Ah… 2020! Just four months ago we were walking into this new decade filled with hope and New Year resolutions. Fast forward a few of months, Australia was ablaze, World War Three almost started, and a killer virus almost exterminated humanity… To top it up, wildfires have started near Chernobyl nuclear plant and we were almost hit by an asteroid yesterday! (29th April). And climate change remains a threat to our survival!
Contagion meet Armageddon meet 2012… Please, whoever is trying to awaken the dinosaurs, don’t! BAD, BAD idea!
We’re four weeks into the huge time-out forced on us by coronavirus. All concerts are cancelled. So are sporting events, major conferences, and conventions for each vertical industry imaginable. Restaurants, bars, and movie theatres are ordered closed by city officials. Theme parks have packed up, and the summer Olympic Games in Tokyo is likely to be postponed or cancelled altogether. The one pertinent question on football fans’ minds: Will Liverpool win the Premier League title this year?
The first radical change we’ve had to adapt to is how we greet one another. The coronavirus has made intimacy feel treacherous, because the disease can sometimes move from person to person through the most mundane of activities, like talking, kissing, even singing. That it is often transmitted asymptomatically has forced us to see everyone as a possible threat. New types of greetings have emerged. Shaking hands and hugging are out of the picture obviously. Most in our society are conversant in the “namaste”. Others are adopting the Vulcan and Wakanda salutes. An easy wave “hello” as acknowledgment and an understanding that sometimes social distancing is kind, not rude.
Most of us have spent much of our time in confinement trying to adjust to the lifestyle change the virus has brought. But we’re also starting to envisage the end of lockdown and how life will be post-coronavirus.
Welcome to the brave new world of COVID-19.
The digital world taking over as the ‘analogue’ takes a step back.
Society runs on information and connections, in an era where both are immediately accessible, anytime, anywhere from a mess of devices. With platforms like Facebook and Twitter, users can share information with only an easy click.
However, nearly as good as social media (and the web at large) is for sharing information, it’s also terrible at filtering the proper information to share. Since its outbreak several weeks ago, social media platforms are rife with misinformation. From quacks peddling “cures” that do nothing to stop contracting the virus, to racist and xenophobic posts blaming entire nationalities and their diet to be the source of the pandemic, social media has struggled to deliver the right information and stop fake and erroneous news from trending.
In the interest of preventing social media from becoming a cesspool of wrong “facts” and faux news, platforms must strengthen their moderation policies and actively censor content that is false, defamatory, and outright fabrications. Only through proper information can the general public understand what’s happening and increase their chances of survival.
Streaming content online has become massively popular over the past decade. As movie theatres close and live events get cancelled left and right as the world fights this pandemic, streaming is more becoming more dominant in delivering content. From concerts to sporting events, what was once considered prime events for giant in-person audiences are going to be forced to stream them to homebound fans instead.
Although live events will eventually return after this crisis, more fans and consumers will instead stay within the comfort of their own homes and watch events that are streamed or broadcasted live rather than paying for expensive tickets, lodging, and even more costly concessions to attend events face-to-face. Streaming movies reception, already a well-liked option, will surge in popularity, with companies like Netflix and Disney reaping the advantages. It is expected that the live show business and theatre business will suffer.
The mask…
In China and other nations, masks are now a part of the lifestyle of citizens. Asian countries have faced such epidemics and pandemics in the past including SARS outbreak of 2002-2004.
These nations have long understood face coverings as a public health resource and a tool for cultivating national unity. It’s routine, for instance, to find people wearing masks on the streets of Beijing, Seoul, or Taipei or as they socialise with friends, because someone with a cough will likely be hesitant to place their neighbours in jeopardy.
Though the science behind the effectiveness of masks is still being debated on, masks are likely to become a fixture of our post-pandemic world.
Work from Home and Not-so-mass transit…
“The pandemic has resulted in what is effectively the largest “work from home” experiment ever conducted in human history… We’re seeing the effect on the internet, in terms of traffic patterns that are shifting. People are accessing more educational resources online for their kids; finding unconventional ways to connect with co-workers, friends, and family; and employers are being more flexible in how they respond to employee needs through more dynamic, cloud-based technology. I think we’ll see these shifts last well beyond the immediate fallout of the COVID-19 outbreak.” – Matthew Prince, CEO of Cloudflare.
Pandemics have always been the enemy of dense, urban life. Cities, where people sleep in close quarters and blend with people from other places, are ideal breeding grounds for contagions. When the plague devastated Europe, as noted by the historian William McNeill, the cosmopolitan centres of Renaissance Italy fared far worse than the reaches of Poland or other parts of Central Europe.
Because of the Coronavirus, we’ve learned to conduct meetings online. Systems like Zoom and Skype are working well, even for giant groups. Because everyone can see their faces, attendees tend to be more present and have fewer distractions than on conference calls.
For some businesses, telecommuting is often a boon for his or her bottom line. Imagine a corporation which will run its entire operation staffed by workers who work from home. No more paying huge leases for large office spaces. No need for long commutes. Flexible hours and dealing in your pyjamas (or anything you would like to wear). Telecommuting provides the advantage of hiring a geographically diverse group of employees without fear about where to deal with them or relocate them.
In terms of education, online learning also comes with some advantages. For quite some time, schools and colleges have resisted online instruction, and institutions that do are considered inferior. However, with a rapidly spreading virus and a campus filled with people in close contact, schools have been forced to make online classes as alternate, albeit temporary, solution. By letting students learn from home, colleges can allow more students to attend class simultaneously, while students who missed lectures for any reason can catch up with video streaming.
Meanwhile, although some classes are often successfully taught online, specific disciplines are impossible to instruct through the web. From lab work for chemistry to the humanities and arts, classes must be conducted face-to-face.
While those in the cities have Wi-Fi and high-speed internet available, people living in rural areas do not, resulting in a possible gap in information in times of crisis. Furthermore, older adults whose survival depends on adequate information are unskilled in navigating online, leaving them susceptible to hackers and false information.
Those who are poor and under educated also are likely to be less well connected, leaving them less informed and more vulnerable. Poor students might find themselves unable to participate in online courses, and a few workers might find themselves unable to afford the connections necessary to telecommute. To repair this information gap, governments and private sectors would need to spend billions on extending home network coverage to the mass at a reasonable cost, but is there a political will to do so?
Some industries will prosper during the crisis, while others will suffer significant losses. Some workers might enjoy telecommuting, while others might lose their jobs thanks to declining business in their sector. Because of our information network, most of us will still be able to connect despite our isolation, while those that lack access to the web will fall behind. No matter the duration and severity of COVID-19, it will have an enduring impact on our society. However, not everything is often solved by moving online. Businesses in personal services, retail, and food and beverage businesses will suffer under this crisis, as personal interaction remains an important aspect.
With little warning, COVID-19 is changing everything about our lives – changes that are universal across generations. Although each generation are going to be affected differently, each and every one of us will be forced to adjust to the new normal. People of all ages will see their lives disrupted. Perhaps this may compel us to place aside generational divisions and come together as a human race to navigate these new realities together.
But if Hollywood has taught us anything… Humanity always survives.
