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Implications of Computer Use 3.6.1 Changing Trends in Computer Use The history of the computer has been remarkably short for a device that now pervades every aspect of our society and affects the lives of so many people in a serious way. The first effective, useful, stored program machine is now acknowledged to have been the Colossus which was a computer that was designed to break the German Enigma codes during the war. Confusion over which computer was the first has been rife because of contrary claims and a lack of definition of what constitutes a computer. Different centres around the world fiercely put forward their claims to have invented the first computer, an argument that was settled by the lifting of the official secrets act from Colossus in the 1970s. Such a seemingly mundane argument over something that only carried prestige for the eventual winner of the argument, not money or power, was a symptom of the jealous way that people who were involved with computers, and who were able to use them, guarded their privileges from others. This mentality gave rise to the concept of ‘Fortress Computing’ where computer competent people kept others away from the systems. There was some justification for this in order to use a scarce resource as effectively as possible, but there was undoubtedly an element of such workers protecting their position by making computer use seem somewhat mystical. The results of this are still seen today in the attitudes of many middle aged, and older people, who believe that using a computer is beyond them. This is not their fault, but something with which they were brain washed when they were younger. The use of computers was largely confined to this technical elite in universities, and to larger businesses, where information systems were needed to produce payrolls and other information hungry examples. The revolution in computer use came in the late 1970s with the invention of a cheap, small, relatively easy to use machine called the Sinclair ZX79. There was very little it could do, for instance, it had 1/4K memory! But it did mean that ordinary people could own their own computer. Also, the phenomenal success of the ZX79, ZX80, and then the Sinclair Spectrum proved that there was a market. Until these machines, no one thought that ordinary people would want a computer. Suddenly many manufacturers jumped on the band wagon and there was a plethora of machines. Each machine needed its own software and many started to go out of business. There was no real market leader, although Acorn, in this country, were very popular because their machines were being used in schools, so parents wanted to buy one for their children to use at school. In the 1980s IBM, the world’s biggest computer manufacturer, decided that they would produce a small machine. It was not successful, but many other, smaller, manufacturers decided to copy the way that it was built. Such machines were called IBM clones. Gradually, as the IBM clones grabbed a larger and larger share of the market, the other companies went to the wall. It certainly helped that Microsoft operating systems were installed in the cloned machines, not because they were the best operating systems, but because it meant that these machines could communicate easily and that files were compatible. Nowadays, we have a society where, world wide, there is a higher number of computers in homes than there are refrigerators or baths. The effect of this has been enormous on society, and the effects are what are discussed in this chapter. 25 years ago the proportion of the world’s population that had access to a computer system was tiny, nowadays it is very high, and increasing daily. However, there are still large numbers of the population, even in a rich country like Britain, that do not have access on a regular basis. There is a distinct danger that this will lead to another form of class-divided society, not based on accident of birth, or based on wealth (or lack of it), but based on whether a person has access to the information revolution. Imagine two people who live in a village. The village has a grocer’s shop and newsagent. The last bank in the village has closed because it was too costly for the bank to maintain the branch, which was losing money, because so many of the villagers had changed to running their account on the Internet. A person living in this village, who has a computer connected to the Internet, will be able to pay their bills, order goods from the supermarket 20 miles away at a lower cost than buying them from the grocer, will have a wider variety of choice from the supermarket than they could get locally. They will be able to book rail tickets, at a discount, through the Internet, which will also allow them to pick up holiday bargains. The other person does not have access to a computer. These two people are very different in their life styles and the social changes that have occurred, not just to one of them, because of the computer, are immense. When we add to this the fact that one of these people used to be employed by the bank to run the branch in the village, but is now out of work, while the other has been told to go on a training course to learn a new piece of software, the scale of how much our lives are being effected by the use of new technology becomes even more evident. Note that many of the changes made to our life styles have been forced rather than being made by choice. 3.6.2 Changes in Leisure and Work Computer availability and acceptance has brought about large changes, not just in the ways that we live, but also in the way we use our leisure time and in work practices. Children, particularly boys, spend long hours of their leisure time in front of computer terminals playing computer games. This is a very insular way of passing the time which is beginning to worry educational psychologists because children who behave like this are in danger of not forming the social bonds, and learning about the social interaction, necessary in later life. Some of the games are particularly violent, or antisocial. Although there is no hard evidence of a link between playing such games and antisocial behaviour of the child themselves, there is a growing belief that there is such a link. Long hours spent in front of the monitor screen at an early age is becoming suspect in the amount of RSI and other injuries being suffered by young adults, many years before their parents generation would have shown such symptoms. Work practices are changing in a number of ways. Computers have meant that some repetitive tasks have been taken away from human beings. A robot, on a car production line, can not only work more consistently than its human counterparts and do the jobs of many people, it does not need paying. Many jobs have been lost by the human work force in this way. However, companies that have invested in this way have tended to become more profitable which has the effect of safeguarding the jobs that are still offered by the company, and also leads to expansion and the creation of additional jobs. Additional jobs are created. Every time a robot is placed on a production line, someone has to build the robot, someone has to write the software to control it, someone has to maintain it. The problem is that the majority of jobs created require more skills than the jobs that have been lost. This in turn means a ‘skilling up’ of the workforce. This change in working practices is another example of the technology creating two classes of people (Section 3.6.1), those able to learn additional skills and those not. The use of technology allows people, whose jobs require a desk and who can communicate satisfactorily with their colleagues without needing to be in the same physical environment, to have their desks wherever they want by using electronic means of communicating. This means that people can work from home for at least part of their week. The implications are far reaching. Less pollution because of fewer commuters and pleasant working conditions are both positive factors. Less positive is the ability of the electronic systems to report the working practices of the workers to their boss, and the lack of social contact which is so important in maintaining job satisfaction. In the past it would have been quite normal for a person to start a job after leaving full-time education and to stay in that job until they retired. Although this may be seen by some as being an uninviting prospect, it does provide for security and gives automatic prestige to even the most lowly of workers because of their seniority within the business bringing invaluable experience. This type of work practice is becoming less and less common as modern technology changes products, manufacturing techniques and the life cycle of businesses. Electronic communications have changed the way that business is done. Communication can be immediate, and the worker is never far from being contacted and consequently can be at work at all hours of the day. A good example is the world’s stock markets. Twenty years ago, each country had its own stock market, the performance of which might affect others when they opened, but they tended to be fairly insular in their dealings. Nowadays, the stock markets of the world are all interconnected. As a stock-holder, it is possible to buy and sell stock at any time of the day or night simply by using one of the markets open at the time, no longer is it necessary to wait for the national market to open the following day. 3.6.3 Privacy and Confidentiality of Data The expansion of computer systems around the world have given rise to more information being stored about individuals than ever before. The problem is that, to get another copy of a person’s information, the only thing that needs to be done is to press a button. Distance is no object either. Using electronic communications it is possible to send a person’s information from one side of the world to another in milliseconds and then to store that information in a system that the owner of the information is unaware of. There would be no problem if it could be ensured that all the users of the information were going to use it for the right reasons and that the information was always accurate. However, these things cannot be guaranteed. Consequently it has become important to protect individuals from misuse of their information by legislation and by measures that restrict both the access to the data and the passing on of the data to other users. Unfortunately the use of electronic information does not recognise national boundaries and some authorities are not as anxious to uphold the rights of the individual as others. A typical effect of this passing on of personal information is the junk mail that comes through the letter box. An interesting experiment is to change your initials every time you have to give your name. Within a relatively short space of time junk mail will begin to arrive and by reference to the initials it is possible to work out who has sold your details on and to whom they have been sold. 3.6.4 Legislation Most countries have now enacted legislation in attempts to overcome the problems that were mentioned in section 3.6.3. The purpose of such legislation is to protect citizens from something that by its very nature can be insidious because it is difficult to understand the consequences of unrestricted use of personal information. Legislation protecting personal information must not be confused with copyright law. Copyright law protects intellectual property, in the case of a computer system it would protect the person who has written the software rather than the user or the person whose details are being stored. Each country will pass laws that are particular to that country, but they largely follow the same model that we have in Britain. Any personal data that is stored in a computer system must be accurate and up to date. be relevant to the task for which it is intended to be used and used for that original purpose. not be kept longer than is necessary. be kept securely. Access to the data must be strictly controlled. be available, on request, to the subject of the stored data. Other measures that could be expected would be some control over the passing on of data to other organisations, excemptions for reasons of national security or because it is thought to be in the individual’s interest. In Britain the Data Protection Act that was passed in 1984 only applied to data that was read magnetically, in other words was stored on a tape or a disk. It did not apply to data stored on a CDROM because that is stored optically. This has now been changed by the latest version of the act. This shows that, just like everything else in the world of computers, things change very quickly and that human systems often find difficulty in keeping up with the changes. Attempts have been made to harmonise legislation across boundaries. The European Union pass their own directives about data, but it is difficult to get agreement when individual parliaments still have sovereignty. 