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TAD Consortium September 2000 Information Update 1
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CONTENTS
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NEWS/TRENDS
--- Online banner ads are drawing
customers
--- Wired youth are devouring media
--- Ecommerce needs momentum in Uruguay
--- Taking A Second Look At Plagiarism
--- Indonesia To Review
Ban On Foreign Internet Investors
--- Sweden
Finishes On Top in Second Annual PoliticsOnline/AMSU Net Intelligence Test of EU
Government
--- Mandela doccie nominated for Emmy
--- Slum dwellers to have access to IT
PROFILED ORGANIZATIONS
ONLINE RESOURCES
--- Lifelong learning: some food
for thought
--- Documenting a
Democracy: Australia's Story [.RTF, .PDF, Word]
--- Teaching
Resources and Materials for Social Scientists (TRAMMS)
--- The Five Paragraph Essay
--- Facts About Privacy and Cyberspace
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Proceedings of the International Conference on Learning with Technology
ARTICLES
--- Ten Ways to make the
most of your Internet connectivity time
--- Printed Page Beats Pc
Screen For Reading, Study Finds
--- Content and the
Digital Divide: What Do People Want?
TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS
--- New Technology
Bridges The Gap Between Paper And Pixels
--- SIMPUTER
: A break through in Computer Technology by Indian scientists to help non-literate users
to surf the Net
--- Storage Update
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NEWS/TRENDS
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Taken from Nua Internet Surveys: August 8th, 2000
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Add Knowledge: Online banner ads are drawing customers
Contrary to popular belief, online adverts are drawing surfers to web sites. A new report from AdKnowledge has revealed that 60 percent of customers who buy or register on a website after clicking on a banner ad do so within 30 minutes of clicking. Another 30 percent converted within a week.
The 'Q2 Online Advertising Report' measures the time lapse between a user's click on a web ad to the time of sale or registration on the linked site.
Portal keyword placements were the most effective form of advertising online. Run of Network (RON) and Run of Site (ROS) placements also showed greater click rate averages on ad networks and heavy-content sites compared to portals.
According to AdKnowledge, CPM rates (cost per 1,000 ads shown) are remaining comparable to last year's figures, and they continue to remain constant for the last quarter, standing at USD34.34. This stability has come at a time when the number of websites selling ads rose by 13 percent.
http://www.adknowledge.com/corporate/press/pr_073100_q2oar.html
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Taken from Nua Internet Surveys: August 8th, 2000
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Simmons Market Research Bureau: Wired youth are devouring media
American children consume more media than their counterparts around the world. This is according to the Simmons Market Research Bureau, which found that kids in the US today cannot imagine life before the Internet.
Simmons MRB says that these children are pushing trends in the Internet and media sectors. The 'Simmons Kids Study' surveyed 5,000 children aged between 6 and 11 across the US.
Children with Internet access watch more TV than those without access and are also more likely to go to the cinema and read magazines. Online kids are also more involved in sports activities.
The preferred software for wired children included games (57 percent), word processing (49 percent), and email (28 percent).
The children of the Internet generation are expected to be high achievers, with 80 percent of those online hoping to go to university.
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Taken from Nua Internet Surveys: August 8th, 2000
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Stephen Moston: Ecommerce needs momentum in Uruguay
The number of Uruguayan companies engaged in ecommerce has risen by 250 percent since 1998. According to a new study from Uruguayan Internet expert, Dr Stephen Moston, 27 percent of businesses with a website now offer consumers a method of buying online, up from 8 percent two years ago.
Although the rise looks positive, many issues in relation to customer needs and web strategy still need to be addressed.
Online security is a major concern for consumers as payment systems are seen as simplistic or insecure. Most sites ask customers to submit order and credit card details via email.
Forty-eight of the sites studied by Dr Moston contained information about the prices of goods and services, up 6 percent since 1998. Hotels represented 42 percent of those offering ecommerce services, with home goods suppliers close by at 40 percent. The computing industry and ISPs lagged far behind, representing only 11 percent of ecommerce websites.
