Information society is our future

Mankind for the long history of itsexistence survived many stages of development, from the primitive community to the era of "developed capitalism." Modern society is entering a new era - the era of developed information technologies.

The term "information society" appearedrelatively recently, only in the middle of the 20th century. The information society is a historical phase of the development of society and the economy, where the main role in the life of people is played by information technologies:

• swiftly the production of information products is developing;
• a single information space is created - the Internet, the telephone, the media become an indispensable part of human life;
• the achievements of scientific and technical progress are firmly included in the sphere of government.

The very image of human thinking will change, people will strive to acquire not material, but spiritual values.

However, the future information society is not only good, there are also negative sides:

• people in the information society will no longer play a decisive role, because the main work will be performed by automated systems;
• Virtual reality can become so plausible that many will prefer it to our material world;
• Information society is an era of total control over every citizen. Due to the exhaustive information stored in extensive databases, it will be very easy to manage people.

In the period of the birth of human civilizationknowledge was acquired only on the basis of life experience and, as a rule, did not reach the descendants in the form in which they were originally given. In order to make individual experience collet, special tools were required. The invention of the first of these became a real information revolution, which initiated the qualitative transition of a man from a semi-animal state to a reasonable one. Scientists distinguish the following stages in the development of the information society:

1. The appearance of writing. Now people could transfer their knowledge and skills to their descendants, this was the first impetus to a scientific and technical breakthrough.
2. The invention of printing. The Renaissance is famous for its artists,sculptors, scientists and philosophers. However, the most valuable invention belongs to John Gutenberg. With the development of printing, the general public gained access to the knowledge that was previously known only to the initiated.
3. Invention of electricity. Without electricity, such first means of transmitting information as radio and telegraph would be impossible.
4. The invention of computers. The beginning of the fourth wave of information revolutionbecame the invention in the 40s of the last century of the first electronic computers. Their gradual improvement led to the creation of microprocessors, and then PC personal computers.

As analysts say, the information society is already a given. Many developed countries are already entering the stage of large-scale computerization of all spheres of human life.