Are We Using The Internet For Our Benefit?
Most young people do not really access the internet for information purposes; they access the internet for entertainment. This means that they are not looking for jobs or opportunities on the internet, they are looking for latest music, movies and access to social media. On social media, young people spend most time propagating ignorance, both directly and indirectly, aware and unaware seeking for acceptance and approval. Lets just say, the reality of young people in South Africa is so sad that they go to social media to escape it. So if we deliver courses online, we still have to find ways to attract young people to those courses or opportunities that will better their lives.
So, what we have in South Africa is a internet that propagates a ignorant lifestyle, it is not yet a internet that betters people’s lives through the sharing and access of positive information, and this is made possible by the South African internet users themselves, there is no evil cooperation behind this, but it is the ignorant user spreading the kind of information that she is interested in. The internet in essence is a number of people(users) connected to each other through the world wide web, if most of those people who are connected are a type of people who are interested in ignorant content, then the spaces(websites and social networks) which they meet at will be polluted by ignorant information and it will be hard to get the positive information to the users, because most of them are not interested in positive information. Most web applications and social networks use algorithms to control how people use their platforms and in most cases those algorithms prioritizes the information that has most interest than the one that does not, so ignorant information wins.
We still have to work off the internet to change the mindset of young people, if we want the internet to work for them, let us impart in them the mindset that will make them see that the internet can work for them, without that, we will take time to realize the improvement of lives through the internet. And I have to say that South Africa also wants to come up with solutions to its peoples problems without first on working on the biggest problem which is the mindset of its people. The apartheid regime has harmed the mindset of the South African, it made South Africans believe in employment, it made them doubt themselves and made them to fear taking risks, we have to fix this first and for most.
On finding ways to attract young people to the information aimed at bettering their lives, I will not give much of the solutions I have on this article, I have taken a decision not to give away my ideas for free. But we (as 2read.co.za) are going to partner with institutions and government to provide young people with information on our plartform that will have dynamic content that young people are interested in, this is just one of the many things that we are implementing to change the lives of young people and changing how they use the net in the long run. As I have said in one of my articles, changing the way South Africans use the internet is a process that requires patience and cutting edge strategy.
So, what we have in South Africa is a internet that propagates a ignorant lifestyle, it is not yet a internet that betters people’s lives through the sharing and access of positive information, and this is made possible by the South African internet users themselves, there is no evil cooperation behind this, but it is the ignorant user spreading the kind of information that she is interested in. The internet in essence is a number of people(users) connected to each other through the world wide web, if most of those people who are connected are a type of people who are interested in ignorant content, then the spaces(websites and social networks) which they meet at will be polluted by ignorant information and it will be hard to get the positive information to the users, because most of them are not interested in positive information. Most web applications and social networks use algorithms to control how people use their platforms and in most cases those algorithms prioritizes the information that has most interest than the one that does not, so ignorant information wins.
We still have to work off the internet to change the mindset of young people, if we want the internet to work for them, let us impart in them the mindset that will make them see that the internet can work for them, without that, we will take time to realize the improvement of lives through the internet. And I have to say that South Africa also wants to come up with solutions to its peoples problems without first on working on the biggest problem which is the mindset of its people. The apartheid regime has harmed the mindset of the South African, it made South Africans believe in employment, it made them doubt themselves and made them to fear taking risks, we have to fix this first and for most.
On finding ways to attract young people to the information aimed at bettering their lives, I will not give much of the solutions I have on this article, I have taken a decision not to give away my ideas for free. But we (as 2read.co.za) are going to partner with institutions and government to provide young people with information on our plartform that will have dynamic content that young people are interested in, this is just one of the many things that we are implementing to change the lives of young people and changing how they use the net in the long run. As I have said in one of my articles, changing the way South Africans use the internet is a process that requires patience and cutting edge strategy.
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