Week 10 Reading Reflection

Week ten’s reading, Beyond Access: Understanding the digital divide by Andy Carvin, basically discussed (as its name suggests!) the digital divide. It detailed how the digital divide is largely due to differences in education and income. It raised the interesting idea that the digital divide isn’t just about access but about literacy/language/technology skills, creation of content and community technological infrastructures. I think this is something important that requires attention. It means that even if someone has access to a computer and the Internet they may still be disadvantaged in the fact that they can’t read, are unable to differentiate credible information from the rubbish or no culturally relevant content is available to them. For example, the Internet is 87% English and certain language scripts are not supported in Web text. So even if someone had access to the Internet how ‘accessible’ is it really?