When we speak of digital, we are referring to everything that is represented by numbers, which is contrasted with what is analog, that is, operating by analogy through analogous references that resemble what happens in reality. An example may better clarify this distinction.
A watch with hands is called analog; the hands can occupy any point on the circumference of the dial, and the points are virtually infinite; in contrast, a digital watch has a screen on which the digits that make up the hour appear, and the combinations are by no means infinite (there are as many as 86,400, however).
What is the digital revolution?
The digital revolution, or information technology revolution, refers to that period, beginning in the 1950s in industrialized countries, which saw the transition from mechanical and analog technology to digital technology.
As mentioned at the beginning of this section, we can also refer to the digital revolution by the expression information technology revolution, where the word revolution is not used casually, or lightly, but is used to express the impact of the colossal social changes wrought by information and communication technologies(ICTs). Smartphones, the World Wide Web (the famous “www” to be entered before sites) have radically changed the daily lives of everyone living in an advanced country, increasing the channels of information and communication and ushering in the information age. The technologies that most are changing our daily lives are essentially four:
- Mobile devices: smartphones, multifunctional devices, allow us to reach information and communicate in a small amount of time.
- Cloud computing: offers the ability to store information in a non-physical space, allowing us to retrieve it at any time.
- Internet of Things: constitutes convergence between the real and virtual worlds, connecting physical, everyday objects to the network. Alarm clocks that ring earlier in case of traffic, medicine jars that alert when we forget to take our medication.
The digital revolution, created fertile ground on which the New Economy was then born.
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The birth of a New Economy
The development and spread of information and digital technologies have not only changed the lives of individual citizens, making communication and information faster and more efficient, but have also changed the functioning of society itself, giving rise to the New Economy.
In general, one can speak of a New Economy when the introduction and diffusion of innovative technologies, such as those that have developed in the past decade, bring about changes in the economic and social structure of a state, leading to growth in both productivity and wealth, with an accompanying transformation in the lifestyles of individuals-consumers.
The term New Economy comes from an essay by Kevin Kelly: in his essay “New Rules for a New Economy,” Kelly identifies cornerstones on which this new type of economy would be based, and he identifies therein not so much tangible goods but intangible goods, namely innovative ideas, information as a commodity, and software. The New Economy and the technologies associated with the development of the Internet have had such an impact that companies need to be classified according to their use of the network:
- Old-Old: companies that did not use telematics products and did not change either internal or production processes because of the Internet.
- Old-New: products or target markets did not change with entry either in terms of opportunity or growth.
- New-Old: companies that were born through the Internet, but remaining to a traditional type of target market.
- New-New: companies that were born through the Internet and operated exclusively through computer networks.
Cultural impact of the digital revolution
Citizens, would you like a revolution without a revolution?
This was what Robespierre demanded of his fellow French citizens, and not unjustly, since every revolution brings with it a change, an upheaval, one might say, of current reality.
The digital revolution is certainly no exception; it has already changed our lives a great deal and will change them again. Over the years we have already adapted to many of the changes that the digital revolution has operated: we no longer watch our favorite programs on a thick television, but on a flat-screen one, and we no longer give taps when it doesn’t work (occasionally someone still tries), when we take our temperature we no longer see a column of mercury rising toward our temperature, we no longer wait days to receive a letter or communication, we no longer type, we no longer use maps to travel to a destination, in short, our lives are markedly different than they were just a few years ago.
It is not only our leisure time, which has been altered by theintroduction of these new technologies, but also sectors such as public administration, with the abandonment of paper forms resulting in the streamlining of bureaucratic paperwork, health care, with the development of health monitoring technologies, or even agriculture, thanks to the spread of technologies that can increase productivity.
The digital one appears, therefore, as a highly pervasive revolution that affects all aspects of our daily lives.
Can one live without digital technologies?
For many, the network and technology are a secondary good, not directly necessary for the well-being of the individual, while they consider goods such as electricity, without which one could not live, to be a priority. However, it is actually possible to survive without electricity, all one needs to do is stock up on candles. The point is that one would live isolated from society, especially in contexts where everyone makes use of new technologies. Pretending that technological innovation, in conclusion, does not exist does not make life impossible, but makes it worse.