Wired...Very Wired

Just how "wired" or digitally connected is the whole world today? "It's wired. Very wired," to paraphrase 007.
   With mobile phones or cell phones serving almost 100 percent of all populated areas and with the number of Internet subscribers bounding 1,350 percent in only 10 years, the world we are in today where information technology (IT) can qualify as a vital bodily function like breathing (that is, people today can't live without it).

Surprisingly, however, this "wired-ness" is just the beginning. Now, IT firms are out to wire the whole world even further with new technologies such as WiMax, wireless television and fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) services.
What the average person will get out of this onrushing digital tsunami is access to data that theoretically should make him more productive and competitive in the wired workplace, wherever this is in the world. Not to mention more connected. And these wired industries are where the new jobs are.

Young Drivers
What's driving telecoms? Young people. Lots of young people with voracious appetites for staying connected. Some 75 percent of Americans are below 40 years of age, which explains why most everyone you meet on the street seems to have three hands: left hand, right hand, and a cell hand. And of the 38 million persons in the national workforce, half range in from 20 to 40 years old.
   These teenagers and young adults will constitute the bulk of the 94 million mobile phone users expected by 2013. That figure is 22 times the number in 1998 or a 142 percent annual growth rate from 1998 to 2012. That will mean they'll send a lot more text messages and make more voice calls than they do now.
It's well known kids are driving SMS (Short Message Service) or texting growth.


Faster Internet growth
   Telecommunications growth is being outpaced by Internet growth, however. The number of Philippine Internet subscribers great 1,350 percent from 2001 to 2009 compared to 567 percent for cell phones and 35 percent for landline telephones.
   There were close to three million local Internet subscribers in 2009, of which 1.4 million used broadband connections to access the Internet. High-speed broadband gives Internet users faster access to social networking sites, arguably the most popular non-email Internet application. As elsewhere, the growth of Facebook has been explosive to say the least, there are about 400 million Facebook users worldwide in 2009, leading to the quip that if Facebook were a country, it would be the third most populous in the world after China and India.

Where the New Jobs Are
   What this data reveals is the digital world is becoming more important than the real world, especially for employment. For young people, this means that IT based careers such as those in the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry and a separate, growing industry called Knowledge process Outsourcing (KPO), is what young people should pursue. In mid-2008, BPO, KPO and other IT-enabled firms employed 345,000 persons compared to 100,000 in 2004.
   While before a facility with the English language was a must for call center applicants, the rise of non-voice operations such as accounting, finance, animation, human resources means BPO and KPO firms have as their talent pool the far larger number of people who aren't native English speakers.
   For those looking for work in IT or IT-enabled service firms, the jobs are in online advertising, mobile advertising and content development, all of which are relatively new. While online advertising and mobile advertising had revenues of less than $2 million in 2009, both are growing more than then percent annually.
Content development jobs, on the other hand, focus on creating interactive content for gaming and online education. IT-enabled services are expected to grow at an average of 12 percent in the next five years.
   Employment prospects should remain upbeat in the BPO and KPO industries since such industries are now recognized as a growing global outsourcing sources. BPO revenues have tripled in less than 10 years, pointing to a large demand in BPO services.
   New technologies such as FTTH, NGN ( New Generation Networks) BPL (Broadband over Power Lines) WiMax and wireless TV will need IT-educated or experienced persons to provide the new services that will complement existing ones. Many of these technologies are currently being tested and improved.
   The World Bank urges a lot of countries  to encourage the development of local IT services industries through policies and incentives for entrepreneurs and the private sector, and through investments in skills and infrastructure. That means more jobs, It noted that even in a crisis, people will keep on using the Internet and their cell phones as both have become part of their lifestyle. That means more revenues.
   More and more people increasingly live in "Two Different Worlds:" the real world where one gets a life and the digital world where one gets a job. It is indeed a brave, new, confusing world out there that's wired... Very wired.