Slashdot Mirror
Only One Quarter of the Planet To Be Online By 2012
Stony Stevenson writes "Researchers are predicting that one quarter of the world's population will be connected to the internet within the next four years. According to the report by Jupiter Research, the total number of people online will climb to 1.8 billion by 2012, encompassing roughly 25 percent of the planet. The company sees the highest growth rates in areas such as China, Russia, India and Brazil. Overall, the number of users online is predicted to grow by 44 percent in the time period between 2007 and 2012." Is it just me or does that seem incredibly small?
THAT'S WHAT SHE SAID!!!
In other news, 1/3 of the world's population don't have access to clean water and/or enough food. If only they could write about it in their blag.
Isn't that all of us? I thought the Earth was covered by 75% water? iT
But then again, roughly one half of the Earth's population lives on $3 per day or less. I would imagine that their priorities aren't broadband and a laptop. Not dying today from malnutrition might rqank a little higher on their priorities.
OK, I'm going to go completely outside the box for a moment and risk getting mocked for this, but what the hell...
What if we did get people without food and clean water online?
There is enough clean water for everyone. There is enough food for everyone. It isn't getting to the people that need it for various reasons; corruption, war, market failures. The common thread in these is a lack of correct information; corruption involves people deliberately misrepresenting information, war makes it dangerous to collect information, and market failures are normally trigged by bad information.
Areas where people starve are normally pretty opaque to information and that makes it harder to help people. If we were to give people in these areas better means of communication might it help allocate resources to solving the problems of food, water etc? It would be similar to how mobile phones were used to let the world know what was happening in Burma not long ago. Better information means better action.
If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
I think you fail to understand how difficult it is to move out of the sort of extreme and dire poverty that persists in the world.
Try moving to a more abundant farming area, whose inhabitants look upon you as an outsider who is muscling in on their scarce resources.
Try moving from a rural existence, where your food comes from your labours, to the city, where you must buy your food with money. (Where unskilled labour is dirt cheap.
Try getting a passport without spending a large amount of money.
Try getting a visa to Europe or US if you come from Africa.
Before you judge a man, walk a mile in his shoes.
Interesting saying. I'd guess most of those people don't even have shoes.
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.