Abstract

This paper reconnoiters the fundamental factors which contributed to the development of the Internet, the World Wide Web and social media.

The first part of the paper portrays, growth of the Internet and the World Wide Web and analyses how the Internet and the World Wide Web is used in conjunction. It also describes the vital personalities behind the modern internet and their inventions that made this revolutionary communications tool promising. Furthermore, it describes how professional communications have evolved from written form to electronic form.

The second part of the paper emphasis on social media, how its usage has emerged as a daily necessity in today’s world and how it is being effectively used by individuals, professionals and organizations across globe. The paper also throws light on advantages and disadvantages of using social media on day to day basis.

ADVANCEMENT OF THE INTERNET AND THE WORLD WIDE WEB

The Internet today, has revolutionized the computer, communications and related infrastructure like never before. The internet merely means an electronic communications network and organizational computer amenities where users at any one computer can, if they have authorization, receive information from any other computer and interchange all kinds of information and not limited to text, graphics, voice, video, programs etc.

There are many factors which has led to the development of Internet and as per the book Funding a Revolution (1999) released by National Academies Press, before 1970, individual researchers established the underlying technologies, comprising queuing theory, packet switching, and routing. Through the 1970s, experimental networks, particularly the ARPANET, were built. In 1980s, networks were widely deployed, originally to support scientific research. In the early 1990s, the invention of the Web made it much easier for users to publish and access information. Not to mention, most of these projects were Government funded.

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In March 1989, a notable research at CERN (CERN was originally named after its founding body the “Conseil European pour la Recherche Nucleaire” and is now called European Laboratory for Particle Physics”) led to the invention of World Wide Web. “CERN” is a meeting place for physicists from all over the world who collaborate on complex physics, engineering and information handling projects. Thus the necessity for Web system arose and in 1989 Sir Tim Berners-Lee a British computer scientist invented the World Wide Web (WWW).

By October 1990, Tim came up with three fundamental technologies that continue to remain the foundation of today’s web:

HTML: Hypertext Markup Language. The markup (formatting) language for the web.

URI: Uniform Resource Identifier. A kind of “address” that is unique and used to identify to each resource on the web. It is also commonly called a URL.

HTTP: Hypertext Transfer Protocol. Allows for the retrieval of linked resources from across the web.

Although Internet and WWW are two different concepts technically, today they are used in conjunction. Simply because, most of us use internet to access websites in order to retrieve or share the information on day to day basis and this routine activity has led the layman to interchangeably use the concept Internet and WWW

Many personalities have played a vital role in the development of Internet and the WWW. To list a few; in 1968 the mother of all demos takes place at the Convention Center in San Francisco by Douglas Engelbart and his team.

In 1969, Paul Baran under the direction of the U.S. Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) pioneered the first connection of a packet-switching network between Stanford and UCLA. This paved the way for establishment of ARPANET which is the precursor for Internet today.

In 1971, Ray Tomlinson programmed the first email on the ARPANET system.

In 1975, John Vittal developed a first modern email client called MSG and this led to the transformation of highly user friendly email tool today.

In 1982, Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and Internet Protocol (IP) a suite of protocols was designed by Robert Kahn and Vint Cerf. TCP/IP continues to be the language of the Internet.

In 1989, Tim Berners-Lee writes a proposal that will eventually lead to the World Wide Web.

What fascinates here is that all of these prominent developers wanted to connect people across the globe virtually, by sharing and retrieving the information in a matter of seconds. Today, accessibility and collaboration via Internet and the WWW has bought the world much closer to humanity.

Transition of Professional Communication

Today, the professional communication has totally transitioned from written form to the electronic form and thanks to global digitization and its scalability. Currently, most of the organizations across globe are using emails, e-forms, power-point tools, project management tools, online chat, teleconferencing, web conferencing, video conferencing etc to communicate professional documents like reports, proposals, memorandums, progress/interim reports etc. There are many reasons why professional communication has transitioned from written form to the electronic form, this is mainly because, to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of the communication, reduce overhead costs ( printing paper, travel costs)  instant communication and  likewise. This is the very reason, why majority of professional organizations and government bodies have moved from written communication to e forms. For instance, online forms, online registration, online complaints submission and likewise.

SOCIAL MEDIA IN TODAY’S WORLD, ITS ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES

In today’s world of digitization, social media plays a very important role as an online platform, connecting people across the globe in order to share their specific interests, create and spread information and fortunately or unfortunately social networking has become a necessary daily activity.

There are many popular social media tools today like, Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Snapchat, Instagram, Pinterest etc.

Facebook: Facebook was founded in 2004 to provide people a platform and power to build the community, connect individuals, professional organizations and communities to discuss about specific current affairs (socio-economic, political etc.) share and express information on the same lines. Facebook provides features where users above 13 years of age can register themselves with an active email id and add friends, send messages, update their status, profile pics, cover photos and all these activities will be instantly published on their friends Facebook feed.

As per that data published by Facebook, it has 1.47 billion daily active users as on June 2018 and 2.23 billion monthly active users.

There are many advantages of Facebook, where individuals can create their own Facebook page and share their interests in a streamlined manner. For instance, many international athletes, actors, multinational company CEOs etc. have their own Facebook page and they constantly engage with their followers by writing or sharing articles, and posting videos related to health, acting workshops, lifestyle, work life balance and so on.

Organizations like Walmart, IBM, Target etc., manage their own Facebook page, where they share product deals, upcoming projects, new product release, organizational announcement, career opportunities and so on. Interested individuals can follow their page and get notified whenever a post is published on the page. This in turn increases their global image and branding across the globe.

Apart from above, today, we can sell and buy items on Facebook market place, send money to our friends and relatives, promote business, impart education via videos and share articles, raise a fund for people in need, update your blood group ( so that people in need can contact you in case of emergencies) and so on.

Today Facebook comes in different languages and with the use of language translator you can talk to anyone in any part of the part without facing language barrier.

When it comes to disadvantages, social media is not an exception. There are many disadvantages of social media and the latest one is Facebook security breach, where attackers exploited a feature in Facebook’s code to gain access to user accounts and potentially take control of them.

Also, there are wide-ranging disadvantages of social media like, lack bullying, stalkers, identity theft, spam and advertising, addiction, pornography, exploitation, depression, social isolation , antisocial behavior and likewise.

Considering all the aspects of advantages and disadvantages, we need to create a social media where lot of scrutiny and restrictions should be placed not only when it comes to registering the account and spreading information but also on how the social media platform is built. There should be no room for identity theft by hackers, nor individuals and organizations spreading racism, hate speech and false messages. In case of any vulnerabilities notified on the Facebook or any social media page, a system should be capable auto deleting the page or suspending account of users and informing the law enforcement officials wherever necessary.

Conclusions

Both Internet and the World Wide Web are invaluable gift by our scientists to the modern society. The advancement in engineering and sciences wouldn’t have fared so well today, without the Internet and the World Wide Web. As of 2018 the number of Internet users worldwide is 4.021 billion, up 7 percent year-on-year. This reflects the way Internet and World Wide Web has become seemingly important to individuals, professionals and organizations across globe. The raise in technology has also led to the transition of professional communication from written form to electronic form like, emails, WebEx conference and likewise.

On the other hand, the raise of social media platform has bought people closer like never before. Today, individuals, professionals  and organizations are using social media platform on day to day basis, be it connecting with friends or followers, sharing information or promoting their business or brands. Although there are many advantages of social media, the disadvantages are no less, one should,  be it an individual, professional or organization should always use social media in a responsible manner and for the benefit of the society. We should not discard our social obligation while using social media, after all the Internet, the WWW and social media are created to benefit our society.

 References