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Govt Says: Internet Is Popular
michaeld writes "The U.S. Dept of Commerce reports that more than half of the nation is now online. In
September 2001, 143 million Americans (54%
of population) were using the Internet -- an
increase of 26 million in thirteen months. 2 million more go online each month. Between August 2000 and September 2001, residential
use of high-speed, broadband service doubled--from about
4 to 11 percent of all individuals, and from 11 to 20
percent of Internet users. ZDNet has commentary as does Reuters, while the government has the Full report."
now what do i do...
The government recently noted that 54% of the population likes to eat.
Sheesh, you reckon it's popular?
Sent from your iPad.
i think the subject needs a little more..er..pizazz. oh, and to keep this on topic-i am suprised..this report is coming out after the whole .com craze. where was this report during 2000? :-)
We are some 80% in .se that has used the internet
and some 60% that does it on a regular basis.
Did I tell you we have digital cellnetworks and use
sms ALOT. etc. Been a while since the US was in the techno-fronteir?
This was not a flamebait. This was just to pointout
how utterly uninteresting statistics like that is.
- To understand recursion, we must first understand recursion -
Lies, damn lies and statistics :-)
--
(if you're still looking for the point, it was back there, in the post. </sig>)
...the online advertising revenue model collapsed, and the total content (fresh, updated content) has imploded to a fraction of what it was 2 years ago, with many sites that were vibrant not placeholders or shells.
Al Gore must be very proud... with inventing the internet and all
Cruise TT
I don't know if 80 000 000 people on AOL is really "on line". It's sad to see that as technolgy advances 'the people' remain in obscurity (ie.: in the hands of companies like AOL and MS) and it the comptres are still mystical boxes not to be tampered with. It makes me think that this headline in a dark ages newspaper would be: Church says God is popular.
--Manuel
"I hate quotations, tell me what you think"
No wonder the cable companies are trying to limit/charge people who use too much bandwidth.
It's probably a massive conspiracy by the RIAA/MPAA trying to stop those evil "pirates".
Enough conspiracies for today anyways.
The Internet isn't really that popular; someone at Microsoft just got confused about the subject of the poll, and sent out some email to the entire company claiming that the government was trying to measure the popularity of .NET.
Knowing how quickly our elected representatives recognise and take advantage of new technologies, how long before we get campaign ads as pop-under and flash ads, or spam? I realize there was some smearing going on in the last presidential primaries, via email, but I expect a bigger role for internet mediums in the upcoming presidential election, perhaps this years congressional elections. I can barely stand this stuff on the TV and radio, the deluge so relentless, how long before I'm hounded on the 'net, too?
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
The interesting thing to me is the extent to which Internet connectivity is (rightly) viewed as an unsupportable luxury in so many households. What I hope to see in the near future is the "normalization" of internet service, to the point where it is included as part of your utility bill. The government could help this along by promoting the idea of, and provideing incentives for, Internet access as a basic right on the level of shelter and food. It's a fascinating time to be alive....
Isn't this really saying that taking a random sample, an individual either does, or does not have access to the internet?
Though that number _includes_ the 33 million AOL users, I think...
So maybe the real number is somewhat less than half?
Seriously, it's obvious at this point that a large number of the population is online to some degree or another, just as it is obvious that broadband use has increased highly in the last couple of years (though not enough to stave off a slew of bankruptcies). The Internet has, for better or worse, gone from just being a playground for those "in the know" to a part of popular culture, with all the dumbing-down that goes along with the change. We just have to deal with it.
We're also probably getting close to the saturation point - I think there will always be about a quarter of the population that doesn't have or necessarily want anything to do with the Internet. So other than people moving to broadband for a few more years, I'd say the days of explosive growth are long gone.
-- Josh Turiel
"2. Do not eat iPod Shuffle."
Though a good percentage would probably be US.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
You know, with all these people on the Web, somebody might be able to figure a way to sell things to them. Just think of the possibilities! We could develop products that cost nothing to deliver! 100% profit! All you'd need is some money to fund the development effort. But I'm sure people would want to get in on the ground floor. This could be BIG!
I've got a bad attitude and karma to burn. Go ahead. Mod me down.
With the same logic, George Bush jr. won the election by a landslide.
54% is nothing.
The subject should read "Almost half of the US population have yet to discover the Internet".
