Cyber Culture

The Internet / Cyber world - Few technologies in human history rival the Internet in its speed of adoption and range of impact. The Internet's spread has been compared to the advent of the printing press, which, like the Internet, greatly enhanced the availability of information and the rate of its reproduction.

Many have commented on the Internet's ability to transform business and the broader economy, but perhaps an equally profound change is being felt throughout society and culture, where the Internet and the World Wide Web are transforming how people live and interact.

The Internet's influence generates a range of reactions from different people, ranging from idealism to cynicism, but however it is received, there's no denying that it has led to dramatic shifts in such areas as interpersonal interaction, work culture, relations to time, expectations of speed and convenience, networking between individuals and groups, and even use of language.

The word "cyberculture" is used in a variety of ways, often referring to certain cultural products and practices born of computer and Internet technologies, but also to specific subcultures that champion computer-related hobbies, art, and language.

In the 1970s, cyberculture was the exclusive domain of a handful of technology experts, including mathematicians, computer scientists, digital enthusiasts, and academics, devoted to exchanging and promoting ideas related to the growing fields of computers and electronics. These early cybercultures sometimes advanced a view of the future guided by the progressive and beneficial hand of technological change.

But following the commercialization of the Internet and the World Wide Web in the mid-1990s, cyberculture took on a new life, and computer and information technologies took the dynamics of culture and social relations in dramatically new directions.

The Internet touches many parts of life in advanced industrial societies. Everything from shopping, paying bills, and playing the stock market to news gathering, family interaction, romantic courtships, and play all take place in cyberspace, whereas before the mid-1990s all these activities existed more commonly in the physical world.

The Internet profoundly influences what and how children learn, the vocabulary employed in daily conversation, the way people coordinate their schedules and work habits, and perceptions of distance and time.

 

Ref: https://www.encyclopedia.com/economics/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/cyberculture-society-culture-and-internet