We are moving from the model of a network to a cloud of connectivity. We have a wide range access to the Internet vs 10 years ago.
There are now 2 billion subscribers around the world. Personal devices now look more like computers. For the purpose of communicating they are not the only tools though, things like RFID, hubs, can store, transmit and carry information. Connectivity is no longer localized. It becomes personal and environmental. In terms of other tools available, in other fields, machinery used to be heavy, hierarchical, and difficult, we now have these tools available everywhere and are lighter, faster, more available.
This has changed the nature of who we are. We become witnesses (eg of amateur photos taken on Sept 11th., tsunami pictures, London bombings (a cell phone picture won Picture of the Year award and was published in the NY Times) , pictures taken of a famous person who was kissing his mistress, (the picture was taken by a child in the airport).
Individuals become co-creators, and join knowledge and forces regardless of location (Wikipedia, flickr, del.icio.us). This means that the world of bits, atoms, are coming together and merging with technologies and time. (Gives the example of websites that we find when we google him) There is content out there that is uncontrollable and some that we have control over. There are therefore multiple personas that are created about someone, reflecting different points of view.
Gives the example of Socialight, world of Warcraft, and Second Life. Lost for example is designed as a video game although it is a tv series. There is the creation of a virtual space that makes people react and try to figure out and decrypt.
In the digital decade, the 2 things that were difficult to digitize, : voice and video are now possible. The global phenomenon of the internet is really expanding more than what was thought possible.
Maybe we should rethink Maslwos’s hierarchy of needs:
Internet/mobile > Shelter > Food water
eg. Of the Hebdo Bondy Blog where some Lausanne journalists are writing in total freedom about the post-riot situations in Bondy a susburb of Paris. This is getting a lot of press from all other media. This freedom changed the shift in thinking about journalism and what journalists can write about. They will be giving training to 2 young people from Bondy and allow them to take control over the blog afterwards.
http://giussani.typepad.com/loip/