Understanding & Use of the Internet (UUI) Digital Divide Spring 2012

1. Understanding & Use of the Internet (UUI) Digital Divide Spring 2012

2. Goals and Themes • Who uses the Internet? • Global digital divide • Adoption and misuse • Non-use • Design for use • Social Exclusion • Digital Divide • Policy

3. What is Digital Divide?

4. Digital Divide • Digital divide can be classified as access divide and social digital divide. • Access digital divide is the gap between people who have access to digital infrastructure and information and those who have no or limited access. • Social digital divide exist due to perception, culture, and interpersonal relationships

5. Digital Divide (2) • Access Divide: • E-service access • Resource availability and convenience of access to service • E-service access quality • Timeliness (speed), Trust, and Stability of the service • E-service access Skills • Technical and applied e-skills for using the service • Social Divide: • E-service Awareness • Knowledge of the services availability • E-service Social Support • Technical assistance and emotional reinforcement from friends and family • E-service Culturability • National colors, pictures, and local language Khan et al., 2010,

6. Digital Participation • The Digital Britain report of June 2009 set out its definition of digital participation as follows: • Increasing the reach, breadth and depth of digital technology use across all sections of society, to maximize digital participation and the economic and social benefits it can bring. • www.culture.gov.uk/images/publications/digitalbritain-finalreport-jun09.pdf

7. How can digital participation be measured? • The Digital Britain report stated that the following metrics were critical for the evaluation of activity to promote digital participation: • 1) Reach: • Access: number of households online, and numbers using the Internet outside the home; • 2) Breadth of engagement: • Modes of usage and consumption (communication, retail, content consumed, public services used);

8. How can digital participation be measured? • 3) Depth of engagement: user contributions, comments, joining networks, user generated content, self publishing, content creation, photos uploaded and shared, etc; and • 4) Social and economic impact: particularly the impact on economic recovery and benefits for disadvantaged groups and communities

9. Digital Divide May be due to.. • Economic division, • Geographical Division, or • Social division http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjfAFsET28c&NR=1

10. Why people adopt a technology? • Why people don’t adopt a technology?

11. Factors Affecting Adoption (1) Technological perspective • From adoption and usage perspective, research has identified several factors that affect e-service adoption for instant • Trust • Quality (info, system, and service) • Compatibility of the service • Ease of use • Relative advantage • etc

12. Factors Affecting Adoption (2) • Social perspective: • Motivations • Resources • Voluntary or obliged adoption (peers pressure) • Consumer research point of view: • Functional: they do something practical • Experimental: they provide sensual pleasure • Identity: products provide expression of self identity • Social and individual context • Network effects • Some innovation have more use as more people have them – slow to start, then much fast uptake a ‘inflection point’

13. Use/Adoption Factors • Correlates with: • Income e.g.. High GDP more internet use • Age and Life stage • Region • Professional activity • Education • Sex • Ability/Disability • Capital/Wealth • Family with children • Culture etc

14. Non-use of ICT • The Enhanced Barrier Model • Resource Barriers • No access, No money, No time or space, No contact with technology • Relevance Barriers • Not relevant, No need, Not part of everyday life, Other more important ways of using resources • Symbolic and Subjective Barriers • Disapprove of technology or industry, Dislike technology, Feel uncomfortable with ICT use, Ignore technology • Knowledge Barriers • Do not know about the innovation, Do not know how to adopt, how to use, how to cope with problems or how to innovate activities. • Why people don’t adopt • “Not relevant”,”no use” • “Too complicated”, “too tricky” • Practical, experiential, identity factors • Physical barriers • Subjective reactions • No resources • No motivation • No community

15. Non-user strategies • Resistors, Delayers, and Rejectors • How to overcome the barriers: • ‘Reduce the barriers’ • Need triggers to use • These come from other changes in life

17. Global Digital Divide: Statistics

19. World-wide Statistics http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm

22. ASIA

25. Europe

27. North America

28. South America

29. Middle East

30. Middle East

31. Africa

32. How can we over come DD?

33. How can we over come DD? We need.. • Economic incentives • E.g. to buy computers (laptops) • To have internet connection at home • Public access to computers • User friendly spaces - cybercafes, telecentres, • E.g. public libraries, free internet access points

34. Hw can we over come DD? • Provide skills (e.g. The European Computer Driving Licence (ECDL) • Local experts - change agents • Free computers+ for whole communities • Government-industry partnerships • E.g. One laptop per child project

35. How can we over come DD? • Donors • Provide Education, telecentres, etc • Donate old computers to less developed countries • Liberalisation • Foreign investment • Infrastructure - Mobile phones • New markets • Industry (outsourcing)

36. Questions • Is the digital divide an important factor in social exclusion? • What policies can help promote adoption? • Does technology adoption really lead to social inclusion?

37. Global Digital Divide: Problems • Irrelevance of the Internet • To expensive, no electricity, no skills etc • Better things to spend money on: • Health, water, food, roads, education • Problem of government control and corruption

38. Problems • Access • Resources (time, money, experience, social network) • Literacy and Skills • Basic literacy • Information age literacy • Motivation • Social and individual issues • Life-stage • We can remove barriers, but not create motivations

39. Result-> ‘Digital’ exclusion • Poor Jobs • Limited Government services (e-government) • Limited Information (jobs, consumer, politics) • Few Consumer benefits (cost of not shopping online) • Isolation from new culture • New excluded groups - older men • Digital exclusion intensifies as society and the economy become increasingly based on the Internet

40. Never Catch up • Many interlocking issues. • Always new technologies • Increased commercialisation • Are the forerunner opening up the gap?

41. References • Martin, Michael J.C. (1994). Managing Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Technology-based Firms. Wiley-IEEE. p. 44. ISBN 0471572195. • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technology http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technology