Do you think they've realised that 'Tv' (Television) and the 'car' are also popular, maybe someone should tell them. What a bunch of twats.
Mod me down, fine with me, it's my real karma I try to keep up.
The U.S. Dept of Commerce reports that more than half of the nation is now online
;)
No wonder its so damn laggy today
So is 143 million is 54% of the population then the total population is around 265 million, and given 2 million more apearing on the net every month, that is a monthly increase of approx three-quarters of a percent per month. After a bit of analasys this gives the disturbing figure that in about 195 years over 200% of americans will be on the internet.
Perhaps we should speed up the introduction if IPv6 to compensate for this.
:offtopic: A state of mind usually reserved for friday afternoons.
0101100101101111011101010110110101110101011100110
Okay, while I accept that giving everyone access to the Internet is a good thing, we all recall days when the Internet just seemed unfairly slow, and pages just wouldn't load even on cable modems.
My question is just how able are we to keep up with this increase in usage? The more large video clips are downloaded, and sites with tons of pretty graphics, and the latest quake 3 patch are put up, the more the rest of us feel the strain.
Conclusive proof that the internet is becoming all pervasive. It would also be nice, now, if the government could help facilitate future growth via funded expansion of shared infrastructure. Broadband access is apparently become less readily available and more costly, right at a time when demand for access is increasing. Just as there is a federal highway system, it would be nice to see a federally funded mega-sized inter-state backbone that would ensure bandwidth needs are met in future. The auto industry was the bellweather of the american economy for 50-75 years, but that industry was not responsible for funding the deployment of roads and highways. Similarly, software companies and internet services would greatly benefit from a shared, open infrastructure that ensures all Americans have access. Of course, I'm a Canadian so what do I know? ;)
John Maynard Keynes: "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do?"
Leave it to the US Government to state the obvious is some special report that they spent millions on.
Who cares.
He never claimed to have done so...
Best Slashdot Co
A non-trivial proportion of those people get their internet access via 56k dial-up modems, and certainly their surfing experience would be vastly better with a broadband connection. In addition, 46% of Americans do not yet have access to the internet. While with most forms of technology, not everyone wants to get online, I'd wager that a fair portion of that 46% would like to learn how.
I think there are several things that we as the richest nation on Earth should focus on going forward:
1. Making internet access available to those in the remaining 46% who cannot afford but wish to have access. Perhaps a large campaign to recycle used computers and 56k modems and then donate them along with free monthly access to poor people would be a good start.
2. Improve the broadband experience for those who have gone through it thus far. By this I mean a concerted effort to reduce the delays in getting DSL service and the fiascos related to the @home collapse.
3. Make broadband live up to its claims. Currently, many if not most cable modem users suffer from network congestion and slower-than-advertised download speeds. For me personally, while still much faster than a modem, the frustration I have in the evening when things seem to move at a snail's pace make me yearn for a modem; at least then I can't complain about the service. Probably the best solution is a two-tiered pricing scheme in which light users pay a lower monthly fee but are guaranteed a speed of, say, 768kbps down and in which heavy users (say, over 2 gigs a month) pay a much higher fee. There is little doubt that a small proportion of broadband users slow down cable networks for everyone; and they should have to pay for their heavy usage.
4. Do everything possible to support open standards on the internet. In other words, make web pages browser-agnostic. Avoid using proprietary services such as Microsoft's .NET offerings until the protocols are publicly known and other software vendors (or open source providers) have had a chance to develop products with a compatible feature set.
5. Do not use Microsoft .doc and .xls formats as the basis for document interchange. Not everyone uses Microsoft products, and because of their proprietary nature other software packages cannot offer 100% portability. If a document does not need to be modified, use a PDF file; if it does, use RTF or some other standards-based document type that can be processed by other software. For spreadsheets, use a basic CSV format if it is sufficient or use WK1, which all spreadsheet packages can handle.
Enough rambling. Time for breakfast.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
Maybe this is horror, not humor, but I must laugh here else I'll cry.
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
... why does bandwidth still cost so much? I figured by now that with all the extra fiber that was put in and that just about every home has cable tv or at least phone line that an interenet connection would be just like a phone connection. What is the real hold up? Why does bandwidth cost so much when a phone line doesnt, its the same damn thing! Its just bits traveling over a wire! Where is the costs? I pay my $20(CAN) per month for the phone to get unlimited local use. Why is the net not like this? I just dont understand how it can be so expensive when the phone is the exact same thing!!
