Internet as vital as food, water, air —millennials

In a revealing study that cements the role of new technologies in people's lives today, it was revealed that Internet now ranks along the same level as air, food and water as basic necessities for millenials. According to the 2011 Cisco Connected World technology report released Wednesday, four of every five individuals aged 18 to 30 years old —the so-called "millennial" generation, born at the turn of the 2000's— consider the Internet as a "fundamental resource" for the human race, with some even saying that it is more important than having a car, dating or partying. The survey of some 2,800 college students and young professionals across 14 countries also revealed that more than half said they "could not live without the Internet," citing it as an integral part of their lives. When it all comes down to it, 64 percent of college students they'd rather have an Internet connection than a car, while 40 percent said the Internet is more important than dating, going out with friends, or listening to their favorite music. "Whereas previous generations preferred socializing in person, the next generation is indicating a shift toward online interaction," the study said. "More than one in four college students globally (27 percent) said staying updated on Facebook was more important than partying, dating, listening to music, or hanging out with friends." The Cisco report echoes recent studies suggesting how Internet has become a central part of people's lives across the globe. Just recently, a study by the London's Science Museum revealed that people in the UK think the Internet is more important than flushing their toilets or even taking a shower. The United nations (UN), on the other hand, has gone so far as to declare the Internet as a human right, saying the Internet allows "individuals to exercise a range of human rights, and to promote the progress of society as a whole." Shunning traditional media The Cisco report also showed that the Internet is increasingly becoming the primary mode by which millenials access information, with the mobile channel slowly gaining prominence. At least 66 percent of students and 58 percent of employees cited a mobile device—including laptops, smartphones and tablets—as the "most important technology in their lives." The study also showed that smartphones are slowly inching ahead of desktops as the "most important" device used daily, at 19 percent and 20 percent, respectively. Television, while still at the top three of important devices to source information, is steadily declining in appeal, with fewer than one in 10 millenials citing it as the most important device for them. "As TV programming and movies become available on mobile devices, this downward trend is expected to continue," the study added. Similarly, the study noted how paper is slowly going the same dead-end route, with only one in 25 millenials citing the newspaper as the most important tool for accessing information. What's surprising, however, is that one in five students said they have not bought a physical book (excluding textbooks) in a bookstore in more than two years—"or never at all," the study said. This trend, however, is not lost on stakeholders of the book industry —especially publishers, who have already begun to make the shift toward digital publishing: the University of the Philippines Press, for example, has started digitizing part of their collections for distribution in Amazon's Kindle Book Store. — TJD, GMA News