"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.