An optimist believes we live in the best world possible; a pessimist fears this is true.
I've never liked data presented with statements like "with two million more each month". That simply will not hold as a predictive model, because there is a limited population to work with.
You might as well say, "In three years, we expect that 150% of the population will be online"
Punctanym: alternate spelling of words using punctuation or numerals in place of some or all of its letters; see 'leet'
broadband users doubled in about a year then why are all the broadband companies dying? I'm not trolling. Just asking.
-- This is not a sig
It will be considered invasive, creeping Socialism (or Communism) by RW fringe groups and be shouted down at every corner. Like Flouride in water was during the middle of the last century.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
This just in...
A Dept. of Commerce spokesperson just discovered the Internet. She was quoted today as saying: "The Internet is cool." In her first IRC apperance she posed this notable question to #hackers: "w1LL j00 t34ch m3 t0 h4XX0r?".
-ryan
broadband usage among internet users is up around 50, 60, 70%... So then ISPs will have more of an incentive to offer broadband INSTEAD of dial-up and have a real price war :)
Let's hope that Gore comes back for Round 2, since we all know that you can't go very far without the inventor!
------
Today's Top Deals
But what I find amazing, after all these years, is that 46% of the population is *still NOT* online. What the hell is life like without the goddamn internet? I can't even remember it's been so bloody long. I've been considering chopping up my home systems for recyclable goods and dumping my cable connection for a while now. Digital TV over cable sucks too so what's the point? I think I'll join the other 46%. Or, I would, if I lived in the Yoo Ess.
:wq
Or I could be really bored, have no idea what I'm talking about and feel the need to devote unused brain power to useless endevores.
The story that Al Gore claimed to have invented the Internet has been thoroughly debunked by Phil Agre in http://commons.somewhere.com/rre/2000/RRE.Al.Gore. and.the.Inte.html
and
rebutted further later
That meme was a creation of Declan McCullagh, a "reporter" for Wired News who is politically a dogmatic Libertarian so extreme that he managed to get a book chapter using him as a poster-boy for Libertarian ideologues, and a different book chapter using him as Libertarian joke-fodder.
If you think this is flame-bait, the aspect of his fabricated story being a Liberatarian hit-piece on Al Gore was extensively discussed in a debunking by Salon
After Declan McCullagh was repeatedly taken to task for his hatchet-job, over more than year, by everyone who was there, from Dave Farberto Robert Kahn and Vinton Cerf, Declan finally grudgingly retracted the "story"
But people still repeat it, because urban legends never die.
Sig: What Happened To The Censorware Project (censorware.org)
So Bush's art of simplicity is trickling down to government reports that "People Use Internet".
;)
Seriously... I voted for Bush, and think he's doing quite a good job (not perfect, but compared to slick willy... excellent).. it's titles like this that question his administration's competance, though
-- Is "Sig" copyrighted by www.sig.com?
Popularity is the main ingredient required for the politicians to really start thinking about that 3 letter word..... tax.
In related news, the Government also declared that the Sky is Blue, Bill Gates is Rich, and that Governments spend money on obvious surveys.
Kind thoughts do not change the world
But I will say that: knowing how your car works can make driving a more enjoyable experience, knowing how to cook can make dining a more enjoyable experience, knowing carpentry can help you appreciate the work that went into the chair you are sitting (and perhaps appreciate it more).
I think that knowing more about the technical side, even if not being a guru - just being a step above "Duh...", can make computing a more enjoyable experience. I think people who blindly use MS (and Mac) and AOL, for example, may be missing out - they may not realize the potential that their computers and the internet are actually offering them. They're living their computing lives with blinders on.
Before anyone jumps on me, note that I DID NOT say that if you use MS or MacOS or AOL that you are NOT realizing what more you can do, I'm saying there are a good number of people who aren't.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
I sat down the other day and thought about the internet and its part in my life and I realised, maybe for the first time, how utterly indispensible its become. I mean, its the first invention or "fad" in my lifetime that has generated interest and worked its way into my life in such a way that I would genuinely have difficulty if it was taken away. Nothing else has done this: not sega game consoles, or compact disks, or satellite tv or whatever.
