Employment and the environment
Technology can mean that certain roles in a company are no longer required. New jobs are created but it is uncertain whether ICT has created or reduced opportunities in the long term.
Advancements in technology have had a huge impact on the entertainment industry. The growing popularity of To copy a file from the internet onto your computer or device. and Data that is sent in pieces. Each piece is viewed as it arrives, eg a streaming video is watched as it downloads. content has affected the traditional A set of organisations that are involved in the production of a finished product., ie the process of getting a product made and into the hands of a consumer.
- Fewer Basic material that goods are made from such as crops, metals, wood and animal products such as wool and leather. are required as the demand for physical media is reduced.
- Factories that produced and packaged books, magazines, A plastic, circular disc used to store up to 700 MB of music, video or data. CDs are optical storage media, similar to DVDs and Blu-ray discs. and A plastic, circular disc used to store music, video or data. DVDs are optical storage media, similar to CDs and Blu-ray discs..
- Packaging companies see a drop in orders.
- Delivery companies have less to deliver.
- Warehouses aren’t as full as they once were and stock management is less of a concern.
- High-street stores struggle to compete with the prices and the convenience of shopping online.
All of the above leads to fewer employees and therefore people could lose their jobs. But new jobs that require different skills have taken their place, for example:
- Somebody responsible for the technical creation of a piece of work, rather than the layout and structure. and Somebody responsible for planning the layout or structure of a piece of work, eg a poster, a website or a computer game. have to build the online store or website
- the A computer that holds data to be shared with other computers. A web server stores and shares websites. that the website runs on needs to be built and supplied
- the content needs adding to the server
- all of the information about a song, album or movie must be entered into the website’s database
- the server and website must be maintained
All of these jobs require an employee to have advanced IT skills. This is true of many jobs today in the Technology industry and many employees undergo extensive retraining to enable them to remain in work.
The environment
ICT can benefit the environment, for example it has given people the option to work from home, reducing the need to travel into work. However, it can have a negative impact. Disposing of old equipment is a particular problem. One of the answers is Reusing materials or reprocessing waste materials to produce new materials. and the law states that companies must recycle their old equipment.
It’s important to wipe any sensitive or personal information from a computer before disposing of it. There are companies that provide this service.