Three major problems were identified by the study. Stores have only a small selection of goods or services available online. Sites do not offer competitive pricing, meaning customers can obtain cheaper goods overseas. Finally, the ordering systems are inadequate for ecommerce, as they lack security.
If ecommerce in Uruguay is to emulate the success of the global online ecommerce industry, businesses must identify the factors driving consumers online, and then design sites with those customer requirements in mind.The study, 'Uruguayan Businesses and the Internet 2000', surveyed leading businesses and analysed the top 100 websites.
http://chasque.apc.org/moston/
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Taken from NEWS-ON-NEWS/The Ifra Trend Report: No. 55 (9 August 2000)
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TAKING A SECOND LOOK AT PLAGIARISM
(USA) -- New technologies have not only altered the face of publishing, they may be changing the meaning of some of journalism's fundamental tenets, according to San Antonio (Texas, U.S.) Express-News editor Robert Rivard. Global pressures, rapid-fast communications and access to the Internet have journalists "thrashing around" to "make our management policies catch up to the technologies," he said. For instance, recent instances of plagiarism in American newspapers aren't necessarily deliberately malevolent, he said, they're often the result of "the merging of data." Jerry Ceppos, president of the Associated Press Managing Editors organization agreed there are "a lot of grays" in deciding what is and isn't plagiarism. And Roy Peter Clark of the Poynter Center for Media Studies allows for varying degrees and intensity of the fault, noting, that "plagiarism is not like pregnancy. You can be a little plagiaristic." Clark said in the face of new technologies, journalists are challenged to decide if they must redefine what is in the public domain -- to "revisit all the important standards cyclically [and] be willing to adjust them in the light ... of the complex and overwhelming development of new media technologies." (Boston Globe 27 July 2000)
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/209/living/Plagiarism_s_many_shades_of_gray-.shtml
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Copyright © 2000 AFP -- Agence France-Presse
Thursday, August 10 11:39 AM SGT
INDONESIA TO REVIEW BAN ON FOREIGN INTERNET INVESTORS
JAKARTA, Aug 10 (AFP)
The Indonesian government will hold an inter-ministerial meeting next week to review the ban on foreign investors entering the domestic Internet sector, the Bisnis Indonesia daily said Thursday.
Hidayatullah Suralaga, deputy head of Investment Policy and Planning at the Investment and State Enterprise Ministry, said the meeting would review last week's decree, which effectively put a stop to any further foreign investment in the multimedia sector.
"But I cannot promise anything on its outcome. What is clear is whether the government will reopen or keep it (the Internet sector) closed...will be decided next week," Suralaga said.The meeting was called following widespread objection to the decree from several Internet companies."The government is always responsive to business needs," Suralaga was quoted by the Jakarta Post as saying.
The presidential decree, issued on July 20, states foreign companies are banned from investing in all Internet services including access and content providers, portals and e-mail commerce service companies.On Monday, Riza Primadi, a senior assistant to the Minister of Investment and State Enterprises said the ban would not apply to foreign investors already in the country but would bar new entrants.Most major Internet companies based in Indonesia are jointly owned by local and foreign firms.
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Sweden Finishes On Top in Second Annual PoliticsOnline/AMSU Net Intelligence Test of EU Government
Amsterdam -- Swedish government sites were rated best in the European Union by the second Internet Intelligence study conducted by the Amsterdam-Maastricht Summer University in conjunction with PoliticsOnline, Inc.
"This study showed that the governments of the EU have taken the Internet seriously and are making a real effort to use it effectively," said Phil Noble, president of PoliticsOnline and one of the study's supervisors. "We are a long way from seeing truly interactive government but things are headed in the right direction."
Sweden scored 78 out of a total of 100 possible points, followed by England at 73. France dropped from a first place to the sixth, while The Netherlands reached the fifth spot at 65.
Complete results of the study are available at: http://www.politicsonline.com/specialreports/000808/eusurvey.asp.
The Internet Test was designed and conducted by Noble, Dutch political consultant Jacques Monasch, and Bernhard Lehmann von Weyhe of Saarbruecken University, Germany, and students in the University's course Political Campaigns, the Internet and Democracy. Websites of prime ministers, parliaments, and governmental ministries from each of the fifteen EU member nations were evaluated in the course of the test.
