Weekly Topics - Week 4: Challenges of the Global Information Society - A review

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This week’s topic it the report from Pekka Himanen “Challenges of the Global Information Society” from 2004. In this report, Himanen makes predictions for the future in regard to the business world and social developments. I am going to talk about some interesting aspects in that report and discuss, whether some of his predictions became true or not.

Right at the start the authors identifies some global trends, that he thinks will definitely continue (or even get bigger) in the next few years (page 2). Some of these assumptions were spot on, for example the global division of labor. He says that routine productions will move to China and India. The most developed countries won’t rely on routine jobs anymore and will dive more in the creative fields.

“The most developed countries cannot rely on routine jobs in the future, so they must specialize in creative work that is based on higher expertise and work to improve productivity both through increased added value and the development of production processes.”

 

I think it’s hard to neglect this statement. We all experience, that many (cheap) productions are made in China and that China is also on an economical rise. The point 3 “Population aging” became true, too. He states that there will be a shift in the countries from “society of young” to “society of pensioners”. Not only is the average lifespan of humans growing each year, but the general population age is also getting older (at least in the developed countries). The point 6 “The rise of cultural industries” is talking about the ongoing digitalization of content. We see this today in all the streaming services. Nowadays, you just stream a movie or a show on Netflix. Going to the video library is no longer necessary. The same thing applies to music streaming. Buying CDs or vinyl records may be something for people, who enjoy collecting them. But most people just stream their music on Spotify, Apple Music, etc. A very interesting point is also number 7 “The rise of bio-industries”. The author predicts a rise of bio-industries in the next few years and says, that this industry will be increased by the population aging. We can clearly see that bio-industries play a very important role nowadays. Especially in the pandemic we see that companies like BioNTech or Moderna have risen to success very quick. Another interesting prediction, especially while being in a pandemic, is the rise of working from home (page 18).

"Although information work is physically not as strenuous as traditional industrial work, it stresses in another way, through static working positions (increased teleworking from home has made it necessary to pay attention to work ergonomics also at home, not just in the workplace).”


This quote is spot on. With all the working from home, we face a new challenge, which is to separate the free time from work. It strongly increases the risk for burnouts if the separation fails. He goes on and says, that “The situation is further aggravated by people’s increasing habit of spending their free time in the static virtual world (computer, TV, virtual games, etc.). “  This statement is also true today. We see it for example with the earlier mentioned streaming services.

 

In conclusion: The author got many predictions precisely. I think he had a good sense for the future technologies and social developments.

 

 

 

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