NETWORKING: STAYING CONNECTED (Original)
by Samuel Chua
CLARA
CHUA, 20, 2nd Year Student, NTU
This sweet and demure computer engineering student from NTU is full
of confidence in handling the basic functions required of her in her
daily computing. She
counts email and ICQ as essential tools to communication between her
and her classmates at NTU. As
a sectional leader in the varsity’s Chinese Orchestra Suona Section,
she makes it a point to keep herself informed about the activities
through email, ICQ and the NTU website.
Her hobbies include listening to FM93.3 as well as reading.
She frequents Sim Lim Square and Funan Centre to keep herself
updated about the current technologies in computer and its
peripherals.
She began to use the Internet for surfing more than 5 years ago,
when Internet was not all that common yet.
She has progressed from a 14.4K modem to her current arsenal of
56K modem. But she is not
all that fazed about broadband access as yet.
“56K
is more than enough for me currently since I spend too little time on
the net to justify a broadband access.
I only utilize the net for surfing, email and ICQ purposes. But even then, these are for my ease of communication to plan
out offline activities such as my ECA.
I do sometimes use it to help out in my research for school
work.”
“But
I may get the broadband access when it gets more affordable. I must also have the time to do all the activities like
downloading of music and videos. “
Net Relationships
“Relationships
spurning from net friends have not become a reality yet.
Maybe I am too conservative or the right guy has not come to
impress me out of my shell. Don’t
really think it is a great idea because I have not seen much success
cases. But who knows what
the future may hold?”
“That
aside, net friends do provide an alternative to real life friends.
They come with this veil of anonymity that coupled with the
unexpectedness of the friendship. You never really know that this friend may be just living
next to your house! It is
also a great way to get to know pen pals.
ICQ provides instant communication and this is a very good
incentive in this time when time is of utmost importance.”
“I
do not have any pleasant experience to share for the time being but I
get plenty of unwanted experience.
I don’t understand why people will find it so entertaining to
send URL links to pornography sites to me.
And to top it off, they are strangers!!!
It kind of irritates you enough that you wished you hadn’t
used ICQ. But the
benefits of instant communication is too good to resist.”
Net Developments
“I
can’t really predict upcoming trends and developments in Internet
but I do hope and see that broadband access will be a more common
choice as their prices are going down.
The competition induced by the opening up of the industry will
definitely make this a buyer market just like what market
liberalization had done for the mobile telecommunications industry.
So, I will not be surprised that at least 90% of the homes in
Singapore will be wired up to broadband.
Since it boasts of a faster data exchange rate and it can
accomplish a similar task in a shorter time, I think it will be fully
adopted as a standard in commercial and industrial applications.”
“I think it is hard to find people that will be least affected by
the Internet but I’ll place my bets on those who have little access
to the Net. Simply
because it is too addictive that a warning label should come with all
Internet packages. But I
will have no qualms about nominating people working in IT line and/or
has jobs dealing in instant or global communications as they will come
in touch with internet almost daily.”
There we have it, the views from an NTU full-time
student on Internet. Next
session on the “Computer Chair”, we will have an IT worker
subjected to our interrogation. Till
then, do keep a lookout. You
may be the next to sit in.
Published Version: Not Available Yet.