3.6.5 Controversial Information The Internet was originally started by the American military (ARPANET) as a means of communication in time of war. The principle was that if a communications system has a central control system (like a telephone exchange) then it is easy to disable that communications network by destroying the central control. There can be as many telephones as you like, without an exchange they are useless. ARPANET was devised so that there was no central control and consequently the losing of one part of the system does not stop the rest of the system from operating. This is the whole principle of the Internet, there is no control. When someone complains about the fact that there is a page on the Internet that shows anyone how to make a bomb and says something like “They should have that page removed.”, they are showing their lack of understanding of the net. There simply is no ‘They’, there is no one in charge. There are some things that all sane people would condemn, the obvious example is paedophiles using the net for their own purposes. However, if there were some central body set up to control the net and to make sure there was no paedophilia on the system, where would the line be drawn. Hard core pornography and the use of cannabis are against the law in this country, however, they are legal in Holland. If the control of the net was in Britain then our law says that these things would not be allowed; whereas if it were in Holland they would be. We would contend that the Internet is a useful tool in the fight against oppression and the suppression of human rights. But do our values necessarily apply in a different society? Do we have the right to subvert another society by using the net for propaganda purposes? If we do then why should we get upset when values that are not to our liking are sent back to us? If the world wants an Internet then it will have to put up with the downside of an uncontrolled information network as well as the advantages from instant mass communication. The truth is that, even if the Governments of the world did not want the net, there is nothing they can do about it because how can they pull the plug on millions of machines all at the same time? 3.6.6 Health and Safety Implications The human being is not a sedentary animal. The human body is not designed for long periods of inactivity. The body is designed to move. The legs are designed to move us around, the arms to carry things and support weights, the eyes are designed for three-dimensional vision. We are not designed to sit for long periods of time, supporting the weight of our own arms while small movements are made by the hands to press keys and our wonderful three-dimensional sight is used to stare at a flat screen no more than a metre away. The human body is very resilient, but, as with any misuse of the body, the long term use of computer systems in this way will cause damage. Muscles that are not designed to support relatively small weights (the arms) for long periods of time when using the computer keyboard begin to be strained, particularly when such small movements are made. Joints in the fingers and the elbow and shoulder are made to perform movements that they normally would not do, and to perform them regularly over long time periods. Over time, these strains on the body can lead to pain and to restrictions on movement which are difficult to ignore. A new condition has been identified called repetitive strain injury (RSI). The simple cure for this is to take regular short breaks and to move around and exercise the joints and muscles. Also helpful is the use of a Natural Keyboard which allows the user to sit naturally while working. Eyes did not evolve to stare at a flat surface that is very close for long periods of time. The eyeball should, naturally, move about in the socket. This produces tears which lubricate the eyeball. Too much enforced staring at one point can lead to a condition called dry eye which can be very painful. The eye can also tire because it is being made to use a fixed focus for long periods. The use of glasses to help the eye to remain focussed and regularly looking away from the screen can help to alleviate these problems, as can the use of anti glare screens fitted to monitors to cut down the levels of contrast so that the eye can handle it better. Much has been made in the past of the radiation that comes off the screen, and the possible damage that can be done because of the radiation. While these worries have probably been exaggerated in the past, and the more modern screens are far safer anyway, there is a lesson to be learned from the research into radiation from mobile phones that demonstrates how even small amounts of radiation can be harmful. Despite the problems that are associated with the computer itself, the most important problems are less to do with the machines themselves. Many computer installations are housed in rooms that were not designed for such use. The result is that cables are left trailing and that the furniture used is not always suitable. Many schools provide good (or bad) examples of this, where a new network has been bought with little thought for the classroom that it is going to be squeezed into. Are there enough plug sockets or are too many pieces of electrical equipment going to be run from too few sockets? Can the cabling be put in trunking? Is there adequate ventilation and is the lighting suitable? If the lighting is the ordinary classroom lighting then it will make the screens even more prone to glare. If the chairs are not comfortable then back problems can occur. These can be lessened by using ergonomically designed seating which encourages good posture. Working with computers can cause stress, particularly among workers who were not originally trained to use them. Historically, once a worker has attained middle age they should be more experienced than the younger people coming in to the firm who will probably be working under them. This situation has changed for many people because of the use of computer technology. Because of the need to keep up to date with the latest hardware and software, it is now the young people coming into the firm that are more experienced than those who have been there some time. This can lead to feelings of inferiority and stress on the older workers. In section 3.6.2 it was mentioned that the new technology allows remote working in many situations. While there are substantial benefits accruing from this practice there are also problems brought about by the lack of social interaction that human beings get from a shared work environment. 3.6.7 Environmental Issues Many years ago the use of computer systems in the office was hailed as the start of the paperless revolution. In the 1950s LEO was invented. It was the Lyons (same company as the cakes!) Electronic Office. The idea was that paper would “become a thing of the past” because messages would all be sent electronically. The environmental implications of this were tremendous. No more cutting down forests to provide paper, no more burning of the documents that are no longer needed so that they remained confidential, with an electronic office this was no longer necessary. There was one tiny problem. With the introduction of machines the amount of paper increased massively. The explanation is simple. Consider a project that you are doing for one of your courses. How many sheets of paper do you use? Not, ‘how many do you hand in?’, but ‘how many do you use?’ The difference is that if you have made a mistake you correct it and get another printout, if you were using a typewriter you wouldn’t do that. When you send something for printing, how often does the printer produce an extra sheet? Do you save it and put it back in the paper tray? How often does the printer not print properly, making another printout necessary? How many people printing off a spreadsheet haven’t given the limits of the sheet, so that the printer has printed 20 or 30 sheets of blank cells before anyone has noticed? The same sort of things happen in business, so what should have been good news environmentally has tended to backfire. As has been mentioned before in this chapter, there is an element of people being able to work from home rather than having to commute. This has obvious advantages in that the pollution is cut down because there are fewer vehicles on the road, but it is not all good news, because if 50 people don’t go in to the office it is an additional 50 homes (offices in those homes) that have to be heated that day which would not otherwise need to be heated. There is a minimal saving at the office block because some workers have to go in to work and therefore the office block must be fully heated. The computer systems themselves have to be produced. There is an environmental cost here on two fronts, the computer requires a certain amount of power to enable the factory to make it, and then there are the raw materials that are needed in the manufacture. When computers are eventually finished with and need to be replaced, there is a large amount of hardware that needs to be got rid of. Some is recyclable. Chips are heated in order to recover the gold used in their manufacture, and some parts of the chassis can be melted down and reused. However, much of the content of a system is not economically viable to reuse and consequently is discarded. As the life of a system in business is about two years this adds up to an enormous waste of resources. When it is also realised that some of the contents of a system are heavy metals and other toxic materials, the environmental problems of replacing a system are great. Example Questions 1. Discuss the implications for customers of a travel agent closing down their agencies and doing all their business on the Internet. (6) A. -Lower overheads for the business… -meaning that customers can expect to pay lower prices. -Information will always be up to date because up-dated centrally.. -but customer may find more difficulty in finding the information required because there is no assistant to help. -Customers who have the Internet will be able to access late bargains -Customers without the Internet may find difficulty in booking any holiday. -Customers with disabilities, particularly blindness may be more disadvantaged than most -Complaints, if things go wrong, will be harder to make. Notes: There are other points to make but only 6 marks, so don’t waste too much time. When you think you have earned the marks, stop. The question is quite specific about it being from the point of view of the customer, so don’t start to talk about workers losing their jobs. It may be true, but does not answer the question. Although the mark scheme would be set out in this way, the question does use the keyword ‘discuss’, so don’t just write notes, the examiner is looking for a coherent argument which contains six of the sensible points. 2. Describe two ways in which a computer system in the home can alter the interaction of the family with the outside world. (4) A. -Children play computer games… -stops them going out and consequently they are safer, but… -affects their social development. -Parents may use the computer to work from home… -cuts down the time spent commuting to work and allows for more leisure time… -but may increase stress and worry about work because of reduced contact with colleagues. Notes: Sensible to use obviously different members of the family. Need to say at least two things for each one because the question uses the keyword ‘describe’. If you were thinking of saying that they could send emails rather than write letters it may be worth a mark but is a little trivial for both marks. 3. State two reasons why it is necessary to protect the confidentiality of information stored about people. (2) A. Data can be misused… -by insurance companies to alter an insurance premium, -by thieves who want to know which addresses have large premiums and are hence worth burgling -by employers who can check on employees moonlighting. Notes: Again, many different possible answers. This would be a nice starter question for a paper, as it expects simple one line answers. 4. Describe three measures that would be expected in a country’s data protection legislation. (6) A. Any three of the measures listed in section 3.6.4. Notes: This is a banker question. It is such an important area of the syllabus it is likely to be asked on a regular basis, the problem for the examiner is that there are only a few ways of asking the question. Candidates should learn the measures stated in the syllabus and use them to answer the question. 5. Describe the consequences of allowing upper school pupils to use the Internet to find information for project work. (4) A. -There is a danger that those pupils who have access to the Internet outside school will use it anyway, and… -therefore it is only right to allow access in school. -Pupils may find inappropriate sites… -which means that the teacher has to censor the material in some way. 6. Outline the health problems that may be experienced by telecall operators and state how such problems could be overcome. (6) A. -RSI… -Use sensible keyboards and properly designed furniture to encourage good posture. -Eye problems caused by staring at the screen… -Wear glasses and fit anti glare screens. -Problems associated with radiation from the monitor… -Sit further away from the monitor screen. 7. Describe two ways in which the use of computer systems in business has harmed the environment. (4) A. -The use of large amounts of paper because… -everyone now expects that when a final copy of a document is produced it is perfect, leading to many copies being produced. -The high turn-over of machines means that many new machines have to be produced and… -the old ones must be disposed of. They contain toxic material which can harm the environment. |