Cyberspace and Internet: Blessing or Curse to the Human Civilization in the Long Run

One of the biggest inventions in terms of connecting people was initially formulated by the great Alexander Graham Bell, who had invented the telephone. The astonishing feel of being able to talk to a person who was settled miles away was an entirely different experience in the 19th-century world. Another landmark discovery of the 19th century, the telegraph, by Samuel Morse, was a radical discovery too, as it allowed sending messages quite simply and quickly, and proved immensely useful in the initial stages of globalization. With the advent of the 20th century, alternatives were being hunted for, and finally came the mobile phone. The human advancement saw a tremendous boost to its efforts to connect with each other through these remnant inventions. But probably the best and possibly the most revolutionary among all the discoveries were still to come. Then aroused Tim Berners Lee and along with him the internet in the mid 1990. The entire world has not looked back ever since, and now a life without internet is seldom compared to a life of a primitive and obscurity. The words ‘internet’ and ‘cyberspace’ are used in our everyday lexicon pretty casually today. The Internet is just an interconnected system of different computers, operating through a central server. Whereas cyberspace is the virtual space in which communication is built between different computer networks. Howsoever how easy their description might seem, their functioning and advantages have ranged from the most simplistic of tasks like sending a message to a friend, to the designing of complex websites giving us with literally any sort of information under the sun. The purposes and reach of the internet and cyberspace have different dimensions, social, economic, technological, and even political at times. Internet browsers such as Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox have granted us access to the vast, uncharted regions of the Internet like never before. Modern-day adolescent find themselves at ease in the cyberspace, it helps them examine the various

aspects of their character by facilitating social connections at the click of a button.

 Benefits

The advantages of cyberspace and the internet and its benefaction to human civilization as a whole have been tremendous. Whether it is carrying on any sort of commercial business, or whether it is about having passage to any form of fun or entertainment stuff, each and every activity in our everyday lives has become much easier. Trends such as social media networks have helped us connect with the globe like never before, with some even adopting them as alternative platforms for dissemination of data or knowledge, or for demanding improved transparency from their respective states.

Today, if you aspire to buy a thing or two, that desire has a much greater chance of being fulfilled regarding the fact that your product, even if placed far away from you, can reach you today within a day or two. Businesses and entrepreneurship ventures now no longer need an office to prove that they are actually working. Virtual offices are a brand-new reality. Video-conferencing is a reality today, where a formal meeting was regarded as mandatory even a couple of years ago.

Booking of train and airline tickets online and being able to pick your cab with the aid of online taxi aggregators are comparable to earth-shaking disturbances in the transport industry, which was seen as heading towards a slow death a few decades ago, in the face of tiring and exhaustive ways of trying to avail the different modes of transport. Even the social system of marriage has not been left untouched, as matrimonial websites have presented prospective grooms and brides with a wide variety of choices to choose from, without the attendant troubles of deliberate socialization.

Disadvantages

One can go on and on about the gains, as there is barely any area of human life where the internet and cyberspace have not been able to enter into. But, despite the abundant benefits that the virtual system has to serve to us, one should not take one’s awareness away from the lurking threats such large scale intrusive role of the internet and cyberspace. Many authorities around the world have been blamed for spying over their own residents through the use of the cyberspace. Trade regulation and business have become much more difficult and complex over the years because of the multiple levels of exercise that online business functions through, making it tough to pin liability on anyone's distinct person at times. Hacking and growing terrorist organizations are possibly the biggest evils that have come out of our disproportionate reliance on the internet and cyberspace. At the same time, the psychological and mental impact, as a result of undue reliance on the internet and cyberspace, has just begun to expose themselves, with children being the worst victims as a result of this. It is still too premature to completely comprehend and reveal the true contours of this vast unexplored space. But, the change that has been brought in our lives is both a blessing as well as a curse at the same time. Before the internet and cyberspace become another Frankenstein, we need to take some steps primarily. Updating legislations, keeping them in tune with the technological advancements, and building a proper regulatory framework for cyberspace, are just one of the many things that need to be centered upon today. At the same time, guarding the health, both physical and mental of our kids, through proper parenting and regulating their exposure to the internet, particularly towards sexually explicit material readily available today, is a much-needed measure.

Access to the internet is without a doubt one of the biggest blessings in the history of mankind. But even today, the poor and deprived across the globe have remained divested of its benefits. States across the planet have tried to address the issue through e-governance, which itself is proving to be a revolutionary concept, implying a virtual government for the future, with less dependence on physical transactions and interactions. Both internet and cyberspace have shaped up human civilization in a way that indicates continuous change and dynamism. Also, with the passage of time, for every advantage that we have discovered, a fairly harmful aspect has come to notice. It is time that we introspect on the true values that we need to supplement through the internet and cyberspace, as in the end, whatever the scientific or technological finding be, it depends upon us to shape it up subsequently. It is eventually we, the human beings who have to discover to balance the good in favor of the bad, because any loss in the basic nature of humanity through these inventions is nothing but a loss for the human progress as a whole.