definitions of Technological Change and Innovation

Tech is the collective term for many of the diverse approaches, practices, and technologies used in the successful development of new products or services or in accomplishing goals, like scientific research. A tech might be involved in developing a new technology or its implementation, or he might be responsible for bringing together people from different fields for joint venture purposes. In any case, the term tech has a broader meaning now than it did in earlier years, when it often referred to only computers, phones, and other common electronic devices.

There are now many definitions for what tech is, what it takes to develop new technologies, what the definition of tech should be, and what its current applications are. This wide-ranging survey of definitions and new technologies was recently published in Trends in IT: An International Perspective (Addison & Johnson, 2021). The most recent definitions employed by a group of IT experts that gathered at a conference to discuss possibilities for the future of technology and society included several subtopics. The first was “technological change”, which described the basic process by which technological innovations emerge from designers’ visions. “izen”, which described what a user actually does with a technology and “systems”, were next, with system being a subset of technology and user a subset of technology; and finally there were social systems, which took into account how people use and interact with technology in a daily basis.

Technological change and innovation are fast becoming integrated, each having its own momentum. The recent published definitions for technology use showed that over the last two decades, the overall volume of information technology has increased almost exponentially, driven largely by advances in computer science, business, and medicine. In addition, many of the definitions for what tech actually is reflect increasing reliance on information technology in business and society. For instance, it was noted that some definitions refer to “a growing reliance on information technology to provide solutions to traditionally more localized and personalized needs.” Another prominent use of the word tech is in defining the term “computer network,” which is beginning to include a broader range of systems and components than were once encompassed within the narrow confines of computer hardware, software, storage devices, routers and so on. These definitions and their use may no longer be limited to academic or research journals but will increasingly influence the way that businesses, governments, institutions, and individuals define and utilize technology.