FIRST LECTURE

The lesson began with an introduction to the subject of "Societal Context", and the lecturer Rashika Sharma. She gained class attention by placing us into groups assigning each group an interactive activity. This worked as a great ice breaker as it woke us up and it got our brains thinking. We were given a scenario where we were charged as developers to perform a feasibility study on a proposed electric train setup in Auckland. As a group our task was to develop key points for consideration in a feasibility study. After gathering these points we went on to collaborate our ideas in order to produce viable solutions.The following is the result of our class discussion: 

Feasibility Study

1. Demand - Determine whether people need or want it
2. Determine the budget - i.e Government ,tax payer, people
3. Environment - Sustainable development
4. History - What has happened in the past
5. Labour - Workforce required for the job
6. Time constraints
7. Survey/research - Consider population of the area
8. Planning process - i.e Location
9. Legislation - i.e Resource consent
10. Research the social impact

Later we are given another task to get our train of thought thinking. Here we are asked to reform our groups and to decide on a technology for discussion. We were then presented with a chain of questions reflecting on the relationship between the technology and society. The following are the results of our group discussion.

Computers

Why was the technology developed?

Computers were made to do the very tedious computations of everyday life and business. The first calculators performed computations in seconds that would take someone minutes if not hours to do. For instance, calculations for NASA entry and exit trajectories would take days or even weeks to calculate by hand and the first mainframe computers would do the calculations in minutes.

What and who are the technology drivers?

Consumers (people) drive the demand for the technology and so they can be considered the main drivers. To be precise, it is the want or desire of people to have this technology is what helps the technology.

What have been its broad social, political, economic and environmental impact?

Computers have changed the way people relate to one another and their living environment, as well as how humans organize their work, their communities, and their time. Society, in turn, has influenced the development of computers through the needs people have for processing information.

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