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| Devangshu Datta: Natives of the digital world |
| Devangshu Datta / New Delhi Apr 10, 2010, 00:07 IST |
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I learnt to drive on manual transmission (a Ford Prefect, which should delight Douglas Adams fans). My first spin in an automatic meant de-conditioning decades of reflexes. My left foot wiggled, seeking a clutch.
Similarly, a shift to computer from typewriter meant forgetting the carriage return lever. Then it was the mouse. The interface got simpler each time. It’s easier to drive without a clutch. It’s much easier to click, rather than type .But I had to unlearn ingrained habits to exploit the advantages.
The post-touchscreen generation considers the mouse a nuisance. The divide between savvy toddlers and their 10-year-old siblings is marked. The toddlers swipe hands across screens and look puzzled if nothing happens, while their older siblings look for the mouse.
Children adapt faster but even they feel some disorientation. Physical disorientation is reflected subtly by incapacity to exploit new digital capabilities. I don’t consume multimedia, or use the Interweb or social networks the way my 21-year-old nephew does. He doesn’t consume multimedia the same way as his five-year-old niece does. A decade down the line, she might be struggling to adapt to voice-activated input or perhaps, ear-wiggle input.
The biggest legacy issues are in our heads. My nephew’s social life is far richer and more varied than mine even though I’ve met far more interesting people. In my time, kids could hang out only if it was physically convenient. Phone calls were short because family members would yell if somebody hogged the phone.
My nephew’s generation is permanently on Twitter and Facebook (FB). He has three IM conversations going and texts in-between, while listening to music and studying. This digital flood doesn’t seem to impair concentration or adversely impact grades. That generation stays in touch painlessly across continents. The next stage could be seamless audio visual (AV)-messaging where, in effect, people hold multiple video-conferences on personal mobile devices.
There is no reason why my peers and I (the over-40s) cannot use the same methods to keep in touch, the way our children do so easily. We do, of course, use email, IM and also Twitter, FB, Skype, etc., and value the ways in which they’ve improved productivity.
But, we’re not natives of the digital environment, we’re emigres. Many of us feel the experience is impersonal. As a result, we tend to under-use digital channels and thus, lose contact with people we could and should, stay in touch with. After a while, we replace people in our social networks more often than we add them.
That’s not how it works for digitally-connected 15-20 year-olds. It requires a deliberate act of commission to sever ties. Somebody must be unfriended, or IM-blocked. This makes it very likely that their social networks will eventually become much larger than that of any previous generation.
There are interesting future implications. What happens if everybody’s “address book” (using the term loosely to include contacts on any two-way digital comm channel) runs to five-figures and more? It's likely to be the norm circa 2020.
Even in a population of 6 billion, that makes it very low odds that any two given persons will have common nodes on their personal networks. The degrees of separation between any two given persons will reduce dramatically. Does such a society turn into a virtual cocktail party, where everybody is privy to multiple simultaneous conversations?
This sounds like science fiction. Any guesses about the evolutionary path for such a society will likely be wrong. The impacts on current practices in security, diplomacy, policy-making, marketing, advertising, sexual mores, etc. are tough to imagine. The legacy issues will be large. The digital divides between haves/have-nots and natives/emigres will have their say in shaping things. But radical changes are inevitable simply because soon enough, most people on earth will be able to directly communicate with everyone else.
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