Its in everypart of my life: I communicate with it, I play on it, I shop on it, I learn from it, I work with it.
It is uniquely useful - you can learn entire programming languages, and probably spoken languages, from deja. The other day I found a page which listed streaming russian tv stations for my homesick wife. Almost any piece of information you can think of is a google search away. And you can even publish your own brand of idiocy for (potentially) every person on the planet to read!! Good god. The idea of life without the internet frightens me...
Is there any wonder its becoming so popular.
http://www.davetansley.com - you proba
Thanks Captain Obvious...
Through the entire internet and PC revolution, I have always looked at it as a double edged sword... bringing computers and such to the masses was one of the best things that could happen, because it brought us the much needed funding, rather than making it a hobbyist toy, and thus, advancing it further. But on the flip side... In order to make it appeal to the common person, they had to "dumb" a lot of it down. I believe we could be farther along if that wern't the case... or could we?
------
"And may your days be long upon the earth."
that was really funny. In a way, it broadcasts the tragic stupidity of those who hate libertarians so much they are willing to (required to?) lie and slander in order to disparage them...
:)
the code-is-law paper was less funny; rather, simply incoherent. Looked like something written by a brittany spears fan. or someone witha serious agenda and little time to proofread (like me
Anyway it was an excellent troll, and congratulations on getting modded up for it. Just enough truth to trick some clueless asshole moderators into letting you slip the bullshit through as well.
At least 90% of the people that I know use the internet. I'm sure many of you would say the same. I think it would therefore be logical to conclude that there must be a number of communities in the US where 10% or less of the people use the internet.
If we want to make further gains in percentage connectivity, it would probably be useful to focus on these communities where internet use is virtually nonexistent.
"If I could live to be several hundred
I could take a walk and really wander, really wonder."
Did we really need the government to tell us this?
okay I am not a bush supporter but to say he is doing a better job than Clinton is craziness. All of Clinton's misdoing aside he was an excellent president who lead us to an 8 year period of prosperity after removing us from the mess created by Reagan that GWB's father could not fix. He was a president who did not really do much but he was a good leader and managed to keep the government in check. GWB on the other hand has cut taxes abd government spending, but based on a projected surplus that does not exist and he will through us into deficit and eventually cause devaluation of our currency. Instead of pumping federal money into our economy to revive it he gives it back to the people who for the large part will not spend it meaning government spending would be more effective. We have not seen what really must be done, that is an overhaul of our government organizations using corporate efficiency experts, instead we see the same inefficient government. What do we see, high unemployment rates, GWB killing programs that help small industry, cutting the funding of research, and a war that Bush is using to cover up the problems. Hell this whole war thing is the best thing ever for George Bush because it is getting people to accept his leadership. Oh and by the way if Clinton, Reagan or either of the Bushes had been on their feet and had helped reorganize Afganistan after the whole Soviet war of 1980 we would not have had this problem. In addition to this Bush met with General Masoud of the Northern Alliance long before September 11 and was given a plea for aid and also a message that the Taliban would terrorize the US and other Nations that did not follow its fundamentalism. Bush did not listen, on November 4 a human bomb killed Masoud, and 7 days later we were attacked. Piece of advice listen to other countries they might be in turmoil we tried for many years to avoid this then sat on our asses when the threat never came and we got burned like in WWII with Pearl Harbor, be aware of your enemies you dolt.
I have some karma to burn as well...
Plus aren't we all happy that he has been reduced to wearing a beard and wearing earth tones.
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
I realy didn't mean that... im just a fucker without a brain, btw annyone got 50m3 w4r3z...d00d 1 w4n1 w1nd0w5
This is good to know. This is a number that you need if you're thinking about Doing Something On The Internet - half the US can *possibly* get to you. This is not trivial info, though I doubt we had to wait for the Gummint to tell us this.
Frinstance - you want to open a bookstore. 50% of the people you want to sell to can click into your store. 100% of the people can head thru the door of a meatspace store. Your call. Jeff? Jeff? Anyone? Anyone?
If you hang around techie sites long enough, you'd think everyone who matters has it, and anyone who doesn't is a mouthbreathing fool. T'ain't so. Apparently upwards of 100 million first-world citizens get along just nicely, thank you very much without direct access to the net.
