With Wide Access to the Internet Comes Responsibility

In 1981, there were 213 computers connected and able to communicate with each other, or on the internet. This was in line with the modest growth the technology would exhibit beginning in the 1960s. The rest, as we all know, is history. Today, over half of the planet’s human population uses the internet.

It has grown to make up for a substantial portion of our professional and social lives. Schools, businesses, government agencies and news and entertainment outlets have grown to depend on this technology.

It is beginning to make up a huge portion of economies compared with traditional sources of profit, spawn new industries and reach scales of influence that have seldom been paralleled in history. There may have been powerful entities before but not the kind that keep deep personal information about our daily lives, as is the case with Facebook and Google.

If a person is seeking information about something, all one has to do is type a question into a search engine such as Google. There are usually millions of results, and in all likelihood, we will find the answer to the question we are looking for. All that is necessary is a person somewhere on Earth that knows the answer and has decided to share it.

No generation has ever had this much information and the ability to communicate with individuals around the world as those alive today. If there is any truth to the saying that knowledge is power, then this, not nuclear bombs or genetic engineering, makes us the most powerful.

China now has the largest number of people using the internet in the world. It is followed by India, the United States and Indonesia. It is estimated that almost half of the Chinese population uses the internet, with usage growth having spiked by over 30 fold since the end of 2000, according to Internet World Stats.

Ethiopia has 16.4 million users with a penetration rate of about 15pc. It is a far cry from Kenya, which is estimated to have close to three times as many internet users.

The technology has barely defused, and the small population that makes use of it is not being afforded the full opportunity.

There are various uses of the internet, including networking and research. Nonetheless, in Ethiopia, there seems to be a proclivity to put it to use mostly for the sake of entertainment.

This is perhaps because outreach on the internet by government and private bodies, civil societies or universities is not as widespread. Such websites are usually unattractive, slow and seldom encouraged for use.

But social media has made a splash on the internet. It is widely available and marketed through word of mouth. It has become one of the primary sources of information, and with no one willing to take responsibility for the content produced there, least of all the owners of the social media platforms, misinformation and fake news have been rampant.

Alas, the internet is being judged and condemned for the ills of social media. Some governments, including our own, have been skeptical of it from the beginning, which is why it never diffused as much. There is just one telecom provider in the country, whose services are often slow, badly marketed and remained expensive until recently.

To boot, internet blackouts have occurred just to cover the eyes of the people from social media. This problem has persisted even with the current reformist administration led by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed (PhD).

Free access to the internet has become equated with freedom of speech. But our belief in this fact has also been tested as social media has had the an unanticpated power to spread falsehoods and hateful comments rather than facts and sober reflections.

Restricting certain sites and enforcing parental controls should indeed be considered to safeguard the development of internet usage. Regulating the internet has been criticised by those that advocate freedom on the internet – since regulators can have their own bias – but responsive and responsible cyber laws should not be disregarded out of hand.

We should have known from the beginning that a technology that connects people on this scale and magnitude cannot come without some flaws. For those that know how to use it, it could be the greatest source of positive power, or an immensely distractive influence for those who do not. It is akin to nuclear energy. We can either use it to generate awesome power, or like the atomic bomb, allow it to wipe us out.

The internet is a step forward in our technological advancement. We have only seen the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the benefits it can provide. It is just that each one of us have to be more responsible in how we use it.

 


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