Week 15
“Hello, India? I Need Help With My Math” Lohr, Steve
This article focuses on the outsourcing of education along with the outsourcing of corporate America. There are a few companies in India that are working on an online tutoring program that allows screen sharing and VOiP progams to assist students with homework and projects here in the states while the tutor is based in India. This program is a monthly fee, rather than a by hour fee. There are also other personal service industries popping up that schedule mundane tasks such as take out, hair appointments, doctor appointments, birthday reminders and the such to personal assistants that are oceans away.
Technology doesn’t isolate people: US Study, ChinaDaily
This short article focuses on the needs of adults in their social lives and if they were feeling more isolated and cut off from their networks than they did previous to things like cell phones and Facebook. The study has found that adults have actually increased their networks and contacts rather than shrinking them. They have been redefined, of course, to be handled in new ways, but the networks are still there and flourishing.
The first article is quite intriguing, but I am one of those people that hates calling any company that routes me to India because I have such a hard time understanding the accent along with the cultural nuances and other problems that come with dealing with a foreigner. My life is usually so crazy hectic that even having to concentrate that extra little bit on a task that I already don’t want to do, like straighten out a billing issue with my cell phone annoys me to no end.
In the second article, I would love to have a personal assistant, or a flat fee for a tutor for my kids. However, the personal assistant thing would never work for me because of privacy issues. I don’t want to hand over my life story of dates, password, credit cards, and addresses to someone in a different country that may or may not use it for nefarious purposes and I can’t even go after them because their sets of laws are different from my own.
Quote of the Week is also the title of the article, because it says it all!
"Hello, India? I need help with my math."
I can somewhat agree with the article’s report indicating, “Contrary to popular belief,
ReplyDeletethe Internet and mobile phones are not isolating people but enhancing their social world”.
If you look back only 4-5 years ago, people sent texts or emails, or talk over the phone to maintain or enhance their social networks. However, as technology has become more advanced, now there are much more options that people can choose such as, Twitter, Facebook, KaKao Talk, Skype, blogs, etc. Those technologies may encourage people create new social networks.