Though I get paid to deal with it on an hourly basis, I can easily see going back to 1970's time by removing my cell, laptop, fax, and voicemail, and pretty much not only living a full life and probably getting more of the 'real' life things done too.
Sounds vaguely luddite, but it's really only a reality check.
Of course, if I weren't online, I'd be muttering all this rant to the cat. Sad. Especially for the poor cat.
And remember - there are more houses with televisions than telephones, cuz you have to pay for the phone once it's in - and ditto^2 online access. Anyone have a good reason why an internet box of any sort would ever move up from third place?
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Everyone knows that 82% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
It's ironic that at Employment and Economic Assistance they now ask email for addresses, and half the folks on welfare seem to have cell phones. Oh how "life's necessities" change over time! I guess some things are more important than food... or housing...
Those that suggest you "dance like no one is watching" really want to see you make a complete fool of yourself.
Duh!
Somebody set up us the bomb! For great justice!
The thing is, we're still doing 100+ installs a day, average. We keep scratching our heads thinking, "It's gotta slow down sometime, doesn't it??" But it doesn't. We had our biggest install month ever a few months ago, and we've been in operation for nearly 5 years. We even figured when dsl came to town that it would slow us down, but it didn't touch us.
Other than having a much higher service quality than other broadband isp's, we don't really offer anything that unusual, no huge discounts for signing up, not anything significant in the way of coupons, no huge promotional deals. If anything, we have to avoid that type of thing just to keep it down to 100 installs a day.
"I can be self-referential if I want to," said Tom, swiftly.
Government studies indicate that water is wet! More on this story at 6.
"I'm not a procrastinator, I'm temporally challenged"
I'm not an elitist. Far from it actually. The first time I saw the nonsense about the digital divide I was furious. Just another way for the government to spend my money on something that people will vandalize and not care for. If you don't work for it, you don't value it.
;)
I'm sorry but computers are not a necessity. I see Internet Access like I do Cable. Its nice but you don't need it to survive. I work for a local ISP and I sure as hell don't want the government getting involved in how we do our pricing/marketing/etc. And if I had to help every idiot on the planet I wouldn't do this job. Computers knowledge doesn't seem to correspond to income level. I've even met Cisco Engineers who were stumped by a dialup connection. I've had problems with every ethnic group out there. Foreign born and made in America. Age has some importance but not much. At least older people listen to you and will talk to you!! The only group I can swear seems to have NO brain at all are liberal arts majors still in college. These are the same people screaming for internet access for all because they feel guilty that they can afford it.
I grew up poor. I'm not afraid to talk about that. And my only access to computers (Macs and Apple IIs) was at school until 1992 when my engineer uncle gave us his 1981 IBM PC after he bought a 386. It was upgraded as much as you could. We had a 300 baud modem that we used to call the local bbs and did email with it. I did all my high school math assignments on the computer by writing the programs in basic. This was allowed as you had to know how the formula worked in order to write the program for it. I just had to submit the program with my homework and one problem done by hand. My parents saved up and bought a 486 almost 2 years later. The relic was given to a friend of mine who was also in a bad financial place. He's now a Computer Animator and finished school a few years ago. Apparently the computer was better for him than me cause I'm still working through school.
If a private, non-profit were to start up and refurbish old computers and give them away, I'd definately volunteer my time/money/effort for them. Just don't use my tax dollars to fix something that not only isn't broken but doesn't exist.
that 99% of these 54% are using Microsoft products to access the Internet.
Stop worrying about the risks of nuclear power and start worrying about the risks of not using nuclear power.
Someone at my university got funding to do a survey into why more married-with-children students don't go on foreign studies semesters.
I'm thinking about applying to do a survey into why there aren't many high school students at universities.
I'd rather have someone respond than be modded up.
Or haven't you noticed every politician using "God bless America" as a salutation?
Opinion polls almost always find that a vast majority of Americans believe in God.
And remember the scene in Contact where Jody Foster doesn't get selected to visit the aliens (at first) because she doesn't believe in God, thereby making her unpopular?
Etc. etc.
-jimbo
XML Tools for Mac OS X
more proof that our government is "Master of the Obvious"
There's no "I" in Linux.. err..
Did the 'net get SlashDotted today?
Oh, maybe not; I think they forgot to include a URL for this Internet thing. I'll post the "root URL" here:
http://
Don't everybody visit at once.
