-Time to speed up or slow down?
In the EU’s annual review of Member States’ digital maturity, Sweden is beaten by both Denmark and Finland. We keep our place, but others are catching up. Good or bad? Is it time to pause for reflection or to accelerate?
– ” The Commission report largely confirms the picture I have. Sweden ranks high in areas such as infrastructure, use of the internet, human capital and integration of digital technology,” says Peter Eriksson, Minister for Digitalization.
We are also slipping from the top of the ‘internet usage’ list – the number of activities we do online, such as shopping and information retrieval – but this can only mean that we have reached a level where we are naturally slowing down, while other countries are catching up.
But if it has stopped, then it is interesting why? For example, many people still don’t really know what a cloud service is, and it’s clear that they may be hesitant to put the very last thing they have, the most private, in the digital flow – if they don’t even know where to put it and roughly how it works.
Or do we simply not want to, but want to keep an analog part of our life – something tangible, real, that is not online?
A list like this, and thinking about placement, raises questions. One rather important one is: Should we hurry up and be first? Or should we slow down, think, play it safe and maybe let others make the mistakes? According to the EU press release, 44% of people in the EU still lack basic skills such as using a mailbox, editing tools or installing new devices. Mistakes will be made.
If we are rushing, why are we doing it? To ‘win’ – and gain glory, fame and market share – or to lead the way to a better, digital world? In the long run, is it worth being number one in a world with a digital limp?
If we work hard – but with the aim of leading the way and bringing others with us – we can be part of creating a sustainable digital future. And we believe in that.
