What Digital Divide?

from the that-one dept

News.com has an opinion piece saying that the "digital divide" isn't that big of an issue. The writer uses some stats to tiptoe around the issue and then seems to suggest that it's not that big of a deal that some people don't have access to computers because "maybe they don't want them". She defends this by saying that we all know people who don't like using computers. While we might, and I'm sure there are plenty of people who don't care about access to technology, that doesn't mean there's no "digital divide". That's the equivalent of saying "you know, there are some people who like living outdoors, so maybe the homeless really want to live on the streets". I do agree with her point at the end that improving education is the most important thing, but I was under the (perhaps mistaken) impression that that was part of the various plans to help solve the digital divide. I don't think the idea was just to throw computers into poor neighborhoods. I thought there was an educational component to it.
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