world through electronic mail and even on mobile phones. There are many websites that immediately inbox you a message on your personal account and mobile phones such as www.facebook.com . There are very populated pages and groups of official news channels that keeps on updating the relevant information. We can easily get that information on our mobile phones and personal accounts. Internet is also a source of communication. There are many community websites such as google plus, facebook, Hotmail, yahoo, twitter and many more that allow us to chat and make voice conversation with our relatives, friends, parents and whosoever we wish to talk anywhere in the world. Skype has been the most cheapest, safer and instant way of communication throughout the world. It helps the people to connect anywhere in the world free of cost.

Internet has been a very useful way of advertisement. Using internet anyone can advertise his or her business or relevant data very easily. Adfly.com is user friendly website that allow you to advertise your ad and in return you get some money depending upon how much your ad has been advertised. Some people claim that their business could never been enhanced if there were no internet. Internet is a very useful and meaningful way to advertise your business. Internet is also a source of employment. There are many websites that employee online jobs in many fields. Contractors and employee personally make the contract on their personal e-mails addresses and the employee is successfully paid on the scheduled time. There are millions of people in the world that relay on the online jobs only. Such a facility is provided by www.odesk.com. It is facilitating millions of people in the whole world.

Internet is very much useful in studies. It’s a blessing for each and every student who is properly making use of it. Students of higher studies after matriculation should must use it to keep on updating their knowledge. Internet has each and every topic explained over it so each and every should avail this information. Internet should be the immediate source of their help. They should immediately take help from internet whenever they need, because internet contains a lot of knowledge of each and every topic. Internet is also helpful in teaching. Using internet online lectures are very much appreciated. Open universities projects have been spread out throughout the world. Open universities are nothing without internet. Each and every instruction, notices, lectures and delivered through internet. Students at open universities stay at home and attend online lectures. According to a Turkish survey "The Internet may also be used to replace the traditional classroom lecture. A number of courses are being developed in which portions of the course or the entire courseware offered via the Internet. The instructor may place course notes on Web pages, may create a video recording of a live lecture for viewing on the Internet, or use combinations of these ideas. Forsyth (1998) discussed several methods of preparing courses for the Internet including facilitating the use of video clips on Web pages as well as the use of forms and other graphics on Web pages." Reference (http://tojde.anadolu.edu.tr/tojde11/articles/usun.htm ). Internet awareness campaigns are must in case of developing country like Pakistan, because most of the schools are still relaying on traditional ways of teaching. Private and high schools are having easy access to computer labs and computerized studies. According to above mentioned survey "A final area for instructor awareness is student fear and/or lack of knowledge about computers and the Internet. Primary and secondary students have increasing access to computers in elementary schools and high schools, but this does not mean that all college students are entering postsecondary education with a competence or comfort level with computers that supports their use of the Internet as a learning tool. Returning students may have had very little access to computer technology during their life experiences. Traditional-age students may have had poor computer instruction or may have slipped through the primary and secondary educational system without learning about computers and the Internet. Instructors need to take into account the varying skill levels and comfort levels of students when designing Internet material for courses (Forsyth, 1998)." (http://tojde.anadolu.edu.tr/tojde11/articles/usun.htm ).

Internet is also beneficial in cultural awareness. Uploading and community websites like google plus and facebook etc gives us an opportunity to make our pages that can easily be publicized in the world. We can easily represent our culture to the whole world. Such activities attracts the tourist to visit your country and our culture. In the similar manners, cultural and international games can also be publicized throughout the world. There are many games competitions arranged that are to be registered first through internet. Sum is that the internet is the easiest and precise way of publically spread out the cultural activities. Internet is a source of infotainment. We can listen songs and watch movies. Information about any topic is easily accessible. We can download any information, movies, songs, soft wares and many more. We can do e-shopping as well. We can easily buy goods of our need without going out.

Internet has some side effects as well. Internet is the best way of getting information but we are never sure whether this information is correct or wrong. We cannot surly trust whatsoever is pasted or uploaded. We might have to rely on some other source as well to make surety about the information. Internet is a blessing when the matter is of studies but it depends on the student and specially the youth, how he or she makes use of it. Purpose to say it is that most of the youth do not use it that much for studies as much as they use it for pornography and gambling. There are many gambling sites that allows free user account and on user friendly bases you can easily gamble on anything anywhere in the world. Other aspect is pornography. Most of the youth try to get some spare time to watch pornographic films and photos. Some statistics shows that pornography has the biggest industry on internet for example "Size of the Industry $57.0 billion world-wide - $12.0 billion US Adult Videos, $20.0 billion Escort Services, $11.0 billion Magazines, $7.5 billion Sex Clubs, $5.0 billion Phone Sex, $4.5 billion Cable & Pay per View, $2.5 billion, Internet $2.5 billion, CD-ROM $1.5 billion, Novelties $1.0 billion and other $1.5 billion." Reference (http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070827215906AA7qHLI ). Not only the youth but others also admit some facts such as "13% of Women admit to accessing porn at work, 70% of women keep their cyber activities secret, 17% of all women struggle with pornography addiction." Hence pornography and gambling is becoming a huge business so we must try to stop it. We can now claim that the internet spoils the youth a lot if used negatively.

An important issue raised commonly is the family gaps. Many people claim that those who are mostly using internet do not give time to their families. They try to keep themselves away from their families. Some also claim that they cannot make more friends and personal relationships. Family issue is raised at many levels such as "An article published by Science Daily reported that time spent on the internet was associated with later declines in within family communication and a decrease in number of friends and acquaintances with which they kept ties." Reference (http://www.universalteacherpublications.com/univ/free-asgn/2008/cs610/page4.htm ).

An issue which is seriously violating the internet is virus and spams. Virus is such a program that disturbs the normal working of the computer. Virus containing software and websites are increasing and chance of data loss and losing your important information are getting higher. Computers attached to internet are mainly effected by a computer virus. A virus can easily destroy hard disk and RAM completely. Sending unsolicited emails is spamming which is increasing day by day. Whenever a user clicks that email, the computer gets seriously infected by a virus and all your important data and information is destroyed. Another issue which is common about internet is hacking. Hacking is illegal access to the information or data from someone else’s computer. Hacking is also top growing issue over internet. Hackers try to access the personal data of multinational companies and successfully get access to it. E-shopping is a blessing but it’s a curse too. Many people do not prefer it because they are never sure of the product they demanded will reach home safely or not. Some people do not prefer it because of the price. They prefer to go out and buy with their own hand instead of paying extra tax to e-shopping companies.

An immediate question comes in our mind is the addiction of internet. Different people have different point of view about it. Some call it an addiction and sometime waste. Regular users of internet spend even 17 to 20 hours per day over internet. Business man sometimes even spend whole day over it. People who are employed over internet spend most of their day over internet. This is also a reason why people claim it for family gaps. Those who are addicted to it have no reason for their addiction. They claim that the internet is just a blessing for them, without internet it could be impossible to survive. On the other hand some claim it as time wasting. They think the information given on internet do not help them that much as it should.

The pith and marrow of the whole discussion is that internet has many advantages but some disadvantages as well. It’s a blessing but a little curse as well because its advantages are much more beneficial as compare to its disadvantages. People are addicted to it but if one avails this blessing in a proper and mannered way one can get full benefit of this blessing.