THE DIGITAL AGE

By Carlos Silverio Bueno
October 25, 2017

Back in 2001, I wrote in the scholarly publication ANTHROPOS of Trinity College of Quezon City* (now Trinity University of Asia) an article entitled, "The Digital Future: Ready or Not, It's Here" --

The Internet as the 'superhighway of information' was already enabling worldwide communication and knowledge sharing, but social media was still in its formative stage. But even then, forward-looking thinkers in the information and communication technology (ICT) industry already recognized five crucial transformations in the Digital Age of the new millennium -- (1) Globalization; (2) Internationalism; (3) Devolution; (4) Marketization; and (5) 'Digital Citizens.'

Globalization is not just about an increased economic interdependence worldwide but also of the emerging global culture. Internationalism makes the global challenges in security, the economy, and the environment more readily and effectively addressed by multilateral responses and capabilities. Devolution is due to the combination of fiscal pressures and community demands that increasingly place responsibilities into the hands of local governments, where more appropriately-nuanced responses and solutions can be crafted and implemented. Marketization means that governments and even corporations big or small are resorting to a wider variety of market solutions (e.g., "crowd-sourcing") to manage fiscal issues, public and private assets, and service delivery challenges and problems.

The last one is what social media is all about -- information- and (non-traditional) media-savvy people 'storming the Bastille' (or conventional norms) as digital or 'connected' citizens of the social media networks, transforming everything from perceptions/perspectives, opinions/thinking, attitudes/values, and relationships or social engagements -- and demanding new accountability from government and more participation in governance (the symbol and arena of the public sphere). While not everything that goes on in social media is political or about governance, economic or human development, today's social media activities (or 'activism') represents the new empowerment of the hitherto "silent majority" to be able to more concretely and substantively exercise their freedom of expression, as well as to more actively demand their right to more and better information.

In that 2001 article, I had cited Don Tapscott, chairman of Digital 4Sight (www.digital4sight.com; co-author of DIGITAL CAPITAL), who said, "As democracy moves into the Digital Era, public culture, structures and processes require reinvention. The tools are at hand. All that is missing is the will."

As today's robustly frenetic social media life indicates, the will to reinvent practically everything in human experience in the postmodern purview has already been exercised -- and how!

An interesting side effect of the power of social media is that traditional mass media (the 'fourth estate') has felt very much threatened, its hitherto-unchallenged power and influence in society steadily being eroded and undermined by the "new kids on the block" (i.e., bloggers). These "new kids" are simply as uncontrollable as they are ubiquitous. Add to these largely-unrepentant 'information meisters' the multiplier effect of individual 'netizens' casually interacting on and sharing ad infinitum what catches their fancy (or even advocacy -- such as their very ardent support for and defense of President Rodrigo Roa Duterte), then we really get some inkling as to how big the impact of social media on our social consciousness has been these recent years.

On the downside, however, the late Alvin Toffler (author of FUTURE SHOCK, POWERSHIFT and THE THIRD WAVE) did warn us of what he called, "the end of truth" particularly where the Internet is concerned. This is because he observed that the technologies of deception are increasing more rapidly than the technologies of verification. It means that we now have very powerful tools for deceiving one another -- and we all know that so many people or entities out there in social media do make use of such deceptions "to get ahead" of the competition. (That's why we have so much "fake news" nowadays.)

That begs the question -- what is really important now -- information or misinformation? Toffler said that misinformation is, after all, just a subset of information, in general. And it's not even all pernicious, although if it is meant to serve a political agenda or purpose (such as "demolition" or character assassination), it is evil because it's quite effective... so many people are just so gullible, easily swallowing things hook, line and sinker. Toffler says that knowledge that is no longer true or accurate is called "ignorage" -- and there is much of it out there in the wild, which so many people actually believe.

But time has a way of revealing what is the truth and what is real, and some people also take pains to educate others on what the actual score is. It all comes down to the individual and his/her perceptions and attitude about the world and everything in it. I've always had the view (ever since I heard of it as a witticism from a close friend, many years ago) that in the so-called Knowledge Age we find ourselves in today, it's just a "mind over matter" thing -- that is, if you don't MIND, it really doesn't MATTER!!

~ 'pag may time

* When I was still teaching there

THOUGHTS
October 27, 2017

Digital Age - everything the filmdom fast forwarded on the screen has come alive! It's no longer an illusionary visions and inventions, but real! However, much as what the digital technocrats envisioned in their own time capsule, the world has bowed down to its worldwide web power and are caught up in its whirlpool of technological vagaries. That's Globalisation and Internationalism. Their intents were magnanimous, but the consumers were varied in their pursuits of patronage and patronisation. That's Devolution, Marketisation, and Netization combined. The network involve is as complex as that of the Central Nervous System (CNS). Everything is endlessly wired up, interlinking axons and neurons to another and in the long process, causing the system to become nucleolytic, where its functions are no longer restrictive. Truth and deception it seems, are to be inevitably part of that system. Even the legality of the scheme is vehemently distorted. Information and disinformation are the only two distinct ingredients for as long as this earth belongs or under a human government as a whole. That's my digitalic point of view of this millennial age. Thanks Mr. Bueno for helping me dig deeper that I came up to this weird world of self-thinking.