There were few iPod or iPhone users in Korea before 4 years ago and my older brother who is ‘early adopter’ was one of them. After he bought iPod, he explained its various functions to me excitedly. But I had an indifferent reaction because it seemed like just a ‘normal phone’ which has nothing to do with me. However, after I bought iPhone4, it gave me ‘new world’. I was able to talk with friends living in America using application ‘Skype’ whenever and wherever. Moreover, I was able to know world news through Facebook rather than newspaper or TV.
Thanks to electronic mass media, people can share the ideas, images, and sounds of different cultures over great distances (Croteau et al. 2012, p. 326). There is no doubt that it brings positive changes. For example, much greater personal communication is facilitated by new media technologies (Croteau et al. 2012, p. 329). However, let’s imagine that if I live in the place where there is no access to such media technologies or no internet? How do I know about world news quickly? Without the Internet, it is hard to share the information. As I mentioned in the first posting, the rise of Internet is one of the major driving forces to globalization.
This world map shows number of internet Users by country in 2009 and internet users mean the people who have access to the worldwide network.
As Croteau et al. (2012) argue, the promise of the globalization remains largely unfulfilled.
References
Croteau, D, Hoynes, W, Milan, S 2012, Media/society: industries, images, and audiences, SAGE, California.
Picture source
Number of Internet Users by Country, International Telecommunication Union, <http://www.itu.int/en/pages/default.aspx>.
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