British Council Presents

The Information Society by Richard Sidaway

Once upon a time, societies were organised around religion, farming, trade or industry. In many parts of the world today this is still true, but something else is becoming more important – the exchange of information, and the technology that we use to do this. Twenty-four-hour news, e-commerce, international call centres, mobile phones, global positioning systems... all these are making the world smaller and faster.

The growth in telecommunications is now giving more and more people access to democratic ideas, to the principles of international law and human rights, to the science that will help their country to develop or to the medical knowledge that can fight disease. It is starting a real global village, which people only dreamed of a generation ago.

But how can everybody in the world share the recent technological advances? Millions of people cannot read these words because they don’t have access to a computer. They don’t understand English either, the language that 80 per cent of the information is written in. They don’t even have a telephone. They are more worried about how far they will have to walk today to get clean water or if they can feed themselves and their families. For most people on this planet, information is not a priority.

The contrast between countries that have information technology and those that don’t is called the ‘digital divide’. Scandinavia and South-East Asia have a high number of people who use information communication technologies (ICT). Central Africa and the Pacific have almost none.

The United Nations is trying to make the information society a reality for more of the developing world. It wants to see rich countries transfer new technology and knowledge to poorer nations.

Ten years from now, the plan is that everybody in the world will have a radio or television and that 50 per cent of the world’s population will have access to the internet from schools and universities, health centres and hospitals, libraries and museums. This will improve medical care and education, science and agriculture, business opportunities and employment. At the same time, they say, local communities, languages and cultures will become stronger.

Is it just a dream? Certainly there are some contradictions. Does only good come with freedom of information? If information is power, why will people share it? Doesn’t more technology mean fewer jobs? And how can the exchange of information keep local cultures alive if most of that information is only in one language? It is much easier to get people connected to broadband or put government online in Europe than in South America or the Middle East. However, developing countries often leapfrog the process that richer nations went through, and avoid their mistakes. Brazil collects most of its taxes online these days. There are cyber cities in Dubai and Mauritius. And Taiwan and Hong Kong have better access to ICT than the United Kingdom. Maybe the English language isn’t so important after all.

Perhaps the spread of technology means that the old centres of power are also changing. The United States introduced internet technology in the 1970s. But people are asking why they should continue to be in charge. Why should a small organisation in California tell the rest of the world how computers talk to each other?

The USA says it makes the rules, but it doesn’t control the flow of information. The domain name system (DNS) controls how internet addresses work, but not what a website or database contains. Many want a more international approach, however. But they also want the internet to remain open and free for all to use.

Can the world create an information society for all? If a farmer in Bangladesh can read this in the year 2015, then maybe the answer is yes.

Word Search

See if you can find these words in the grid. They can be horizontal, vertical, diagonal and backwards.

DIGITAL

A_CE_S

A_O_T

I_FO_MA_ION

B_O_DB_ND

I_TE_NE_

CO_NE_T_ON

S_C_E_Y

C_B_R

W_BS_T_

English and Сulture

‘The English language is nobody’s special property. It is the property of the imagination: it is the property of the language itself.’ Derek Walcott is a West Indian poet, playwright and visual artist who writes mainly in English. Born in Castries, St. Lucia he won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1992. Do you agree with him?

VOCABULARY

Five words/phrases from the text:

• e-commerce: business done over the internet

• global village: the idea of a world made smaller by being connected via computers

• digital divide: difference in wealth and opportunity measured by how many people use information technology

• broadband: large capacity internet cable connection

• cyber city: metropolitan area linked to other cities by information technologies

EXERCISE ONE

Vocabulary gap fill. Now use the five words/phrases to fill the gaps in the sentences below:

If you want to play games online, you really need a _______[1] connection.

The ability of organisations to recruit staff in several different countries very quickly shows that the _______[2] is a reality.

I haven’t got involved in _______[3] yet. I am still not confident that my money will be secure.

I wonder how long it will be before the place I live in can be called a _______[4] I don’t think having a few internet cafés will be enough.

There is a _______[5] between north and south Europe.

EXERCISE TWO

Comprehension: true or false. Decide whether these sentences are TRUE or FALSE according to the text:

1 More than three-quarters of the information on the internet is in English.

2 The writer isn’t sure if new technology can preserve local languages.

3 More people use information technology in the Pacific than in South-East Asia.

4 Poorer countries can often adopt technology quicker than richer countries.

5 An international organisation decides how computers communicate with each other.

Answers:

Vocabulary: 1. broadband; 2. global village; 3. e-commerce; 4. cyber city; 5. digital divide

Comprehension: 1. True; 2. True; 3. False; 4. True; 5. False

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