"Is Google Making the Digital Divide Worse?"

Image courtesy of http://www.forbes.com/sites/cherylsnappconner/2013/09/19/why-even-being-near-a-google-fiber-city-is-good/

This is the title of Michael Brick's thought-provoking article published in Newsweek in February of 2014.  Despite its claims to spread Internet access to everyone far and wide and thus make it essentially a human right, Google just might be exacerbating preexisting social inequality.  Google Fiber, purported to be a savior by bringing information to users at lightning fast rates, and thus bringing jobs, possibilities, public safety, etc., got off to a rocky start:

"When Google came to town in 2011, the company divided the two Kansas Citys spanning the Kansas-Missouri border into "fiber-hoods." To qualify for service, residents in each zone would need to hit a certain percentage (varying by population density) of $10 prepaid registrations. Registration took place online, payable with a credit card. When the deadline arrived in September 2012, the online map of fiber-hoods was largely divided by [racial and ethnic] lines." 

Kansas City's Google Fiber divide. Image courtesy of http://www.wired.com/2012/09/google-fiber-digital-divide/

Until Google figures out a way to include poorer areas in its connectivity plans, it seems that cities fortunate enough to receive a Google Fiber installation will continue to isolate those historically less fortunate.  Brick's concern is that as the U.S. expands its high-speed connectivity, it faces the very real possibility of not just ignoring the less fortunate but creating and maintaining a permanent underclass.

Source:

Michael Brick, "Is Google Making the Digital Divide Worse?",http://www.newsweek.com/2014/02/21/google-making-digital-divide-worse-245546.html

The Digital Divide in South America

As one would expect, the digital divide is not isolated to any single country or continent.  In 2014, Miguel Angel Perez Alvarez wrote an article for Latin American Science website addressing South America's challenge in bridging its technical inequalities.  Perez Alvarez raises some very interesting points that would apply to populations regardless of geography, including what he calls the Civic Value of the Internet: 

"Regarding the cultural order it is necessary to undertake campaigns in all spheres of social life which allow citizens to realize the benefits of Internet access. These contribute to the social construction of well-founded knowledge so that citizens can demand access (at reasonable prices and with modern technologies) for education, health, communication, organization of social life, financial transactions and governmental action."

As we've witnessed with increasing frequency early in the 21st century, access to the Internet means many things to many people.  To naysayers, it is a conduit to video games, pornography, and social media...to others it means--as Alvarez Perez points out--access to educational materials, social movements, and a political voice.  Librarians everywhere should keep in mind that just because patrons aren't spending their time online poring over cutting-edge scientific journals doesn't mean that their time using the Internet isn't productive in its own way.

Researchers can use another valuable tool located on this particular page: an interactive map of South America, the Caribbean, and Mexico which projects the percentage of Internet usage in each country when a computer mouse hovers over it.

Photo courtesy of http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/241297

Source:

Miguel Angel Perez Alvarez, "Latin America's digital divide,' http://latinamericanscience.org/2014/05/latin-americas-digital-divide/