The advantages and disadvantages of the Social, Economic, Legal and Moral effects of ICT

On chat rooms there are often people who would tae advantage of a child if they had the chance. Also when they use the 'text' language their English is suffering as they most commonly misspell the words they don't know in the first place so as a consequence their vocabulary is being limited to simple easy to spell words.

However the parents of these 'computer junkies' often present the argument that when their child is on the computer they are not on the streets causing trouble. However it has been proven that often the source of the teenagers aggression Is the computer so surely removing the computer will remove a source of violence.

Another argument against the use of IT in modern day society is that often when children et home the first thing they do is go and turn on the computer. As a result they fail do do their homework, and then their education suffers.

A solution suggested to the problem posed by teenagers spending too much time on computers was to restrict teenagers and only allow them on computers for a certain amount of time each day. However there are several flaws in this idea.

. How would the teenagers be monitored? And how would they then be blocked after their time limit had expired?

2. How do you tell the difference between a child on the computer and an adult doing work?

3. Many adults may not support this idea so why should this only apply to the adults who do support it?

However there are times when computer have benefited society. For example with the internet families on other sides of the globe can easily stay in contact without paying a fortune in telephone bills.

Old people who are confined to their homes with illnesses can stay in contact with family and friends.

Also with extensive networking international criminals are easier to catch with international security forces working together.

The Economic effects

The introduction of computers and the internet has greatly helped the economy as now it is possible to keep track of changes going on in the world simultaneously, it is easier to transfer money, business transactions can be conducted from other sides of the globe.

The only disadvantages of using IT in the economy is that computers are dependant on electricity so when power cuts occur there can be serious repercussions. Also if a virus infects those computers then in theory the whole system could be brought to a standstill.

Overall the introduction of IT greatly helped the economic side of things.

The legal effects

When the criminal database was set up it became easier to link crimes and catch and convict criminals. Also it became easier to get files on the criminals as they were all easily accessed on a huge database.

However crimes committed on the internet quickly became popular. Hacking, virus creation, fraud, abuse etc all became easier on the internet as it was hard to trace and catch criminals.

So IT has improved the catching of criminals but has opened up more opprertunities for criminals to exploit.

The Moral effects

There are many opposing arguments regarding moral issues concerning computers.

One of the key issues lies in employment. Is it right to give a human's job to a computer? As the computer industry advances so the number of jobs a computer can handle. In manufacturing computers do more of the work than humans. So is it right to make humans unemployed just so the company can produce more?

However if the computer can do it more efficiently shouldn't the computer do it?

This is one of the cyclic arguments regarding the use of IT

In conclusion I have decided that out of the four main sectors of arguments two have been badly affected by IT, one hasn't really been affected, and one has been greatly improved.

All in all I feel that although there are many issues surrounding the use of IT, I feel it has improved the human way of life and should continue to do so.