PoliticsOnline is the world's premier company providing fundraising and Internet tools for politics. Among the company's many products and services are an award-winning web site, the Internet Campaign Manager CD-ROM, Instant Online Fundraiser, a free daily news and information service, NetPulse, The Weekly PoliTicker, and Phil Noble's Guide to the Internet, which was produced with Campaigns and Elections magazine. PoliticsOnline is an affiliate company of Phil Noble & Associates, an international political consulting firm based in Charleston, S.C., with offices in Washington, D.C., and Stockholm, Sweden.
For more information about PoliticsOnline, Inc., go to http://www.politicsonline.com, and for more information about Phil Noble & Associates, go to http://www.pnoble.com
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Taken from Screen Africa News Bulletin 15 August 2000
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Mandela doccie nominated for Emmy
The Long Walk of Nelson Mandela, a two hour doccie produced by Indra De Lanerolle of South African media company Clear and David Fanning of USA-based Storystreet, has been nominated for a News and Documentary Emmy in the Outstanding Background / Analysis of a Single Current Story category. Broadcast in South Africa as Mandela The First Accused, the doccie was directed by Cliff Bestall, written by John Carlin, researched by Sara Blecher, production managed by Lindy Wilson and edited by Alan Charlton. "We are all proud and honoured to be selected as nominees from the very best of the year's documentaries broadcast on American television," says De Lanerolle.
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Slum dwellers to have access to IT
HT Correspondent
(New Delhi, July 26)
MARCHING STEADILY ahead on the Information Technology highway, Delhi slum-dwellers will soon have access to computers. The Delhi Government is setting up special computer kiosks in slums for imparting adult education and general information.
This is not all. If everything goes according to plan, the Delhi Government will make application forms and tender forms also available on the internet, just a click of the mouse away.
Principal Secretary to Chief Minister S Regunathan spoke about these and other developments in the IT sector made by the Delhi Government during a meeting at the Chief Minister's office. The issues discussed included a partnership in the IT area between the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, IIT Delhi Alumni Association and the Delhi Government.
The meeting was attended by senior officers of the Delhi Government, representatives from IIT Delhi and IITDAA.
Mr Regunathan said that the key departments of the Delhi Government - revenue, sales tax, transport, education, health - are almost completely computerised - the areas where the government can enter into a partnership with the IT experts.
Mr Regunathan also informed that a radio station through cable will also be established to give a fillip to literacy and education. At least 150 schools will be equipped with computer labs with the cooperation of Cyber Media (India) Ltd and a training programme for school and college teachers will be held to improve their teaching skills. IIT Delhi and IITDAA will conduct a study to formulate this training programme for educators. Technological consultancy to the different government departments to help them improve their capacity will also be provided by them.
A mass campaign to educate the common man about the e-commerce will also be undertaken after IIT Delhi and IITDAA conducts a study.
http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/270700/detCIT06.htm
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PROFILED ORGANIZATIONS
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Taken from The Drum Beat - 60
Web Site: http://www.comminit.com
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Radio1 FM - Gambia - this not-for-profit radio station has been advocating and lobbying to develop a National Communication Policy that will account for the diversity within Gambia. They have developed a telecentre as a means of supporting the radio station, offering fax machines, telephones, e-mail, and word processing. A 2nd station and telecenter are in development in a rural area where the government has gradually been abdicating responsibility for previously provided services - including registration of births, deaths, marriages, local government registrations, etc. They are seeking support and resources to further develop the capacity of their telecenters. Contact George Christensen
George.radio1@qanet.gm
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ONLINE RESOURCES
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Taken from TrainingZONE LearningWire #113
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Lifelong learning: some food for thought
Lifelong learning has become a universal panacea: the Holy Grail, winning the lottery, a double Scotch, Viagra, whatever turns you on. So says Maggie Woodrow, Executive Director of the European Access Network based at the University of Westminster, in an article entitled 'The Struggle for the Soul of Lifelong Learning'.
http://www.trainingzone.co.uk/item/23250
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From The Scout Report for Social Sciences, Copyright Internet Scout Project 1994-2000.
