Jobs in the IT Industry

Advantages

Working with IT has many advantages, such as the easiness to create charts with Excel for business jobs and Word Processing documents for reports etc. Working in the IT industry is of the most common job roles on Earth and with the job roles come many advantages for both people and the companies. People are able to learn how to fix computers so computers actually have an extended life span.

Disadvantages

If a person spends many hours at their workplace on a computer, their person, social and family lives may suffer accordingly. Not every business in the world has access to computers which is a huge disadvantage, especially to a company with dedicated workers which would do extremely well otherwise. This can also affect companies who need a faster form of communication to these companies.

Threats

People working in the IT industry Jobs in the IT Industry are almost certainly very useful. But companies will employ people who create Viruses and forms of Spyware and Malware to destroy their rival’s systems.

Apple Inc. iPad

Advantages

As a computer, it features everything a normal PC has including personal folders and Internet accessibility. There are over 35,000 Applications available for the iPad from the Apple Inc. App Store, more than any other form of PC in the world. These can range from reading books, to teaching music, downloading images of X-Rays and charts for medical purposes and playing games. Its weight is between that of the average Tablet PC and a Laptop computer and because it is also an open-faced PC, combined with its light-weight and it is also the most portable computer system ever created. It also runs the same system as the iMac, used by the biggest media companies in the world for their work, meaning that the iPad will soon replace it giving these companies the freedom to work on the move.

Disadvantages

Although the size of the iPad is a good thing in most ways there is also the fact that if dropped from a certain height or enough times, it will break, very easily although there is now a case to go with the iPad that is designed to protect it from external damage. They are easy to hide in a thin space so they are easily stolen from out of an open bag or when it is sitting out in the open.

Threats

Due to the advantages of the iPad are the threats that they pose. As with my posts on social networking and instant messaging the iPad is obviously going to be very addictive to its users, which could lead to a degrading social life for iPaddicts.

Social Networking

Advantages

Much like emails, Social networking allows people to communicate through sending messages along with the ability to post pictures and web links on other people’s walls. These websites, again like emails, allow people to keep in contact with each other from long distances and cost absolutely nothing to join or use. Some of the social networking sites feature an instant messenger system allowing people to have a conversation in real time rather than sending full messages back and forth. Social networking sites are often not hard to get used to in terms of using them. When adding a person as a friend on Facebook the person you have added must confirm that they know you. Otherwise you cannot post anything on their wall.

Disadvantages

Although denying permission to be friends with someone you don’t know or want to communicate with is a huge advantage, the person still has the option to send you messages without consent; this is called spamming. people are easily addicted to Social networking sites and it can take up many hours of their lives leading to problems in their real social lives because there is no inscentive to meet with friends in person because they believe that talking to them online produces the same effects.

Threats

There is no guarantee that the person you’re talking to is who you think they are. If you are sure you are talking to a family member or very close friend, you could be very easily persuaded to freely give out personal details leading to serious complications. Cyber-Bullying is a huge problem with social networking sites and cannot be avoided easily.

Shopping Online

Advantages

You can shop anytime during the day or night, it never closes (24 hr service). People who have physical disabilities can be restricted from leaving the house without a carer and so shoppping online and this allows them to do their weekly shopping without any difficulties. There are also some bonuses to shopping online with certain shops such as Tesco and other large shopping chains that send you discount vouchers for shopping with them. Shopping online usually involves having the shopping delivered to your house which is also very helpful and saves you carrying all the shopping to your car and having to unload it all etc.

Disadvantages

Shopping Online does not have a restriction for people who are able to go out and do the weekly shop normally and so this is taken advantage of by people who are just being lazy and this can cause a delay in the delivery times for people who actually cannot physically do the weekly shop.

 There is usually a shipping cost when having the items delivered to your house. Depending on the company you bought off, the charge could be a fixed rate or varies depending on the amount being delivered. Importing goods such as games from another country is popular, especially when the goods are not available in your own country at the time. Buying from overseas can be fairly expensive.

When companies send out orders it is unlikely but possible that they could send out the wrong packages to people causing a lack of trust with both the company that messed up and online shopping in general. Also, because some shopping businesses have their own clothes sizes, you cannot try on the clothes you have bought online until they arrive at your house. When this happens it is common practise that you will have to pay for the package to be returned.

Threats

The website you are buying off might not be the actual company that you think it is and they are actually trying to access your bank details using the payment scheme.
Because you do not see the actual product in your hands when shopping online, you may not recieve the quality that you were promised or even a fake brandwhen you researched the item making it a waste of money.

