Discuss (in writing) the social significance of and the ethical considerations arising from greater dependence on computers.

Aim:

• Content: Collect issues and describe them with respect to the issue of computer dependence. (This makes a great test question).

• Skill: Be able to quickly determine key information relevant to your topic with out wasting time reading unrelated information.

Skim two of the article options below:

http://latc.com/1999/09/15/comment/comment2.html

http://hometheaterinfo.com/technology_dependency.htm

Use your own search skills through Google or MSN.com to find your own good article on computer dependency ...

Students should skim and identify issues that arise due to computer dependence. Some of these issues can be economic, political, health, security related, productivity, business, employment, etc.

Why skim instead of reading the article?

• Allows you to quickly identify if the article is appropriate for your research and eliminate it if it isn't.

• You can quickly locate and focus on specific information that is important to your assignment.

How to skim

• Don't read entire sentences instead focus on sentence fragments to obtain the general idea of the subject matter of the paragraph.

• Read the beginning of the first sentence of the paragraph, a sentence in the middle of the paragraph and a fragment at the end of the paragraph to determine whether the paragraph is important to your research.

• If the information obtained in this way does not seem to be relevant, move on to the next paragraph.

The Assignment (10 marks):

• Determine 5 social problems (can be issues and/or areas of impact) presented in these articles related to computer dependence.

• Describe each issue and show how computer dependence has caused this social problems. Make sure your description explains why someone should care about computer dependence.