It’s no secret that the Internet has been around in our world for more than 50 years. Since 1969, the internet became an icon in the tech world filled with websites, servers, and others. But what really makes the internet that helps us find and search for things we don’t understand and the answer is very simple: objects that created it. We call those objects the Internet of Things so let’s run down the role it played on creating this extraordinary invention.
Let’s think of the internet of things as a multidimensional doorway to all networks that keep us all connected in the real world. For example, in an article from Foreign Affairs entitled, As Objects Go Online, Neil Gershenfield and JP Vasseur stated, “The Internet of Things is not just science fiction, it has already arrived. Some of the things currently networked together send data over the public Internet, and some communicate over secure private networks, but all share common protocols that allow them to interoperate to help solve profound problems”. This quote is truly a fact that the internet of things have benefits to help us to create networks for our own society.
Now let’s discuss the method of objects that made the internet so unique. If you have a computer and want to connect it to the things, then the objects can do all the work for you by transferring your data to the mainframe but believe me, it really works. That is why Julian Bleecker made an excellent point about the connection of the internet of things in the PDF reading, Why Things Matter, that “Once “Things” are connected to the Internet, they can only but become enrolled as active, worldly participants by knitting together, facilitating and contributing to networks of social exchange and discourse, and rearranging the rules of occupancy and patterns of mobility within the physical world”. It is true that the internet of things can help connect us to other users by communication through social life in the real world.
Sure the internet of things could have benefits for a safer and secure society but it also takes a downfall due to the abuse of technology that affected us since it was introduced. According to the New York Times article, Thermostats, Locks, and Lights: Digital Tools of Domestic Abuse, Nellie Bowles believed “Their stories are part of a new pattern of behavior in domestic abuse cases tied to the rise of smart home technology. Internet-connected locks, speakers, thermostats, lights and cameras that have been marketed as the newest conveniences are now also being used as a means for harassment, monitoring, revenge, and control.” This quote proved that there was a price to pay for the overuse of technology that we were fallen victim to the controlling methods and antics that the internet has made to cause panic and madness among the community.
For my final thought and my conclusion, the internet of things played an important role in the field of technology because of the connections it made to help us communicate ourselves better but not only that but it also helps us understand the positive and negative methods so we could connect the things we care about the most to make the internet more useful, fun, safe, and secure in reality today.
P.S: Happy Anniversary to the World Wide Web, serving and helping the world for 30 years since 3/12/89 and here’s to another 30 years in the future.
Works Cited
Vasseur, JP, Gershenfield, Neil. As Objects Go Online. Foreign Affairs. 2014. https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2014-02-12/objects-go-online
Bleecker, Julian. Why Things Matter. Critical Networks. http://criticalnetworks.coin-operated.com/WhyThingsMatter.pdf
Bowles, Nellie. Thermostats, Locks, and Lights: Digital Tools of Domestic Abuse. The New York Times. 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/23/technology/smart-home-devices-domestic-abuse.html?fallback=0&recId=17YkHDo1w6yNhRavYZhvgzdhRsl&geoContinent=NA&geoRegion=NJ&recAlloc=thompson_sampling&geoCountry=US&blockId=signature-journalism-vi&action=click&module=editorsPicks&pgtype=Article®ion=Footer