Christmas is coming so let’s start the ‘festive-ITs’ with some little-known tech facts about the holiday season. We will then look at how technology and digital transformation have impacted the way we celebrate and behave at this time of the year.
As an IT company, ICE always takes a keen interest in the tech behind things. As a fun game this Christmas, why don’t you try to guess how many ‘tech touchpoints’ you encounter on an average day? The first could be waking up to the chime of an electronic alarm clock. Or perhaps it might be making a breakfast order via a touch screen? The last may well be checking in on Facebook or Instagram on your mobile device before bed. This writer’s average seems to be too difficult to calculate – if you work on a laptop all day, does that count as one touchpoint? Or is it one for every different interaction? (Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!)
- Electric Christmas lights were invented in 1882
- 47% of all Christmas shopping in the US is completed online
- Data from Facebook recently revealed that the second most popular time for couples to break up is 2 weeks before Christmas (bah humbug)
- The popping sound in Christmas crackers comes from gunpowder (perhaps don’t mention that to the recently separated…!)
- 1840 – The mechanical age ends, replaced by the electromechanical era (which ushers in new technologies)
- 1876 – The telephone is created
- 1894 – The first radio is created, developed by Guglielmo Marconi
~ 1940 – The first large-scale automatic digital computer is created by Harvard University in the US (the Mark 1)
- 1991 – The World Wide Web is invented by computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee
- 1992 – The 1st smart phone lands (The IBM Simon)
- 1994 – Amazon changes the way we buy books (and much more besides)
- 2004 – Facebook (Meta) arrives to become a communication gamechanger
Those new technologies to emerge in the electromechanical era included telecommunications. This of course enabled people to send handmade postal cards for Christmas. Nowadays, more than 3 billion cards are sent each year in just the US!
All of the technological advancements listed above influenced and changed the way Christmas has been celebrated. Without the telephone, for example, long-distance exchanges would be impossible without travel. No radio at Christmas? Well how are you going to enhance the festivities when you cannot listen to the new Christmas number one?
The computer and the internet have proven to be the biggest game changers in recent years. These have changed everything on a vast scale, modifying the way we share gifts and interact with one another at Christmas. Technology and digital transformation has then impacted the festive season hugely. Indeed, life as we know it has been impacted drastically. If you use and embrace tech in the right way, it is an amazing thing.
This is one reason why ICE and theICEway place innovation at the heart of everything we do. Without innovation, we would not be opening cards this Christmas nor enjoying a Zoom chat with loved ones from around the globe.