'Nano Society', the New Society of 2022
The changes in people’s perceptions this year
Explaining what a ‘Nano society’ is and its positive and negative effects
Reporter Lee Se-mok
churrasco23@naver.com
As COVID-19 continues, many people are still experiencing a lot of inconveniences in their daily lives, in particular due to the various social restrictions that have been applied. Through these kinds of restrictions a new society called 'Nano society' has begun to appear.
A 'Nano society' is a community in which people are scattered over a wide area like individual grains of sand. The freshmen who are now first and second graders could not experience normal college life, such as going on MTs and to festivals, and they are more familiar talking with their classmates online. However, this is not only limited to the COVID-19 situation, but, more generally, people living in the modern hyperconnected society have less interaction with each other. The term 'Nano society' can be divided into three main keywords; The first word is 'sand grains'. People are getting scattered like sand grains in society and people now prefer to be alone rather than be a part of the community. The second word is 'Hashtag'. We are social animals and no matter how advanced technology gets and how infectious diseases such as COVID-19 are, people are naturally willing to be connected with others. Before COVID-19 there were many natural ways to encounter people, but these days people prefer artificial encounters such as blind date apps. More and more people these days are pursuing thinner and wider encounters as if they were turning on and off their phones. Their preferences are more important than their sense of belonging and their inner preferences are starting to change. Finally, the last keyword is 'Echo room'. As technology advances people are able to choose what information they read. Through this phenomenon, people only communicate to those who have the same opinion as themselves and do not want to meet others who have the opposite opinion. This leads people to believe that they are right and that people around them have the same idea.
The modern 'Nano society' is not only influencing people's lifestyles, but also influencing the incoming trends. Communities which make new words are increasing, but they are starting to enjoy them by themselves. Life in a ‘Nano society’ does not guarantee fairness and this makes people live more aggressively. Furthermore, the perception that modern workplaces are no longer guaranteed for life has become bigger. Because of this, many people are turning to freelance occupations that rely only on their labor. However, there are also positive effects that can be attributed to the ‘Nano society’. With the D2C production method, consumers can purchase custom fit shoes, for example a size 245 right shoe and size 250 left shoe. This opens up a new level of eco-friendly production without additional raw materials and inventory waste. With the development of technology, environmental pollution and global warming caused by the mismatch between supply and consumption can be reduced, leaving a positive impact on global problems.