-me
Love many, trust a few, do harm to none.
Declan McCullagh also lurked in the LiViD newsgroup during its early days, writing a wired story about "rampemt DVD piracy software" with the full knowledge that DeCSS and cssauth were being used to develop a GNU/Linux DVD player and that absolutely no pircacy was going on, anywhere (at that time). This was before burnable DVDs, before DivX, in short, before such piracy was even technically feasable even with easy decryption (without a $4000 DVD burner that could copy DVDs without decrypting them ... unlike later models following the start of the DeCSS court case). His actions were directly responsible for legal troubles by numerous early developers, some of whome were forced to drop out of the project and discontinue their work.
If you do not believe me, feel free to perus the LiViD mailing list archives. The entire ugly incident is well documented in the public record. His behavior was appalling and reprehensible, and very destructive to a number of free software volunteers. Yes, we now have free players galore, but at some great personal cost to a number of volunteers thanks to Declan's yellow journalistic tendencies.
What is even more interesting is the number of articles on slashdot that, when posted, mentioned Declan McCullagh as the author by name (effectively promoting his fame), in direct contrast to nearly every other article posted on slashdot then and now. Clearly, for a time at least, he had a cordial relationship with some influencial folks at slashdot despite his reprehensible behavior vis-avis the LiViD project, and despite posts and emails by myself and others trying to get the word out about his behavior wrt LiViD (and quite likely others). Hopefully this has changed, but for the public record, I feel it is important the free software enthusiasts know about this little chapter in LiViD's history, and the casualties and personal losses that resulted.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
and in other news the head of the FBI stated that "wrestling is fixed", and a former member of the baywatch cast was heard, while referring to Pamela Anderson, state that "they arn't real!".
I stole this Sig
a 17 billion dollar government funded research grant. Your tax dollars at work.
Children and teenagers are leading the way. Ninety percent (or 47.4 million) of children between the ages of 5 and 17 now use computers at home and at school; 75% percent of 14- to 17-year-olds, and 65 percent of 10- to 13-year-olds use the Internet. Households with children under the age of 18 are more likely to access the Internet (62.2 percent) than households with no children (53.2 percent).
Looks to me like a lot of those figures are based on kids using the library computer at school. Most other use can be attributed to people who have internet connections at work. The rest to people who have an AOL account, and aren't *really* on the internet per se.
Then you have to give some thought to what it is people use their internet connection for, if they even use it regularly. I'd assume if they do use it regularly it would be for email.
Which leaves us, with... well, us. I still think there are an extraordinary amount of people who aren't getting the real internet "experience", if they're even getting past their AOL chatrooms or Hotmail accounts.
This is not a flame, this is not a troll. I'm just trying to say that the numbers aren't always what they appear to be.
The numbers are more like 60% - 55%-69% depending on the major market. Then again we don't survey rural areas, which probably results in the government's numbers.
And that doesn't include dumb people who say they don't use the internet - they only get on the computer to check email. Those people I have to mark down as not using the internet.
And some people use the internet, but only for work purposes, they do nothing else on it. And a surprising amount of richer people don't do internet at all.
And none of the privacy advocates are surveyed, as most of them don't respond to telephone surveys, or have privacy block on their phones. So none of those people are in the numbers.
-- Ender, Duke_of_URL
I think there are several things that we as the richest nation on Earth should focus on going forward:
Those are good ideas, not really even controversial, but...
Why should every inequality, even ones that aren't enforced by coercion (e.g. as was the case with racism), turn into some kind of socialist agenda?
I don't have sex as often as I would like. Should there be a national agenda to assist the under-sexed? Does that mean that American chicks should "help" me? Swell!
Just as I can get off my ass and lose the beer belly and .. *shudder* go to singles bars or whatever, if I really wanted to, people who aren't on the 'Net can damn well spend their next paycheck on a computer, instead of a bigscreen TV ,or crack, or a quit buying $7 popcorn at movie theaters for a year, or whatever else it is that they spend their money on. It's just about priorities, that's all. Computers and 'Net access are very affordable in America, and we don't need to do anything about it at a national level.
I hear the government used an online survey on their web page in order to gather these statistics...
I don't think that the amount of those is terribly significant.. i'm sure they exist but despite the opinion of a lot of urbanites, farmers and other rurals use computers a good deal - the dumb farmer is no more accurate a stereotype than the pimply engineer that can't get a date with anyone but himself...