Online Banking

Advantages

Online Banking is convenient as you can access your bank account from home, provided you have internet access. It never closes i.e. it can be accessed at any time so having to go at a specific time is no longer a problem. It is also fast and effective and there are no delays caused by queues. Transferring money between accounts and applying for loans and recieving results are instant.

Disadvantages

Trust, some people cannot always be 100% sure that a transaction went through when using online banking. Learning to use the online banking on the website can be difficult, especially for people who are not very knowledgeable about computers.

Threats
The website you are buying off might not be the actual company that you think it is and they are actually trying to access your bank details using the payment scheme. if someone has hacked your computer or has uploaded spyware they can obtain your bank account details very easily and empty the money out of it.

Email

Advantages

Emailing is a great way to keep in touch with people who may have recently moved away or you have recently got into contact with after a long time apart e.g. an old school friend. Using emails are as simple as typing and sending. Getting used to them doesn’t take long and creating a simple message doesn’t consume much time at all. Emails cost absolutely nothing to send. Messages are automatically stored in a draft folder if the message is not sent. Talking to people through emailing is easy and effective as the messages are sent to the receiver’s inbox almost instantly.

Disadvantages

Computers are very impersonal and this can have a seriously affect the socialising skills people have because instead of talking to a person directly, they are simply typing words into a machine. This causes the conversations that people have to be boring and this can in turn can lead to serious communication issues in their future e.g. interview techniques will suffer when applying for a job. Email Accounts can be hacked as anyone with the correct technical know-how could easily do so and destroy your account. Messages being easily stored are considered to be a good thing. However, there could be some cases in which a person will read a message they are not meant to be. This may cause problems with that person and/or other people. There is also the problem with spamming messages, where a company has bought your details off the mail server as a way of contacting you and providing you with information on their company. However, they may constantly send you messages asking you to buy from their website and in some common cases they will send you the same message over and over again.

Threats

Many people worldwide are ignorant of the threat of Email hacking and store very important personal information in a draft message. This may lead to fraud through the theft of credit/debit card details etc. Also, the conversational disadvantage mentioned above can be considered a threat because, assuming enough children suffer from this problem, this could lead to a communicational breakdown in young people. This is also the on going threat of Trojans. These are messages with a subject title that may pose and interest to you but instead of containing a message, it actually releases a virus into your computer. This is a very common and hard to deal with problem. Young people now have MSN and other applications on their phones, thus removing the possibility of Parental control.

Mobile Phones

Advantages

Long Distance Communication through the use of a mobile phone has many great benefits e.g. when finding someone or requesting information from someone who may be miles away from you. Keeping track of what your friends are doing can be done through a quick call or text. Or when checking up on your children a simple text will do to tell them when to be home. Safety, as said before, checking up on people can be for their and your own safety. In the case of Elderly people, they may have a problem e.g. they have had a fall and they live alone. They can use the mobile phone to call a family mamber or friend for assistance.

On a night out texting people to say that you’ve got home safely. Things like this are what make the use of mobile phone. Internet Access on the Move can be very helpful e.g. when checking flight times etc.

Disadvantages

Having People Keeping track of you may not be in your best interests for any number of reasons, depending on the person. However, someone having your phone number can result in you needing to change your phone number – big problem. This means having to collect all the phone numbers from your old sim card and some of the numbers might be hard to track down. Having a contract phone can be very expensive and sometimes, unaffordable. 

 People are lured in by the phone sales companies by cheap and very affordable prices for their contracts (such as £25/month for a 12 month contract), especially young people such as Students with a low income. However they do not read the small print that the contracts price per month increases after a certain amount of time passes. This can lead to running up expensive bills. Forgetting to charge your phone can cause problems, such as staying in contact with friends on a night out etc.

There are a lot of foreign people leaving their own countries to come to the UK and communication for them can be limited through the fact that texting using a mobile phone is only available in English and to use a mbile from their own country over here will be extortionate.

Threats

Safety – There are certain applications that allow people to track mobile phones through the number the SIM card they are currently using. This can be dangerous and/or can lead to harassment and other forms of abuse, should the wrong person obtain their number. In the case of children and young people, a popular form of harassment is cyber-bullying, which can be a serious issue and hard to deal with.

There are people who circulate scam texts saying that you have been awarded a sum of money for unknown reasons e.g."you have won £1,000, reply to this number to claim it". When replied to, the person empties out the balance in your mobile and into their bank account. This can prove a serious problem in the case of a family with a low income or in an emergency.