Friday, May 26, 2006
Digitally divided
There's a risk when studying new media technologies that we quickly become advocates for all things new without giving proper consideration to the negative effects. The BBC has a short news article on a trial analogue switch off, in which it was discovered that particular groups in society had the biggest problems when faced with switching to digital TV. The elderly and those facing financial difficulty are both affected.
NMTs are more accessible to younger and more affluent members of society, so those claims for the democratic powers of blogging, self- web-publishing, podcasting and so on should all be considered in the context of a society in which only 10 million people have home broadband access. When you're using the technology, it's sometimes difficult to image those that aren't. Switching off the analogue signal will happen, but it may leave a significant minority experiencing exclusion, rather than the promised riches of a multi-channel, interactive platform.
NMTs are more accessible to younger and more affluent members of society, so those claims for the democratic powers of blogging, self- web-publishing, podcasting and so on should all be considered in the context of a society in which only 10 million people have home broadband access. When you're using the technology, it's sometimes difficult to image those that aren't. Switching off the analogue signal will happen, but it may leave a significant minority experiencing exclusion, rather than the promised riches of a multi-channel, interactive platform.
// posted by Gavin Luhrs @ 8:30 pm 
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