[WEB4LIB] Re:Digital Divide (was Re: RE: Questia: who is behind

[Andrew Cunningham]

Quoting Tony Barry <me at Tony-Barry.emu.id.au>:

> 
> The digital divide is between the first world and the third world. In 
> rich countries like the US and Australia (my country) the poor have a 
> chance to get access via public libraries and other institutions. But 
> the bulk of the world's population hasn't even got a phone let alone 
> internet access.

they can access access the internet via public libraries?

>From my experience of working in Australian public libraries, i'd suggest that 
they'd be able to access parts of the internet. There are severe limits on what 
is available .. let alone discussing bandwidth limitations ...

put to address your points below ... poverty isn't the only mechanism that 
excludes ...

in australian public libraries the work on mainstreaming the internet is only 
just getting underway, after many years of various people working behind the 
scenes ... 

additional barriers (other than poverty) that can have major impacts include ... 
 langauge and literacy barriers, visual impairments, motor cordination 
impairments, low technological literacy levels , deafness (I include this one 
because the primary language of deaf people is sign language, english if know at 
all is a second acquired language that they may not be literate in ... some 
interesting research going on in this area)

some of these problems coexist in a number of cases ... for example the horn of 
african community in the western suburbs of melbourne (australia) speak a range 
of languages ... sections of the community have low levels of english literacy, 
IT literacy is low ... print materials in libraries in Amharic, Tigrinya and 
oromo are non-existent ... most libraries in the region are not set up to 
support internet access to resources using teh Ethiopic script ... Microsoft in 
windows 2000 does not support the Ethiopic script ... the public libraries in 
teh region do not provide access to audio on the internet .. so that they cannot 
access the digitized radio programs in Amharic from D.W. 

and since most interfaces for public internet access in australian librraies is 
in English ...  *shrugs* ...

How does a blind person access the internet in their local public library?  Only 
some Victorian public libraries have Jaws ...

until resources are accessible in a practical sense to anyone in the australian 
community ... I doubt you can really justify the assertian that the digital 
divide is between the first world and the third world ...



> 
> Let's remember folks we are talking about the world, not just the 
> relatively poor in the rich countries. From where the bulk of the 
> world's population sits the poor in the first world are pretty 
> comfortable. For instance they don't face the risk of starvation or 
> an AIDS epidemic which in Africa and Asia will have an effect as 
> ghastly as the Black Death.






Andrew Cunningham
Multilingual Technical Project Officer
Vicnet, State Library of Victoria
andrewc at vicnet.net.au