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So Long, Digerati: The Vanishing Digital Divide
As recently as three years ago, studies showed that the majority of Net users were similiar -- high-income, tech-savvy, mostly white, male and very career-minded. They constituted a highly tech-centered subset of the population, a distinct techno-elite.
Their understanding of and experience with technology was radically different from that of most Americans, few of whom were online. Included in this group were the people literally constructing the elements of the computer revolution, and building the Net and the Web. There was consequently a powerful class element to computing -- poor, older and blue-collar people were, by and large, not involved.
That has changed, suddenly and dramatically. Despite media reports of a tech slump, computer and Net use is exploding, and among all age groups and class, racial and ethnic categories. As many suspect, the much-hyped tech slump has mostly hit poorly run, ill-conceived dot.coms, not mainstream technological use or growth.
And boy, has the Net gone mainstream:
According to Nielsen/NetRatings, 56 percent of the U.S. population, nearly 154 million peoople, accessed the Net in the month of November, 2000 alone. This represents a whopping 30 percent increase over the previous year alone.
The average age of the Net user, reports ZDNet, is now 39 years, and rising. At the same time, their average education -- 38 percent hold a college degree -- is falling.
So is their socio-economic status. One of the dominant characters of tech culture has been it's affluent, educated, tech-centeredness. No longer true. The fastest-growing segment of Web newcomers are Americans over 55 years old with working-class incomes, older members of minority groups, blue-collar workers, and people with decidedly non-tech interests and backgrounds. The new generation of wired Americans, says American Demographics, looks "increasingly like the folks who cruise your local Wal-Mart." From the surveys, they are clearly drawn online by e-mail, other messaging systems, and especially, entertainment and related communities.
These new figures don't mean that all poor people actually have computers or are even online. Members of the underclass -- especially minorities -- continue to lag behind when it comes to access to computing. But the divide is definitely shrinking, and faster that all but a few starry-eyed visionaries ever predicted.
This means that in the United States, Net users are no longer a monolithic group with anything resembling a common view, either of the Net, technology or other political issues. There are so many different people of different backgrounds using the Net in different ways that the very idea of a typical Net user -- or a digital citizen -- has vanished.
Despite that, the tech core -- the geeks, nerds, programmers, designers will almost surely continue a separate entity, shaping and and influencing computing and the evolution of the Net and Web.
But clearly, there are other significant constituencies online now as well, and the class differences are interesting. The newcomers are different from the first generation of Net users, primarily because they aren't as interested in the underlying technology, but see the Net much as they see TV, a focal point for varied activities.
There are other differences as well. In fact, says Nielsen, last May the number of women online surpassed the number of men for the first time. And Harris Interactive reports that the online community has grown by more than 900 per cent over the past six years.
This new reality will change the political and economic environment surrounding the Net. It will be a lot tougher for politicians to demonize cyberspace as a nest of theives and perverts now that many of their constituents are regularly online. Nor can Net users be dismissed as an arrogant elite.
The new American Demographics data shows some surprising trends -- the poorer the user, the more time they are apt to spend online. Why? Because many upscale Americans are Web-surfing vets who have bookmarked their favorite sites, and know how to use search engines efficiently. Nielsen//NetRatings says that Internet users now frequent an average of only 10 sites per month, down from 15 just one year ago. While on those 10 sites, they are digging deeper, reading more pages than they used to.
Another class factor is Net work access -- those who lack the ability to surf the Web at the office (blue collar workers in particular) are more inclined to go online at home. Another socioeconomic difference is that more affluent Net users go online to gather information, access services or data, while poorer Net users are more likely to go on the Net for amusement or entertainment.
The study has enormous political and economic implications. Vast potential new markets are coming online for businesses, despite all of the hysteria about the dropping NASDAQ. These numbers make it more, not less, likely that the Net will soon have an impact on new forms of retailing, and on the political system. It means the entertainment industry has bigger problems than Napster. Issues like copyright and intellectual property will move beyond colleges and into the broad population, as these newcomers are particularly interested in accessing entertainment information and content online.
The much ballyhooed Digital Divide isn't quite bridged. But it appears to be growing inevitably smaller. And like it or not, the Digerati will soon be rubbing elbows with the hoi-polloi.
Oh, yes, they will. Those days you could still keep up with Usenet, the days 99% of posts was relevant to the group and the previous message, those days when "Flame" stood for an intelligent, almost literary rebuttal, instead of moronic incendiary gutter-drivel, the days of the Crystal Cave, the days the 'net _was_ free and open, and abuse and crass commercialism non-existent. They will be missed, Jon, until they pry the keyboard from my cold, dead fingers and nail the coffin shut. And I bet many will agree, if maybe not here.
Stefan.
The truth shall make you fret. (Ankh-Morpork tImes motto)
demo-crap-hics
That is, the people (demo is from "demos", the people -- Jon evidently had a Classical education) are crap (crap) hics (folks from the sticks i.e. backward). Jon is an elitist member of the Digerati living in New York, you see, and he's just as worried about the on-going "AOLization" of the Net as anyone.
Tell it like it is JonKatz! Right on!
The days of the so-called Digerati are numbered (they will not be missed) as poorer, working-class Americans thunder online in amazing numbers.
This is no bad thing, but there is a mistake in thinking they are 'computer literate' instead of just 'net literate'. These new users will hinder, not help, attempts to fight DMCA etc.. because they will be the first to accept, and unquestioningly use, copyright friendly content viewers/players. And are very succeptable to the suggestion that anyone who deviates from this path must be a 'evil nerd/hacker' to be despised, bullied and then called a coward by lame presidents when they finally snap.
sorry, bad mood today.
EZ
"Oops, I always forget the purpose of competition is to divide people into winners and losers." - Hobbes
Note that these views cast the new numbers as consumers to be entertained and marketed to, rather than as participants in information production. And general Net trends these days seem to support this characterization.
The one thing that I will miss about the "digerati" (as Jon calls them) is that they really believed in the Net as a medium to facilitate our communications among ourselves as a group of peers, as members of communities. It appears that the rush of the masses online is drowning out that vision with the somewhat competing vision of the Net as a delivery vehicle for spoon-fed, one-direction-only, cross-tied Valuetainment (tm) marketing. The displacement of the so-called techno-elite in Net demographics has not come without its own price. But so long as the technical core can continue as niche communities on the Net, I guess we have gained much over the truly one-way media of old.