The Myth and Effect of the New Technology

 下面为大家整理一篇优秀的essay代写范文 --The Myth and Effect of the New Technology，文章讲述近年来，我们听到了很多关于新技术影响的说法。一些人持积极的态度，声称技术可以给我们的生活带来根本的改变。例如，专栏作家汤普森在他的文章《比你想象的更聪明》中指出，技术将使我们的大脑更聪明(340;360)。《连线》杂志的长期编辑凯文·凯利(Kevin Kelly)在一篇文章(299;312)。专栏作家格拉德威尔甚至注意到，有些人倾向于宣称，技术能够通过Twitter操纵一场革命(格拉德威尔399)。然而，也有其他人坚持消极的态度。一些人断言科技会削弱我们深度阅读的能力，分散我们的注意力(Carr 313;329);一些人坚持认为新技术扭曲了沟通(Turkle 373;392)。但就这么简单吗?在这篇文章中，我想打破这种“消极和积极”的二分法，并提出新技术的影响取决于相关的社会结构，因此，技术神话应该在更广泛的背景下重新考虑。

In recent years, we have heard a lot of claims about the influence of new technologies. Some hold positive attitudes, claiming that technology can bring radical changes to our life. For example, Columnist Thompson states in his article “Smarter Than You Think ”that technology will make our brain smarter (340; 360). Kevin Kelly, the long-time editor of Wired, is even more radical to assert that robot will take over all our jobs in the future and our only job will be create job for robots in an article(299; 312). Columnist Gladwell even noticed that some people tend to claim that technology is able to maneuver a revolution via Twitter (Gladwell 399). However, there are also other people adhereing to negative attitudes. Some asserts that technology will weaken our ability of deep reading and distract our attention (Carr 313; 329); some insists that new technology distorts communication (Turkle 373; 392). But is it that simple? In this essay, I want to breakdown this “negative-positive” dichotomy and suggest that the effect of new technology depends on the related social structures, and thus the myth of technology should be reconsidered in a broader context.

We may be confused by the different myths of technology, because they all make sense in different perspectives. If we look back in the history, it is actually an ordinary phenomenon. Media analyst Brooke Gladstone points out that it’s common that “people always see the future and despair that the latest gizmo will destroy our concentration memory, communities, our mental and physical health” (335). Take radio for example, when it was invented, it was heavily blamed for scaring the children, but several years later people fell into the myth of “radio’s golden age”(Gladstone 335;336). The same technology in different period and different social context may be made into different myths. If we want to understand the influence of the society, these myths of technology, no matter how positive or negative it is, should be examined carefully in order to discover its effect on the society. 

In order to evaluate the impact of a new technology, we must relate it to the related social structures to analyze how it is woven into the social structure, and how the specific combination of technology and society changes our life. These three cases of social media and social movement, including the America case in Gladwell’s essay, Iran’s “Twitter Revolution,” and the Chinese Internet activism show how the same new technology in different social contexts have different influences on activism. 

In Gladwell’s essay Small Change: Why the Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted, he looks back on the classical social movements in America in the mid of the 20th century, and suggests that the strong-tied relationship and hierarchy are significant factors of social movements. It was these two factors that made popular protests and effective actions possible. In his view, the characteristics of weak-tie relationship and networked structures make social network unable to mobilize a social movement. His analysis seems powerful and universal, and he use his theory confidently to analyze the mobilization of Iran Revolution and draw the easy conclusion that social media is unable to precipitate the revolution. 

However, Gladwell may be blinded by the myth of technology pessimism, and thus hasn’t paid enough attention to the connection of society and technology, despite his effort to consider social media and the social dynamics of activism. Although Iran could not utilize social media to organize a coup, it did empower the dissidents to overthrow the government in some ways. Media researcher, James Curran points out that in 2009-2010, the arrest of dissidents helped built up the network of the discontent citizen by e-mail and mobile phone contacts (57). Without this new technology, the rounding-up of dissidents is implausible. With this foundation, social protest is possible. Moreover, the specific social context of Iran even helped the social media become a good tool to start the insurgence. James Curran asserts that “large-scale alienation (as in Iran) could produce activists adept at evading censorship” (51). Under the authoritarian regime, without any alternative, the loose-connected and networked structure enabled activists to communicate with each other tactfully and effectively but at the same time avoid the interruption of the government because it’s not easy for the alienated government to inspect every word in the loosely-connected Internet. In turn, the Internet produced a strong-tied relationship built on the protection by the loosely-connected network, and therefore the social media help the Iranian to make a revolution. Seen in this way, Gladwell’s point of view may also be a negative myth of technology. He is true to the dynamics of social movement, but may be wrong about the Internet. He stresses the experience of American Internet but doesn’t pay enough attention to how Iranian social structures influence the Internet and how the Society-Internet symbiosis influenced the society. Actually, the Iranian Internet enabled the revolution. 

But can we draw a conclusion that in authoritarian regimes Internet and social media tend to benefit the social movement? In the case of China, the answer is no. The Chinese model combines the characteristic of Gladwell’s model and Iran’s model in a different period, which demonstrates my argument that the effect of a technology should be evaluated by examing the relationship of technology and society. Before 2012, the Internet in China seemed to be a magic tool for introducing democracy and freedom. In the case of China, in this period the weak-tie relationship and networked organization of BBS and Weibo (the Chinese Twitter) helped those who asked for justice. It made a connection among the famous civil lawyers, public intellectuals, liberal entrepreneur and liberal-wing in the government, who can put pressures on the local government. And the weak tie also became a strong tie after the connection was made. The dissidents sharing the same idea were able to organize social protest online and offline to fight against the state. An intellectual can also made full use of the Weibo to spread liberal ideology to as many people as possible with the help of its weak-tie structure. In this period, the authoritarian regime was not able to respond to the social protest in the Internet quickly, and was impacted by the citizen from the bottom up. So in this period, the social media had a positive impact on the society. But after that, the authoritarian regime found a tricky way to break the possible connection of weak-tie relationship. They divided the dissidents into different category and censored different groups separately to break the potential connection. Weibo can only provide immediate news and entertainments, but it cannot evoke activism, because users are not able to make connection with the intellectual, lawyer and liberal entrepreneur to start any action in real sense .Without potential strong tie, Weibo users won’t commit to a political event because they have to face the state individually. Due to this, Gladwell’s observation may seem reasonable in China.

We can see from these three cases that even the same technology impacts others in opposing regions differently. In Gladwell’s case, social media in America seems to have no political potential, but in Iran it did help make the revolution, and in China, impact is even more complicated. The myth that a new technology is always able to make a difference or is never able to change the existing society should be broken, and we should examine actual effect of a new technology in a wider context. In conclusion, the impact of technology on society is greatly related to its connection with the society. 

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