Week 3 Commentary: Communication Infrastructure

Nguyên Nguyễn
Sep 7, 2018 · 3 min read

Student ID: 102237305

Name: Tran Khoi Nguyen Nguyen

It is stated by Jyoti Choudrie and Catherine Middleton that developed information and communication technologies have reshaped the digital world in a much more advanced level (Choudrie & Middleton 2013, pp.1). Nowadays, our daily lives seem to be dependent on how effectively we get information through digital access. Thus, broadband has become a vital part as the main gate leading us to various resources of information online. With that being said, having knowledge to utilize these modern world broadband infrastructure can be considered as necessary. According to a study by Nansen, Wilken, Arnold and Gibbs, the notion, or the metaphor of “digital literacy” is the combination of having three following skill-sets: instrumental skills, semantic skills and social skills (Nansen et al. 2012, pp.65). The qualitative method that Nansen, Wilken, Arnold and Gibbs used to conduct this study included interviews, “technology tours” and “domestic probe” pack to fifteen participant households in North Hobart and Midway Point, Tasmania, when National Broadband Network (NBN) offered them trial services (Nansen et al. 2012, pp.67). Nansen, Wilken, Arnold and Gibbs argued that instrumental literacy has its limits, where most of the participants make use of High-speed Broadband and the NBN similarly to when traditional technological platform took place (shopping online, checking emails…) (Nansen et al. 2012, pp.68). However, the NBN is expected to only give faster and more reliably connection rather than act as a world-changing technology (Nansen et al. 2012, pp.68). Even though high-speed broadband access was given, but the incoherence in its connection signal is one of the main reasons that makes it illegible to the users. The informants in the authors’ study find it difficult to use NBN wireless connection, claiming that its signal would get weaker when they move far out of the Internet router (Nansen et al. 2012, pp. 69). This creates barriers and conflicts between providing a high-speed connection but limiting the flexibility to get that access.

Applying these arguments to Nardi and O’Day ideas, where information ecology relies mostly on technologies’ roles to contribute and affect human activities (Nardi & O’Day 1999, pp.49). With that being emphasized, digital literacy is not solely dependent on how effectively human can make use of the broadband high-speed connection, but is also up to the way technologies provide its access which can possibly eliminate at most obstacles for internet users. Information ecologies kind of have the same way of working with biological ecology, where human, and technologies that bring information, knowledge and services (phone, computer,), co-exist to guarantee the society functions at its best. Nardi and O’Day also stated that in an ecology, any effects that cause to an element need to be adopted by the rest of the system in order to guarantee best result for growth (Nardi & O’Day 1999, pp. 51). Therefore, communication infrastructure would work at its best when people understand digital information with a higher level than instrumental skills, and the digital platforms able to minimize its limitations simultaneously.

REFERENCES

Choudrie, J & Middleton, C 2013, ‘Management of Broadband Technology and Innovation: Policy’ , De Taylor and Francis, Hoboken.

Nansen, B, Wilken, R, Arnold, M & Gibbs, M 2012, ‘Digital Literacies and the National Broadband Network: Competency, Legibility and Context’, Media International Australia

Nardi, B & O’Day, V 1999, ‘Information Ecologies: Using Technology with Heart’, MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass.