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By 2020, more people in the world will have a smartphone than running water
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A new report has found there's going to be a serious influx of mobile phones across the world. So much so there will be more phones than electricity. - photo by Herb Scribner
Everyone around you right now probably has a smartphone. Youre probably reading this article on a smartphone.

But it may not be that way in other parts of the world for now.

A new report from Cisco says that by 2020, there will more people around the world who own a cell phone than those who have electricity or running water. In fact, 5.4 million people around the world will be seeing their hotline bling, whereas only 5.3 billion people will have water and 3.5 billion will have running water.

To put that number even more in perspective, by that time there will be 2.8 billion cars on the road across the world, CNET reported.

That means that by 2020, cell phone use will make up 81 percent of total mobile data traffic, the report said. Three-fourths of that is expected to be video traffic alone, according to the report.

"The mass adoption of phones underscores society's increasing reliance on handsets for all facets of life. Yes, you can use the device to make a call, but you can also message your friends and families, pay for goods and services, turn on the lights in your home or binge-watch 'Boardwalk Empire,'" CNET reported.

But its not just cellphones thatll increase during this time. The report also said that there will be 11.6 billion mobile-ready tech devices up from the 7.9 billion there were last year due to the increase in wearable technology, like FitBits and Apple Watches. This will only increase as mobile networks increase their abilities, jumping to a superfast 5G wireless technology to truly kick off in wide scale, CNET reported.

Impoverished nations across the world will likely have the most amount of mobile traffic growth overall. The Middle East and Africa specifically will see a 117 percent increase in 2015, with Asian Pacific nations seeing an 83 percent growth and Latin America growing by 73 percent, the reported said.

This comes at a time when developing nations have seen some increases in Internet capable technology, but not a significant amount. As the Pew Research Center found, only 24 percent of the worlds developing and emerging nations have mobile-ready smartphones.

The United States sits well above the rest, with 58 percent of the population owning a smartphone that can connect to the Internet. But less developed nations, like Pakistan (4 percent), Uganda (5 percent) and Tanzania (8 percent), dont have that luxury.

Smartphone ownership is also higher among the more educated, Pew explained. In all of the nations polled, those with a secondary degree or higher are more likely to own a smartphone than the less educated. This is especially true in Jordan, where 67% of the well-educated own a smartphone, compared with just 13% of those with less education a difference of 54 percentage points. A similar gap exists in Chile.

But to become more educated, people may need access to these smartphones. A worldwide report in 2014 from UNESCO found that hundreds of thousands of people in these developing nations often use smartphones and mobile phones to read, since they have access to electronic books that can be purchased cheaply and easily. In fact, 62 percent of respondents in the report said they read more because they could read on their phone.

This is especially helpful in countries where cellphones are easy to buy, but books are not. About 10 percent of respondents said that phones made their reading more affordable than print, and another 9 percent said that it was their only access to books.

How do we bring text to the unreached? the report asked. The answer at least in the immediate term is mobile devices, and more precisely mobile phones.

This can be especially important for womens education moving forward, too. The UNESCO report said that reading through smartphones allows women to find easy ways to read without worrying about the repercussions of finding actual books. Thats good news since women read six times more than men, Time reported.

And that empowerment may have already begun. In October 2015, Tata Communications and MasterCard, two major worldwide companies, joined together to provide more than 100 million women with mobile tech devices over the next five years, The Huffington Post reported. They will start in India, Nigeria, Indonesia and Guatemala, hoping to reach a total of 25,000 women in those countries in the next few years.

Overall, the goal is to help these women find better access to their bank accounts, books to read and keep in touch with their digital financing.

