The Future is Now. . . Sort of Technology moves so quickly today and it offers a natural solution to all our problems as if it were damn near instinctive. However it does hold a problem. Can our existing system and society evolve quick enough to accommodate the change? At the moment the world seems to me as if it were on the verge of collapse, but then they must have felt the same in the 1930s. The problem I see is that we're going to create a world where there's more people than jobs. Let me give you some examples. . .
Also the full integration of tech into all in one items means a reduction in manufactured hardware and the people who used to be employed in its construction. For instance instead of having a PC, games system, Television and stereo you can now have all of that in one piece of equipment. Downloads of movie and music again means no physical copies and again, great for resources but it will put a lot of people out of work. Already we're seeing mass closures as the business of the old world struggle to keep up with the changes the recession has forced upon us. Photo shops will probably close as people use their own printers and send pics purely as files. On line ordering and self serve checkouts - although not the standard right now - again would mean less workers IF they were to become the norm. In time we could have no physical stores at all, just shipping depts and storerooms. This isn't to say new work and positions will be created by this technological revolution, for instance they'd need delivery drivers, self serve till maintenance and construction and the installation of said units. And this isn't to mention all the IT work that'll increase to be needed but the world that's being created around us is going to be very different. Will we need TV licenses when all viewing is downloaded to our box or pc or we watch programs purely on the net and we all skip the adverts, I'm not sure.
The last point I want to make is that at some points we're going to have robots fully integrated into every level of our society doing tasks that they're either more suited to do or humans just don't want to and again I'm talking about in decades and not in the immediate future here. Might sound like Sci-fi nonsense to you but one day we will have machines doing tasks like road sweeping, sewer cleaning and even performing life saving surgery which again mean much less jobs for people and in a world where the population is constantly increasing I see this as another problem. Ultimately I think in some far and distant future we will universally
abandon the concept of money but to do this the world would have to
be united and due to different economies, political structures and religious
ideas I don't see this happening any time soon. But one day it's gonna'
be like Startrek I promise you! But without the Klingons. . ." By kUZE rEN [thekuzeeffect@fsmail.net] |