Saying 46% of Americans don't use the internet doesn't imply that 46% of homes don't have it. I'm sure there are homes where not everyone uses the computer... the general online kid with a parent or two who don't know where the "any" key is.
********************
I object to Intellect without Discipline.
Show me a 'meatspace' store where 100% of the US population has the ability to go into it, EVER, let alone any time and without leaving their home.
Unless you include Starbucks, nothing even comes close. Add the duplication and waste in setting up several thousand copies of the exact same store.. you're talking apples and oranges.
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
are hopefully using the Internet to look at porn.
Being a computer geek is an act of terrorism, so you can't go looking for security notices. Working on Open Source is Unamerican, so you can't be off browsing CVS trees. Listening to Indy Artist X's music before buying tickets to their concert is Piracy, so you can't download MP3's either.
Looking at smut is about the only moral use of the Internet, according to the media.
"Look at me, I invented the stove!" -- Ben Franklin
The government could help this along by promoting the idea of, and provideing incentives for, Internet access as a basic right on the level of shelter and food. It's a fascinating time to be alive....
Let me guess.... you haven't been alive for very long.
Humans, on average, can survive a few days without water, a few weeks without food, and around 70 years without internet access.
-CausticPuppy "Of all the people I know, you're certainly one of them." -Somebody I don't know
Govt Says: Internet is Popular
Population Says: No shit
AOL, what a great service. What else could you want besides a spyware captive program, ads while you read your mail and directed, unsolicited marketing? How about the fact that AOL makes more money off the advertising side of is business, selling the AOHell losers' info and eyeballs. It should be a crime for AOL to actually charge for its service.
The biggest trick the devil pulled was letting lawyers become politicians so they can write the laws.
Well, DUHHHHHHHHHHHHH! :)
Steve Magruder, Metro Foodist
Yeah, sure, we're online. But how safe are most of the schmucks running M$ products? The Edge Report has posted an interesting article talking about the national security implications of closed source software. While the infiltration of Microsoft by Al Qaeda may have been only a rumor, the article explores a world where this could happen. And guess what? We're living in it. It closes with a powerful statement: "Closed source software vendors, in the name of National Security: Open your Code!".
http://www.edgereport.com/article.php?sid=135
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So _that's_ why windows crashes all the time.
Now I just need to find the dipstick, filter and fill tube.
In related news, the government also said today that liquid water has officially been determined to be wet. Experts predict that other testing will show that grass is green and the sky is blue, but industry pundits are divided on the actual hues involved.
In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet and say to us, Make us your slaves, but feed us. - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
What percentage of the population was surveyed? 137,000 individuals and 57,000 households (I assume they only spoke to one person in each of those households), so we're talking about less than 200,000 people. That's less than 0.07% of the population. I'm sure their survey of less than 0.1% of the population is representative of the 99.93% they know nothing about.
Why do people accept these reports as hard facts? The thing that really kills me is the moron who began his comment by calling this "conclusive proof." This isn't conclusive proof of anything other than some government agency had to produce a report to justify some funding.
BT - bunch of to**ers.
Mj
"Govt Says: Internet Is Popular"
So how do I mod the Govt down as "-1 Redundant" ???
Graspee
Just as with anything else, I have the right to try to acquire Internet service.
The problem with calling "connectivity" a right is because it creates an obligation on someone else to provide it to you.
If someone is obligated to provide you with their labor, that is called slavery.
Freedom means that you might not get what you want all the time. That's your problem, you must provide for your own success. If you don't, and you loose "connectivity", don't blame someone else for your lack of foresight.
Bob-
The Ludwig von Mises Institute. The reasoning individuals economics
Stop spouting the fabricated 'digital divide' nonsense.
Dumb, dumb and more dumb fabricated crisis stories to sell newspapers/tv time.
/. readers lookout for more fabricated crisis stories.
I'm using "Allah Bless America," myself.
Next week: "Godess Bless America!"
Feh! Any God who's into Nationalism ain't got my vote.
Opinion polls almost always find that a vast majority of Americans believe in God.
Polls also show that a vast majority of Americans feel the need to give pollsters an answer they'll like.
Superstition has had its day. Spend a few CPU cycles and come up with answers that don't end with "And then, the Gods just up and did it."