The Digital Panacea

We sometimes hear statements such as: “I don’t read anything on paper”… Is this a fashion, a trend or a slip into the digital? The question if the mouse will eat the book is not relevant anymore. The battle between the paper and the digital access to information is uneven. Paper will continue to lose positions, but it won’t lose the war. It’s enough just to recall the Commercial Registry’s crash during the summer of 2018 to tell ourselves that no matter how many  drawbacks the paper has compared to digital technologies, its longer “memory“ continues to be an advantage. With just one click, information gathered for a long period of time can vanish forever. Many sites have already gone into the digital void. Of course, a spark can send volumes of archived information into nothingness, but still someone somewhere could keep a copy.

Photo Zoom

Isn’t it that when we deny the old we turn into people who see the forest, but not the trees? It’s a fact that digital cameras replaced their analogue predecessors too soon. Nevertheless, there are still fans of the traditional camera films, especially among professionals. “I made tests and for me both technologies have advantages, as well as disadvantages. What the digital cameras lack is that they have lesser shades and the transition from clear to blur is too abrupt. The colours are not adequate as well”, a professional French photographer explains. If we use the same analogy, the transformation in the real world from clear to blur is very abrupt as well. An analogue film processing studio owner summarises the causes that made most of his clients choose the digital technology: “The advantage lays in the cost and the ease of use, as well as in the option of seeing the picture immediately without the need to develop it. Of course, fashion matters, too. However, the quality of the analogue photo will be better, also because the photographer will concentrate on the view-finder and will know that they’re paying to capture every frame on paper. They will pay much more attention to the focus and the framing, and that’s why the outcome will be much better with an analogue camera than with a digital one”. The transition to digital photography rearranged that business, and as in every big transformation, here, there were big casualties as well.

Sounds from the Old Records

In the end of the 80s, the vinyl record was replaced by the newly emerged compact disk. But years later, it turned out that the good old black record was buried prematurely. Today, when the CDs yield their territory to the music downloaded online, the vinyl goes through a renaissance. The record factories closed down three decades ago, but new ones open in response to the expectations of an auditory of connoisseurs with a modern and a slightly nostalgic attitude. Yes, there are fans who are convinced that the digital technology will never reach the analogue in terms of sound warmth and high and low frequency ratio, but the trend is not in their favour.

Conveniences vs. Inconveniences

The deeper in the jungle of the digital technologies we enter, the clearer some advantages of the things we turn our back on become. Still, the digital technology, although having its conveniences, solves some problems and causes others. Let’s assess them fairly. Smart technologies require understanding and smart attitude. We “pay” for conveniences with a set of inconveniences, which we can get in return.

The New Gold

To use the main functions of Viber, Gmail and other platforms, we grant access to our files and to all our information, without being explained what it is used for. They can copy whatever they want and transfer it into the cloud. Information is the new gold. And when someone possesses it, they can use it and even trade with it. In that way, users turn into a target for marketing and advertisement. Let’s just think about what online advertising attack we are exposed to and how advertising uses more and more aggressive tricks to grab our attention.

Playing with Fire

Mary-Jo de Leeuw, who is among the most influential cybersecurity experts in the world in 2018, reminds us that smart devices are not a toy, even when they are toys. Children have smart devices at their disposal. A smart doll, for instance, can be controlled through an application and… it’s not a problem to be reprogrammed. A digital technology conference was attended by former generals who had no idea of the potential threat. But when the doll was reprogrammed and started pronouncing obscene words in Arabic language, they realised that playing with a seemingly harmless doll can turn into a crying game. That’s why, according to Mary-Jo de Leeuw, people should also be aware of the risks that the modern technologies hide for the security and the established order. When you’re connected to a wireless network, someone can breach it and take control over your devices. And thus, the situation can go beyond the peachy side of the convenience of using digital technologies. But what happens to our data when someone somewhere doesn’t stop collecting it; what will happen to the information about every one of us, where will it go and where will it be stored? We’re waiting for an answer.

One should not Mess Around with Security

We will also hear the warning that the smarter the technologies get, the dumber the people will get. And instead of people using applications, applications will start using people. Internet takes over greater territories and the question is not if, but when will technology takes us over completely. Undoubtedly, the world is becoming more and more digital, but it must be secure as well. Convenience matters, but security is not in the least to be ignored.