Not so long ago, advanced countries (Europe, the United States of America, Canada) entered the era of post-industrialism. The most valuable resource was information. Gradually, knowledge begins to prevail in value over capital and the rest of the world. This process is noticeable in literally every area. You can sell the machine for several thousand dollars, and know-how for one billion. Developed countries have long been transferring all tangible assets abroad, leaving only research centers, universities and laboratories. This suggests that human information activities have become more valued, and people are ready to invest in it.
Why do bachelors of elite universities that have received a quality education have a promise of four-zero dollar salaries, and a graduate of a Russian professional college can hardly reach forty thousand rubles a month? This is explained simply: in each case, the employer evaluated the information activities of these two training places differently. It is the quality and accessibility of knowledge that are the determining factors in modern education.
Information activity of a person is a fairly broad concept: it includes the processes of transfer, receipt, storage, accumulation and transformation of knowledge and data. This is a complex multi-stage streamlined process. But, despite the various types of human information activities, in the global sense it comes down to one thing - progress through the use of accumulated knowledge.
An acute problem was the safety of information. Manuscripts and cuneiform copies did not differ in durability. They were often irretrievably lost during the great movements, wars, revolutions or the change of ruling dynasties. Due to such failures in the transmission of accumulated knowledge to generations, the development of the nation slowed down. The importance of the transfer of experience and skills was considered several centuries ago. The professional information activity of man was then placed on the shoulders of priests, chroniclers, oracles, and druids. However, it was not effective: there were very few sources, and only a select few had access to the data captured in them.
Over time, the techniques changed, became more convenient: private libraries, archives with various types of systematization were created. The profession of librarian and archivist appeared.
Years passed, and the volume of waste paper steadily grew, cataloging became more and more difficult, the staff expanded. Some statistics: until the beginning of the nineteenth century, the average amount of human knowledge doubled once every fifty years; already from the middle of it five were enough for this. Currently, this period has been reduced. In this form, the information movement lasted until mass computerization. The computer “ENIAK” became a pioneer in 1946 from the USA. In the USSR, the era of computerization came in 1951 through the efforts of Academician Lebedev.
Now it’s hard to imagine a specialist on the table who would not have a computer, tablet or laptop. The human information activity with the development of the nano-technology segment has made a huge leap in recent years. It is difficult to find an industry where computer databases are not used and are not used for the benefit of mankind.