Samantha Ekeroth
“The Future of Media” Paper
Media Literacy Class
It’s the year 2011, and we have some absolutely amazing technology at our fingertips. When our parents were our age a computer screen took up an entire wall, while now you can carry one around with you. We have cable TV, satellite radio, cell phones, and so much more that makes communicating faster and more interesting. We have created more for media in the past one hundred years then in the hundreds before, and things are still be developed on a faster and more expedited level every day. The main subject that seem the most interesting in how they will further develop are computers. Computers are ever growing and changing and can do so much to help us in our daily lives, I needed to find more information about their future. A lot of information about the future is speculative, but there are some pretty amazing advances, and it’s all interesting and exciting!
The first idea that seemed really fascinating was the idea of cheaper smaller computers. Many speculate that computers will continue to grow thinner, smaller, and faster. By making all those adjustments, it is very likely that prices will reduce somewhat as well! According to http://www.futureforall.org/computers/computers.htm, by making “computer transistors” and computer chips smaller the cost will decrease because there will be lets components of the computer to make, so less money in the making of parts will go into it. Of course creating the technology is very expensive, but once it is developed, more people may actually be able to afford computers. According to Forbes.com there is actually a man (MIT professor Nicholas Negroponte) who is almost finished creating the, “$75 laptop,” which he said will allow children in developing countries to gain access to more advanced forms of education Along with being very reasonably priced, it also is very thin, is easy to handle because it does not weigh much, and is a touch screen which could provide for more interactive learning.
The only problem with this idea is that Negroponte has promised innovative cheap computers before now and hasn’t delivered. Whether or not it will be a successful endeavor, the idea of a $75 dollar laptop that is available to anyone is very exciting and alluring.
A second interesting idea that is going to continue to develop in the world of computers, is artificial intelligence. We already have this is simple forms such as when you call a business and you are received by a “robot voice” that is able to recognize human voices and certain words to help connect you to what you need. According to http://www.cbtplanet.com/ in the near future many if not all routine calls to business’s will be run and controlled by computers with artificial intelligence. It’s amazing that things we know from Sci-Fi movies are going to be a part of our lives in the near future. For example, Gordon Moore (Co-founder of the chip created for Intel) predicted in 1965 that computer and computer technology (then referred to as industrial change) would continue to develop and grow at an increasing rate.According to the http://www.nytimes.com/, there is a man by the name of Dr. Kurzweil who has in fact started a university called, “Singularity University,” where scientists will work on developing artificial intelligence, and even attempting ways to download human thoughts and processes into a machine. Essentially he wants to make human minds immortal. He wants to make it so that even if your body dies, you’re thoughts can essentially live on like a forever record of you. This computerized mind would not be “alive” but would be able to communicate everything that person had learned and knew. Whether or not Dr. Kurzweil and his associates will be successful is yet to be seen, but he is confident he will achieve such technology in his lifetime, which is simply mind boggling.
Another fantastic idea I ran across that needs to be mentioned, involves a more earth friendly computer usage. In this day in age, many people are focusing on going green and green technology.
Well, the computer company Dell has definitely done that, at least on a prototype basis. One of Dell’s designers Luis Luna, has come up with a design called, “O Project PC,” where a plant is attached to a computer, and it is attached in a way that the plant absorbs the majority of the CO2 surrounding the computer, apparently extending the computer’s life. When the PC’s life has ended, the cornstarch & bamboo polymer-based case that holds the special plant can either be recycled or used as a regular plant pot for decoration. The idea that we can combine plants and technology is such an exciting idea because we are allowing ourselves to extend the life of our technology without using other possibly harmful synthetic materials. Hopefully other companies will follow Dell in trying to unite nature and technology.
The final idea I’ve chosen to research in relation to the future of computers is Google and the new extremely fast broadband they are developing, and what it would mean for us and other internet providers. I read on the New York Times website that, “Google said it planned to build and test a high-speed fiber optic broadband network capable of allowing people to surf the Web at a gigabit a second, or about 100 times the speed of many broadband connections,”. They have this type of technology already made and have been testing it in communities who have volunteered to do a trial, and it has been extremely successful. The problem Google is having has nothing to do with its advanced technologic ideas, but with the problems that would arise if Google succeeded in this endeavor. They would basically become a monopoly, which causes questions to arise about our future. Is it worth creating a monopoly to have unbelievably fast internet? Would it be ok to put many people out of business so that we can do everything 100 times faster? In another article I read from a San Francisco
The future of media is a vast and exciting subject. The future of computers, though a more narrowed down version of media still has endless possibilities to what the future could bring us. Ideas like a $75 dollar laptop, complex artificial intelligence, a plant that helps to keep a computer “healthy”, and an internet server that is 100 times faster than anything we currently have. These ideas are just a few of the many possibilities we could be experiencing in our near futures. Though computers are new to human history, they will continue to grow and have a large impact on our lives, and all the things we will be able to accomplish with their new technology. Media is an important part of society, and with the help of computers, media will be able to take a whole new and exciting direction.
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