Re-thinking the Digital Divide

The Pew Foundation, known for their excellent polls and the resultant statistical analyses of common questions, published a (fairly) recent poll regarding the Digital Divide entitled Digital Divisions.  This article separates computer users into three categories: users of broadband, or fast internet, dial-up or traditional users, and non-users.  The results of the poll, in short form, are as follows:

* Two-thirds of American adults go online and one-third do not.
* "Newbies" have become a rare species.
* The percentage of "truly disconnected" has remained stable in the last three years.
* Different access speeds create a new divide among Internet users.
* Connection speed is a more important factor in Internet use than experience.

Connection speed is a more important factor in Internet use than experience.

Internet use increases according to race and level of education; beyond that, someone who has access to a fast connection is more likely to spend more time on the Internet doing tasks than someone with more experience who has a dial-up connection.

One of the main points of the article, however, was that whatever we as a nation are doing to combat the digital divide is not working.  The percentage of people actively avoiding Internet use in 2002 was statistically the same as the percentage in 2005; this seems to make it clear that whatever programs are in affect, such as E-Rate, are not affecting this bottom tier of users, some of whom are very reluctant to use the Internet at all.  E-Rate in particular has had its fair share of problems -- growing pains, as Wired called it back in 2001 -- but also issues with fraud.  The program has been called a success, since 90% of rural schools and libraries now have Internet connections (as of 2007) but the old adage, "You can lead a horse to water..." also applies to providing Internet access versus actual use.

Something to consider in this notion of "The Digital Divide" is what it means to have digital access.  Techno-geek Cory Doctorow, in his novel "Overclocked (Eastern Standard Tribe)," claims that cell phones are the tool of the underdog and WiFi is the utopia of the elite who can afford laptops; the "suburban white man's" tool for change.  Since the Pew article indicates that cell phone usage is the same across racial divisions (74% usage for whites and 73% for blacks), it seems that the digital divide begins to close when we consider access from this point of view.  As cell phones become more adaptable to Internet usage through the development of smart applications, they may indeed become a more useful tool in closing the digital divide than any government program. 

Of course this puts the library in an awkward place yet again: about 10 years behind.  Google this week released 1.5 million books that are cell-phone accessible, something libraries are not even starting to consider, as the debate over e-books rages on.  Overdrive and NetLibrary, the two main library sources for e-books and audio books, still do not have a user-friendly interface and their content is rife with digital rights management code that refuses to interface with many MP3 players.  Overdrive and NetLibrary software also conflicts directly with Audible software, an enormous corporate producer of audio books, making dual digital downloads a nightmare. Librarians continue to question whether digital content is even worth a part of the library budget; meanwhile Google has, in the space of half a decade, quietly created accessible books for millions of users who cannot access the Internet through standard means.

Perhaps it is time for libraries and government agencies to re-think this digital divide and consider less traditional ways to aid those information seekers than a computer in a bricks-and-mortar library; there is more than one way to solve a problem, and we need to look beyond what was current ten years ago.