The internal systems of our online world are growing at a startlingly rapid rate. It seems that almost daily, a new social networking site or application emerges to facilitate quicker, more personal, and more multifaceted communication between users; a new entertainment media site enters the public consciousness, offering faster access and broader offerings; a new consumer service knocks out the competition with a more innovative, comprehensive customer mechanism. Every day, these advancement create more interactive, thorough, and personalized experiences for users. Yet while these internal systems become increasingly efficient, complex, and user-friendly, the internet's external reach remains staggeringly low.
According to 2009 statistics on World Internet Usage, less than a quarter of the world's population has internet access. Additionally, of the one billion internet users, 81% live in only 20 of the roughly 240 countries and territories worldwide.Although the US constitutes just 4.6% of the world population, 69% of US citizens are internet users; on the other hand, while Africa represents 14% of the world population, a mere 3% enjoy internet access. Population data projects that, in just 40 years, our world population will exceed 9 billion, with a large percentage of the growth focused in developing countries. Therefore, on our current track, an even smaller percentage of the global community will have access to the internet. Clearly, the internet is growing internally at an exponential rate, but so too is the disparity growing between the internet and global communities.
In The Long Tail, Chris Anderson celebrates the internet as a source of diversity, moving away from the insular world of hits to a more inclusive collection of media. He argues that, as long as a few users in the world show interest in a song or movie, it has value in the online arena. Therefore, the internet supposedly represents the collective tastes of many rather than the popular tastes of a few. Yet how can a system that engages less than 25% of its potential audience claim to be "inclusive"? How can a system with 68% English content call itself "diverse"?
I am not suggesting that our programmers and technicians halt their innovative processes and cease the creation of exciting, interactive advances in internal web systems. Rather, I hope to draw attention to a disturbing trend: internal growth within a limited external scope. As globalization draws the far reaches of our world closer, we must capitalize on systems to facilitate this process. The internet offers an excellent platform for global exchange, communication, and education, but it must expand to encompass more of the authentic global community.
Fortunately, the picture is not entirely bleak. Several companies - whether motivated by social awareness or market opportunity - are seeking to address this disparity and incorporate the developing world online. Companies like PacStar, Cisco, Nortel, IBM, Microsoft, Intel, HP, and AMD are developing technologies and systems to engage these underrepresented markets. But change needs to come from the policy end as well. International political leaders must recognize internet usage disparity as problem affecting our educational, business, and social systems and accept this disparity as a global failure that we all have responsibility to rectify.
Here, I have only drawn attention to the problem, but have yet to identify actionable solutions. I encourage those of us in the fortunate quarter of the world's population to leverage the advanced internal processes we have developed to brainstorm, discuss, and suggest such actionable solutions, petition our politicians to recognize the issue, and help ensure that our generation will see the internet evolve into a truly inclusive and diverse resource. I look forward to hearing your ideas...
Sources:
World Internet Usage Statistics
"Bringing the World Together Online" article from Iron Horse Ventures
No comments:
Post a Comment