Someone on BBC recently did an experiment (finding only two families who would participate) of people willing to give up their Modems for a week, in South Korea. For this article by John Sudworth, click here. While I don't have current statistics on Americans using the Internet, Sudworth wrote: " A recent survey showed that 68% of South Koreans get their news from the internet, compared with just 32% who still read newspapers."
I'm not in South Korea but I find I must use mine similarly. I rarely do shopping in a store; other than groceries, most shopping is online. I no longer look up information in books, I go online for dictionaries, definitions of phrases, translations for foreign words , tutorials on many subjects (often found on youtube.com by doing a subject search), checking medical information, description of prescription drugs, and the list goes on and on. If I am without a computer I feel like an amputee.
Remarkable is that I don't seem to have any more free time than people who don't bother with computers. After being with these people for a while I realized how information-challenged they are. I haven't subscribed to a newspaper in 10 years because I read newspapers from all over the world online. I could say that I did it to save trees but that is only a side benefit. I learn more and don't have all that paper to tie up for the trash pickups. Many foreign newspapers have an English version. I find the perspectives printed from other countries expands my thinking. Al Jazeera is very interesting to me. Note the list of continents or countries on the left hand side of the screen from which you can choose.
Now that postage stamps have gone up to 44 cents, it saves money to pay online. People think that paying shipping makes it more expensive to shop online but they don't realize that places like Amazon that don't have store front rents.can charge less, which defrays the shipping fee if you don't get free shipping for buying more than $25. Many forget that it costs money to drive, pay for parking in some cases, and there is more time spent to do shopping more than 5 miles from home. Additionally, certain services done on phone are now costing $5 per transaction (airline tickets, some utilities, etc) whereas, on line there is no charge.
However, while saving money is a boon, it is hardly the major reason for turning to a computer for many of the things we used to have to leave home to do. I may not live in South Korea but I'll bet I am one of the millions of Americans whose computers get just as much action. It really makes the old ad slogan 'let your fingers do the walking' have real meaning today, doesn't it?
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