Week 9- Question 2

2) What difference to all this might the 'digital divide' make? a) To socioeconomically related access issues within a society? b) To global access issues across countries and regions?

A) The digital divide means that people within societies use new media in different ways. People access differently due to mass media. If there is a topic within there social circle that is talked about often, eg within my social circle it could be musicals, then I am more likely to access the internet to gather information on this subject and then pass it on to other people in my social circle. Therefore people within my society who do not have a favourite topic, or subject may not go on the internet as often as they have no reason to find out more information for instance. According to Goldfarb, A and Prince J (2006), who did a survey on 18,439 Americans, Higher educated people are more likely to have adopted the internet by 2001. Though this is the case it was also found that low income and less educated people may have taken longer to adopt the internet, they actually spend more time on the internet. Internet adoption is higher for, younger, married and city dwellers.

B) The Digital Divide across countries and regions mainly occurs due to wealth. Obviously the richer communities can not afford to have the internet on tap and access it as often as possible. Other people in poorer communities will not have this privilege. This may not always be a bad thing, because some regions and countries may not be as aware that the internet is such a big phenomenon and so to them it may be irrelevant. It was also found that white people had higher internet adoption, but also it was found that there was not a significant difference between people spoken in different languages.