21ST CENTURY INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY REVOLUTION

Full citation in the ACM Digital Library

The computing power in the few micro processors that are now in a Ford Motor Car is much
more than all the computing power that was put in the space vehicle that landed the first men on
the moon and brought them back. In today's do-more-with-less business environment, with
increasing demands from customers, shareholders, and regulators, the IT organization is not
only asked to work harder and smarter, but is being asked to take on the role of assuring the
business.

Humanity has progressed from agricultural revolution to the industrial revolution and is now
moving to an information revolution. It is this awesome computing power at continuously falling
prices and the computers being networked over global telecom highways that is leading to the
use of Information Technology in every sector of human activity be it communication, banking,
trading, learning and teaching, entertainment, socializing, government, management and
librarying. Just as machines have extended man's mechanical power and his convenience and
comfort, Information Technology as commonly picturized by computers, is extending man's
mind or brain or intellectual power. The term information technology has ballooned to
encompass many aspects of computing and technology, and the term is more recognizable than
ever before.

Objective:

Looking at the present scenario, one can easily predict the dominance of Information
Technology in daily life. Despite of hectic schedules and lots of burdens, IT always wins in the
long run. Globalization and Liberalization has expanded their wings in the world and even
beyond that in terms of bringing the global space on to a common platform. Ranging from
magnificent infrastructures to wearable transmitters, IT manages it all. On the contrary, there
are negation points of the same for different cases. A brief research has been portrayed in this
article.

Thoughts:

Just as chemical or metallurgical or electrical technologies enable the processing of raw

materials into usable goods, to satisfy man's and societies' needs so does information
technology (IT) help the storage, processing, transmission and exploitation of information to
satisfy a person's, company's, society's or government's needs for information. The invention of
printing was the first big breakthrough in Information Technology. It enabled literacy and
education to go up from 10% to over 80% within 50 years by making available vast amount of
reading material. That reading also led to the Reformation in Europe. Other break-through for
Information Technology were the inventions like telegraphy, telephony, wireless or radio,
television, broadcasting, computers (from room size to desk top to lap top to palm top and very
soon, wearable ones.)

There had been breath-taking inventions in electronics and photonics, micro-miniaturization,

super and mega-scale integration; optical fiber and communication satellite transmissions,
electronification and digitization of all information, storage and display devices and the transport
of electronified information on worldwide telecommunication networks, increasingly under the
control of the sender and the receiver. Information covers voice as in telephony, text as in fax,
images as in video and data as between computers. The limitation for transmission and
reception of information only from instruments connected to wires and therefore only from
particular places, has been dramatically overcome by earth-based cellular mobile, radio
telecoms and now by satellite based globe wide mobile systems like the Iridium.

Information Technology devices like microprocessors are becoming mass appliances from pace
makers for the heart, hearing aids, and efficiency enhancers in automobile engines and devices
to steer space vehicles on the moon.

Technology is an enabler for more effectively managing the business, but does not solve the
problem unless it is tied directly to business and governance objectives. There is an urgent
need for IT in underdeveloped areas where access to even the smallest bits of knowledge can
have far-reaching, long term effects. The use of technology has a great many effects; these may
be separated into intended effects and unintended effects. The implementation of technology
influences the values of a society by changing expectations and realities. Technology,
throughout history, has allowed people to complete more tasks in less time and with less
energy. However, work has continued to be proportional to the amount of energy expended,
rather than the quantitative amount of information or material processed.

In countries like India, which undertook government-centered development since Independence,

government has become obstreperous, taking in the largest fraction of the GDP as taxes and
the largest amount of their savings as loans. Government is not confined to its primary role of
defense, internal security, justice, primary education, primary health, irrigation and roads, but it
encompasses production, industries, services and businesses. It is commonly known that most
of government's money is spent very inefficiently and much of it, on the salaries and
establishment of the Government servants them selves and yet every service is inefficient. And
the delays and the non-transparency and controls breed corruption.

Talking about IT, Information technology (IT), as defined by the IATA, is, "The study, the study,
design, development, implementation, support or management of computer-based information
systems, particularly software applications and computer hardware." IT deals with the use of
electronic computer and computer software to convert, store, protect, process, transmit and
securely retrieve information.

Technology has had profound effects on lifestyle throughout human history, and as the rate of
progress increases, society must deal with both the good and bad implications. Technology
often enables organizational and bureaucratic group structures that otherwise and heretofore
were simply not possible. Technology enables greater knowledge of international issues,
values, and cultures.

