Discover Bangladesh

 

After reading the first two chapters of Cognitive Surplus, I’ve come to find that Clay Shirky argues about how the Internet is creating a better and more democratic world by turning us from passive consumers into active producers and participants of information. I also found the reading very interesting that how he compared the role of Twentieth century’s TV culture with Today’s Internet culture on the first chapter (page 22,23). The media TV in past century was running as a consumption event only. People used to just watch it or enjoy it. They weren’t able to react on the consumption actively. Shirky called this event an unbalanced single event. In contrast, Today’s phones and Computers are balanced and have multiple events such as production, consumption and participation. When we buy them to consume we automatically own the means of production. We can now react on the consumption by sharing the consumed product or information with people around the globe through Web. A simple example of this is how we are blogging or tweeting or face booking each other about every little new thing we learn and share it.

Shirky also explained in a very clear way about how our free times are being switched from watching TV to browsing on web. However, while I was reading the first chapter it reminded me of my childhood when I used to be glued to TV after coming from school. I used to watch cartoon/Superman shows for hours after hours. Then did the homework at night. But what I see now a days, kids for example my younger sister who is 13 is more interested in doing homework and watching her favorite shows on computer at the same time. If she gets stuck with her homework she googles about it and finds an answer. The kids today could customize what they want to watch for example they could watch selected episodes from Spongebob Squarepants on internet. However, Just two decades ago when I was a little kid I didn’t have that much of choices. I rarely watch TV now. It’s not like I don’t get time to watch TV, its just I want to multitask while watching news or something. It is really fascinating that how the modern technology and media are changing our daily lives and giving us opportunity to participate actively. Can we project exactly what would be the world after two decades from now?

 

 

 

 

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