"Digital Divide" and the role of new media in creating it

Digital divide is a term that refers to the gap between demographics and regions that have access to modern information and communications technology, and those that don't or have restricted access. This technology can include the telephone, television, personal computers and the Internet. In other words it is a term used to describe the discrepancy between people who have access to and the resources to use new information and communication tools, such as the Internet, and people who do not have the resources and access to the technology. The term also describes the discrepancy between those who have the skills, knowledge and abilities to use the technologies and those who do not. The digital divide can exist between those living in rural areas and those living in urban areas, between the educated and uneducated, between economic classes, and on a global scale between more and less industrially developed nations.

Well before the late 20th century, digital divide referred chiefly to the division between those with and without telephone access; after the late 1990s the term began to be used mainly to describe the split between those with and without Internet access, particularly broadband.

The digital divide typically exists between those in cities and those in rural areas; between the educated and the uneducated; between socioeconomic groups; and, globally, between the more and less industrially developed nations. Even among populations with some access to technology, the digital divide can be evident in the form of lower-performance computers, lower-speed wireless connections, lower-priced connections such as dial-up, and limited access to subscription-based content. ‘Digital divide’ divides the society into two i.e. information rich and the information poor.

The convergence of new media technologies, digitization, computerization and high-speed data transfer create new pathways for the transmission, exchange and storage of both existing and new forms of information and entertainment. But these technologies have played important role in creating a digital divide in the society rather than creating the society into a well networked society. With the technology continually advancing, the issue of the "digital divide" cannot be ignored. In our society, where the distribution of wealth is already heavily unbalanced, access to computers and the Internet is unbalancing the situation even more. Those with computers and access to the Internet are becoming even richer through the power of information, while those without them are becoming even poorer in comparison thereby creating a knowledge gap in the society.  As technologies are emerging day by day this knowledge gap in the society is expanding instead of decreasing.

With socio-economic divisions already present in today's society, the digital divide is compounding the effects. It is not just the cost of new media technologies that results in the digital divide, but also the presence of widespread illiteracy among overlooked populations. 
The society needs to change its attitude towards new and emerging technologies. Rather than perceiving new media technologies as a superfluous luxury, the public should view them as crucial necessities. The public must come to realize the incredible power of new technologies and embrace them as tools for their future and the future of their children.

Negative impact of new media on society

Previously I wrote about how new media has made our life easier and has helped in shaping the society. But just like there is two sides to a coin new media also has two sides that is it has both positive and negative effects on the society. New media technologies have created some challenges and made our lives more complicated than we imagined.  We have become consumed by these technologies that we have lost interpersonal communication among our family, friends and professional colleagues. The person who watches television does not interact with anyone while watching television. Robert Putnam who is best known for his work called,” Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community”. In this book Putnam shows how we have (mainly referring to the American citizens) become increasingly disconnected from family, friends, neighbors, and our democratic structures and the main reason for this is the new media around us.

One of the best examples of new media today are the social networking sites that we use like for instance MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and the list goes on. It’s true that these sites have increased our reach in communicating to the world around us but it surely has also had negative impact on the society. It is because of these sites that today we are more comfortable having a virtual conversation rather than a face to face meet up in the real world. In a way it gives the society a false sense of connection. Social media sites can make it more difficult for us to distinguish between the meaningful relationships we foster in the real world, and the numerous casual relationships formed through social media. By focusing so much of our time and psychic energy on these less meaningful relationships, our most important connections, are weakening.

Another disadvantage of new media (social networking sites) is that encourage people to be more public about their personal lives. Because intimate details of our lives can be posted so easily, users are prone to bypass the filters they might normally employ when talking about their private lives. While most sites allow their users to control who sees the things they've posted, such limitations are often forgotten, can be difficult to control or don't work as well as advertised.

The immediacy provided by social media is available to predators as well as friends. Kids especially are vulnerable to the practice of cyber-bullying in which the perpetrators, anonymously or even posing as people their victims trust, terrorize individuals in front of their peers. The devastation of these online attacks can leave deep mental scars.  The negative psychological effects of media are seen in terms of media changing the people’s outlook on life. New Media has changed the cultural and moral values of society. A majority of the audiences believe in what is depicted by the media. Youngsters and children often tend to mix the reel and the real world under the influence of the mass media.

Any sort of technological advancement, after all, has both its pros and cons in the context of social change. This is especially true when it comes to new media technological advancements. It has a lasting impact on molding cultural attributes—ways of thought, attitude and lifestyles. Whether this impact is healthy or not from the viewpoint of developing a ‘culturally’ sustainable society is a crucial question.