“The New Digital Divide” an article
written by Susan Crawford and published by The
New York Times, discusses a new outlook on our current and future digital
divide. This article explains that recently the quality of the internet has
greatly increased, however this increase is only available to the consumers who
afford it.
According to Crawford, “Over the
last decade, cheap Web access over phone lines brought millions to the
Internet. But in recent years the emergence of services like video-on-demand,
online medicine and Internet classrooms have redefined the state of the art:
they require reliable, truly high-speed connections, the kind available almost
exclusively from the nation’s small number of very powerful cable companies.
Such access means expensive contracts, which many Americans simply cannot
afford.”
Simply put, America is divided into
two parts. Consumers with high-speed web connection and consumers who either have
second class web connection or no connection at all, so a complete divide
between the wealthy urban consumers and the poor, rural minorities.
These wealthy urban consumers not
only have access to the exciting world of high-speed internet, but they also
are always a step or possibly a few steps ahead of the rest. Basically meaning
these consumers have a hand up in education, the latest entertainment and
local, national and global news and information. Therefore, the informed stay
informed and the less fortunate struggle to keep up.
The problem we are having with the
digital divide is it’s simply not affordable to everyone in America. In reality,
that makes sense and that is just how the world works. However, this is a way
America can be a step ahead in the digital world. If this high-speed internet
access was available for everyone then the possibilities for us as Americans
could be endless.
As a quick example, to truly show
how fast this internet is, according to Crawford, “The connections are truly
high-speed: based on a technological standard called Docsis 2.0 or 3.0, they
can reach up to 105 megabits per second, fast enough to download a music album
in three seconds.” This is incredible, even though downloading an album is not
that big of a deal or that important compared to politics or foreign policy found online,
however it just shows that the faster the internet is, the faster we as consumers
can take it in and ingest the information.
In all, this digital divide is a setback
for America. However, there is a possibility in the future, with how quickly
our technology is developing, that this high-speed access will be affordable for
many American citizens.
