Amazingly, technology is one of the main factors and means that have driven the world to date, and forever shall it be so. This is what has given our lives so much a leap.
Most of us, I am pretty sure, might appreciate technology from the angle of Information Technology (IT), and it is quite understandable because that is all that we have been exposed to as technology.
The following are examples of technology, yet because of how common they are today the notion of they being seen as such and perhaps the impact of how big a deal they were and still are had been lost on us.
The discovery of fire was technology. Mind you, this was in the medieval or primitive era. It enabled man to warm up during cold times, and also to see in darkness in order to protect themselves and defeat huge predators.
Again, out of the discovery of fire, spears, cutlasses and other forms of weaponry got invented.
As this technology got worked on, it could be used to produce large weaponry in the form of canons that could be used to wipe off a whole nation during a war on a mass scale.
During the industrial revolution, another technology was discovered, and that was electricity.
The discovery of electricity within this era changed the whole perspective on productivity. Factories and industries could now churn out more products throughout the day.
Owing to that, employees could work 24 hours and 7 days in a week in the industries. So more people got employed and economic growth was phenomenal.
This industrial revolution led to steam and combustible engine technologies, which also totally altered the way man travels. This led to the invention of ships and cars to carry goods from one country to another and within towns or cities.
Finally, the discovery of flight technology in the nineteenth century completely brought countries closer than ever before. By now, less time was required to reach other countries, unlike the ship.
The ship took days to reach whatever destination. This means flights could be used to deliver goods and services in a faster, more convenient way than ships.
Well, the Internet technology in the things of today has given you the capacity to do business in any country of your choice by a click away from wherever you are, and not necessarily stepping a foot in that country and in a very scalable manner. For example, AB&B, UBER, ALI BABA and so on.
So what is technology?
Technology is any time, any where a new variable is introduced to the same set of circumstances to create a totally different exponential result.
From this, one can deduce that technology is not information technology products like computers, printers, scanners, photocopiers, tablets and phones, as well as software applications, but a means or vehicle through which technology can be deployed to achieve exponential results.
So what should one do?
Before one decides to spend on any technology, one has to identify and understand the same set of circumstances, and then look for the variables that can scale it beyond imaginations.
Always understand that the variables are very simple in little clues and most times embedded within the same set of circumstances.
Technology is not IT and IT is not technology.