Due mostly to mass transportation and mass media, the world seems to be a much smaller
place. The effects of technology on the environment are both obvious and subtle. The more
obvious effects include the depletion of nonrenewable natural resources (such as petroleum,
coal, ores), and the added pollution of air, water, and land. The more subtle effects include
debates over long-term effects (e.g., global warming, deforestation, natural habitat destruction,
coastal wetland loss.) Each wave of technology creates a set of waste previously unknown by
humans. Humanity at the moment may be compared to a colony of bacteria in a Petri dish with
a constant food supply: with no way to remove the wastes of their metabolism, the bacteria
eventually poison themselves.
Today, the term information technology has ballooned to encompass many aspects of
computing and technology and the term is more recognizable than ever before. The information
technology umbrella can be quite large, covering many fields. IT performs a variety of duties
that range from installing applications to designing complex computer networks and information
databases. A few of the duties that IT professionals perform may include data management,
networking and engineering.

When computer and communications technologies are combined, the result is information
technology, or "InfoTech". Information Technology (IT) is a general term that describes any
technology that helps to produce, manipulate, store, communicate, and/or disseminate
information.

There are mixed consequences of IT on environment. As previously discussed, each wave of

technology creates a set of waste previously unknown by humans. Talking of life, about fifty
years, back the line, no one was familiar with what is called Cyber Waste, but we are now.

So, the point is, despite of higher achievements, there are major drawbacks that IT has failed to
rectify during course of its evolution.

Most modern technological processes produce unwanted byproducts in addition to the desired
products, which are known as industrial waste and pollution. While most material waste is re-
used in the industrial process, many forms are released into the environment, with negative
environmental side effects, such as pollution and lack of sustainability. Different social and
political systems establish different balances between the value they place on additional goods
versus the disvalues of waste products and pollution. Some technologies are designed
specifically with the environment in mind, but most are designed first for economic or ergonomic
effects. Historically, the value of a clean environment and more efficient productive processes
has been the result of an increase in the wealth of society, because once people are able to
provide for their basic needs, they are able to focus on less-tangible goods such as clean air
and water.

The effects of technology on the environment are both obvious and subtle. The more obvious
effects include the depletion of nonrenewable natural resources (such as petroleum, coal, ores),
and the added pollution of air, water, and land. The more subtle effects include debates over
long-term effects (e.g., global warming, deforestation, natural habitat destruction, coastal
wetland loss).

Each wave of technology creates a set of waste previously unknown by humans: Toxic waste,
radioactive waste, Electronic waste.

One of the main problems is the lack of an effective way to remove these pollutants on a large
scale expediently. In nature, organisms "recycle" the wastes of other organisms, for example,
plants produce oxygen as a by-product of photosynthesis, and oxygen-breathing organisms use
oxygen to metabolize food, producing carbon dioxide as a by-product, which plants use in a
process to make sugar, with oxygen as a waste in the first place. No such mechanism exists for
the removal of technological wastes.

Impacts of Technology

Technology, throughout history, has allowed people to complete more tasks in less time and
with less energy. Many herald this as a way of making life easier. However, work has continued
to be proportional to the amount of energy expended, rather than the quantitative amount of
information or material processed. Technology has had profound effects on lifestyle throughout
human history, and as the rate of progress increases, society must deal with both the good and
bad implications.

In many ways, technology simplifies life:

 The rise of a leisure class

 A more informed society can make quicker responses to events and trends

 Sets the stage for more complex learning tasks

 Increases multi-tasking (although this may not be simplifying)

 Global networking

 Creates denser social circles

 Cheap price

In other ways, technology complicates life:

 Pollution is a serious problem in a technologically advanced society.

 The increase in transportation technology has brought congestion in some areas.

 Techniques

 New forms of danger existing as a consequence of new forms of technology, such as

the first generation of nuclear reactors.

 New forms of entertainment, such as video games and internet access could have
possible social effects on areas such as academic performance.

 Increases probability of diseases and disorders, such as obesity.

 Social separation of singular human interaction. Technology has increased the need
to talk to more people faster.

Conclusion

Concluding from the aspects stated above, the only line which comes to mind is "In one line of
thought, technology develops autonomously, in other words, technology seems to feed on itself,
moving forward with a force irresistible by humans. Information is knowledge and knowledge is
power. Knowledge plus experience is wisdom and it is the wise use of information that gives
advantage to those who have information."