This report is about the digital divide, which means the gap between those people who can get information and those who cant through the modern communication technologies like internet. Well, the topic of my report is`closing the digital divide` and in this report I have pointed out various steps that have been taken and still needed to be taken for filling this growing information gap between the countries. It is believed that the digital divide may lead to wider gap between the societies and countries. So, in order to close this increasing gap a lot of work has been made. However, a lot of work still needs to be done.
Well, the main reason for this gap is that in the west people have an easy access to the internet compared to those who live in the other parts of the world. However, this situation does exist with in developed countries as all people are not able to use internet because of their income level, availability of services, their age and lack of knowledge.
The major barriers to the equal access of internet in the world are the difference in the amount of price charges for these services such as in a country like Finland it is available for free to a large no. of population where as in developing countries one has to pay. Secondly, such technologies is mainly available in developed countries, as according to some research, world`s 80% of population belongs to the developed countries. Thirdly, since a large no. of people in the developing countries are uneducated so they don`t know how to use the computers. And lastly, as the computers are quite costly, so those who have low income can`t afford to buy it.
Well, several steps have been taken to fill this digital gap and provide internet access to more and more people worldwide. Such as .
In India , a minicomputer called simputer has been developed which is very easy to use and carry, quite cheap only for 200dollars and very useful even for those who cant read and write since it has a text to speech function which translates all a web page into any regional language.