Technology is one of the most present forces in our lives today. There is technology in nearly everything that we use in our daily lives. It helps us save time, enhances certain needs, and creates an easier path to complete tasks. Without technology, there are goals that would be harder for us to achieve, especially because we have become so dependent on technology to help us. It’s hard to imagine our lives without technology because it is everywhere and sometimes we don’t even realize it. We use it when we listen to music or flush the toilet or even wear glasses. It’s unbelievable how different out life would be without all these advancements and devices.
Growing up, technology played a huge role in my life. I grew up in the age of Gameboy’s and Playstation’s and the start of the internet. I was regularly using different forms of technology, whether I was talking on our landline phone or riding my bike, technology was always a part of who I was. If I had to chose one piece of technology in my childhood that had the most impact on me, it would be the computer. My neighbors and brothers and I used to be obsessed with computer games. There was one game we owned where you could create your own amusement park and build roller coasters and create what was to be your dream park, and we used to play this game for hours nonstop. From choosing our own color schemes, build water rides, and expensive food courts, this game was our excuse to build a new world. It was one of the first steps towards becoming in touch with our creative sides and being able to expand our minds to new, sometimes pixelated, levels. Without the computer, this game would not have been able to take such an influential role on my childhood.
The computer still holds an impact over me today, however, if I could choose one technology with the highest significance to me currently, I would confidently pick my iPod. Music is one of my many passions and I am steadily listening to music, playing music, and discovering new music. My iPod is my best friend and I bring it everywhere with me at all times. It’s a device that brings me joy and comfort and I don’t think I could do without it.
I embrace my iPod and the computer and I support lots of technological gadgets, but there are always fallbacks to having an overload of things. For example, the smartphone. It’s a great advancement to our everyday lives, business workers, and designers, but when it comes down to it, is the smartphone truly a beneficial source of technology? Although it helps us check the weather instantly to see how to dress or to bring an umbrella, or shows us the latest news within seconds, the smartphone prevents us from a lot too. It’s creating a world where we don’t have any more social, face to face, interactions. We can purchase things from our beds online almost instantaneously. We can shoot a quick text to our friends about the latest celebrity gossip. But it always is drawing us back from speaking and interacting with one another. Too often we see groups of friends together, quiet, and hypnotized in their smartphones. It’s drawing us away from actually going out with our friends and family and genuinely having a great, carefree time.
When I go out with my friends, I am guilty of this too, but I usually try and leave all my worries behind me and spend time in the moment without checking my phone every two minutes. It seems like we are programmed to be so absorbed into our phones nowadays. The technology was not like this years ago.
I interviewed my mom about how technology impacted her as a child. She told me over and over how she didn’t have these phones like we do now and that in order to reach someone, you would call their home landline phone. She described that she would call up her friends, plan to meet somewhere, and trust that the friend on the other end of the line would actually show up because there was no way to get in touch once they were not at home. My mom also talked about how she listen to lots of music as a child. She would regularly have the radio on, listening to music as she went through the day. Another thing she empathized was how she would need to walk to her local library in order to find out information. “I had to find books, read the books, and then figure it out on my own,” she told me. There were no computers or smartphones right at their sides to find out facts or information right away.
My grandmother said different things. During the interview, she told me stories about how she used to live on a farm and didn’t really have time to mess around with the different technology present. She used her radio, but that was pretty much it. My grandmother moved around a lot in the United States because her father was a pastor who had job travelled around frequently. She honestly couldn’t explain to much about the impact of technology in her childhood besides the radio, the telephone, and the early TV. Mainly she was spending her time outside, at school, with her family, and friends.
My last interview was with my friend, Maya, who experienced a similar experience with technology as I’ve gone through. She grew up in the 90’s and told me that the majority of technology included the telephone and TV. Growing up, she was right in the upcoming of new devices and electronics. Her favorite, she said, was her Walkman MP3 player. In order for the Walkman to play music, you would have to insert the CD inside and press play and blindly know the setlist, unless you were looking at the back of the plastic CD case. The Walkman had the most impact over her and I knew right away because her face lit up as soon as she started talking about it.
I learned a lot through the interviews I held. It became obvious to me just how much technology has changed throughout the decades. I feel like as time has gone on, we became more and more dependent and involved with the technology around us. Technology is advancing at extreme rates and before we know it, we may be flying around in our cars traveling to the moon. It’s scary to look back and see how fast we grew into this futuristic world. Who knows where we are headed next?
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