Three billion people will come online over the next decade primarily from the developing world, Rangu Salgame, CEO, Growth Ventures Group, Tata Communications, said in a statement. We now have our generations greatest opportunity to unshackle women from endless cycles of poverty and dependency by providing them with access to information and economic opportunities.
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How to avoid 'sharenting' and other paparazzi parenting habits
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A recent study revealed parents often spend up to two hours staging a single photo of his or her child to post online. - photo by Amy Iverson
Before having kids, some people just dont appreciate their friends baby posts. But after having a child of their own, three fourths of new parents jump right on the parental social media bandwagon. If you have become a member of this group, there are some rules to follow for posting responsibly.

Much of a parents worry is how to teach their children to use social media responsibly. We talk with our kids about privacy, oversharing, and setting restrictions on their devices to keep them safe. But parents themselves need to look in the digital mirror once in a while. Before having children, it doesnt take as much effort to think about what to post online. Its up to us to decide what we share about our own lives. But once you become a parent, there are many questions to think about regarding what is appropriate to post about your kids on social media.

In a recent survey, kids clothing subscription company Mac and Mia surveyed 2000 new parents to find out how they are documenting their kids lives on social media, and what concerns they may have.

First of all, people without children seem to feel a bit differently about the onslaught of baby pictures online than those who are parents. 18 percent of people say before they had kids, they were annoyed by their friends baby posts. But after having children of their own, 73 percent admit they post progress pictures of their little ones every single month.

Not only are new parents letting the world know each time their baby is a month older, but they are posting about their kids every few days or so. Men and women report they post 6-7 times per month about their baby.

And while 70 percent of new parents say the benefit of using social media is how easy it is to help family and friends feel involved, there are some downsides. Here are a few tips to avoid the pitfall of becoming paparazzi parents.

Dont miss the moment

In the Mac and Mia survey, some parents admitted to spending up to two hours to get the perfect shot of their baby. That seems a little extreme. New and old parents alike should be careful about spending so much time taking pictures and videos that they dont enjoy the moment. Years ago, I decided to never live an experience through my phone. A study by Linda Henkel, a psychology professor at Fairfield University in Connecticut, found that when people took pictures of objects in an art museum, they didnt remember the objects as well as if they simply observed them.

This photo-taking impairment effect can happen to parents as well. If we are so consumed by getting the perfect photo, we can miss out on the moment all together, and our memory of it will suffer.

Dont forget about privacy

60 percent of couples say they have discussed rules and boundaries for posting their babys photos, according to the Mac and Mia survey. Even so, men are 34 percent more likely to publish baby posts on public accounts. If parents are concerned about their childrens privacy, keeping photos off of public accounts is a given.

In the Washington Post, Stacey Steinberg, a legal skills professor at the University of Florida, and Bahareh Keith, a Portland pediatrician, wrote that sharing too much information about kids online puts them at risk. They write that all that sharenting can make it easier for data thieves to target out kids for identity theft. Check that your privacy settings are where they should be and never share identifying information like full names and birth dates.

Dont be paparazzi parents

36 percent of parents say they take issue when their childs photo is posted online by someone else. Responsible social media users will always ask permission before posting a photo of another child. But parents should also think about whether their own children will take issue with their own posted photos a few years down the road.

When parents are constantly snapping pictures and throwing them on social media, it can be easy to forget to pause and make sure the post is appropriate. I always use the billboard example with my kids. I ask them to picture whatever they are posting going up on a billboard in our neighborhood. If they are okay with that, then their post is probably fine. Parents should ask themselves this same question when posting about their children. But they should also ask themselves if their child would be OK with this post on a billboard in 15 years. If it would cause embarrassment or humiliation, it might be best to keep it private.

Once children reach an appropriate age, parents should include them in the process of deciding what pictures are OK to post. Researchers at the University of Michigan surveyed 10- to 17-year-olds and found children believe their parents should ask permission more than parents think they should. The kids in the survey said sharing happy family moments, or accomplishments in sports, school and hobbies is fine. But when the post is negative (like when a child is disciplined) or embarrassing (think naked baby pictures or messy hair), kids say to keep it off social media.
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