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Documenting a Democracy: Australia's Story [.RTF, .PDF, Word]
http://www.foundingdocs.gov.au/home.htm
Produced by the National Archives of Australia in conjunction with archives and records offices in the seven territories of Australia, this superb new Website allows users to examine the history of the Commonwealth through its founding documents. Because each territory in Australia began as a separate colony of the crown, there are founding documents for each of the seven states in addition to the founding documents of the Commonwealth as a whole. Users may access these documents as well as their descriptions and historical context by clicking on the different sections of the map posted on the homepage. Visitors may also view the documents in relation to particular historical themes (Foundation, Building, Freedom, Lands), via an annotated timeline, or in conjunction with a picture gallery posting representative images from Australian history. In all, there are over one hundred documents posted here, including constitutional documents, Queen Victoria's instructions to a territorial governor, Aboriginal land rights and ordinances, acts of territorial self-governance, and much more. The entire site is searchable, and documents may be downloaded in .RTF, .PDF or Word 6 formats. An eminently useful Website for both researchers and students of Australian history. [DC]
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From The Scout Report for Social Sciences, Copyright Internet Scout Project 1994-2000.
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Teaching Resources and Materials for Social Scientists (TRAMMS) -- Economic and Social Research Council
http://tramss.data-archive.ac.uk/index.asp
Created and maintained by the Economic and Social Research Council of the United Kingdom, this Website is designed for graduate students and academics in the Social Sciences who want to hone their research and data analysis skills. Offering access to several thousand datasets in the University of Essex Data Archive, the Website's tutorial will teach users to search one of the largest online data archives in the Social Sciences, as well as teaching them how to download software and data, and how to run analyses on this data. In order to use the site effectively, visitors must have "about an hour and an understanding of multiple regression." There are other Social Science research tutorials on the Web, but none, to our knowledge, operate at such a sophisticated level and with such quality datasets. [DC]
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From The Scout Report for Social Sciences, Copyright Internet Scout Project 1994-2000.
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http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Atrium/1437/index.html
This Website provides thorough and easy-to-follow instructions for creating an organized five paragraph essay for the junior high school level. The Website presents guidance on brainstorming, drafting and organizing, and editing and revising, as well as prompts for practicing narrative, expository and persuasive forms. A "Tips and Techniques" section features advice on transitions, introductions and conclusions, and developing evidence. There is also some advice here for teachers on presenting and modeling the five-paragraph essay. Though often the bane of composition instructors at advanced high school and college levels, the five paragraph essay still offers a useful heuristic model for teaching beginning writers the basic rhetorical requirements of an essay, and this Website teaches the form about as well as one might. [DC]
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Taken from GigaLaw.com Weekly Update, August 12, 2000
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Facts About Privacy and Cyberspace
http://www.gigalaw.com/articles/aba-2000-08-p1.html
Privacy may be one of the most talked-about but least-understood legal issues on the Internet. Despite the attention, relatively few laws exist to protect privacy online, so it's important to be educated about the legal and business issues relating to privacy. A new set of questions and answers on GigaLaw.com provides a broad discussion of privacy issues in cyberspace.
Here's an excerpt:
"All cyberactivity, even simply browsing a web page, involves transmitting information that can identify you and be tracked. The data in cyberspace can be collected to produce telling profiles of what we do online and with whom we associate. The technology that makes cyberspace possible also makes detailed, cumulative, invisible observation of us possible. One need only sift through the computer mouse clickstreams generated by our cyberactivity. Much of this information is detailed, computer processable, indexed to the individual, and permanent.
"A 1999 Georgetown Internet Privacy Policy Survey reported information practices of 361 web sites drawn from a list of 7,500 busiest servers on the World Wide Web. The survey found 93 percent of the sites collect personal information from consumers. Sixty-six percent provided at least one disclosure about their information practices. Forty-four percent of those sites post privacy notices. Only 10 percent of the sites are implementing all of the fair information practices recommended by the Federal Trade Commission and other government agencies. These would include notice of the information collected, consumer consent, access and ability to contest the accuracy of the information, and that information is secure from unauthorized use."
To read the full article, go to http://www.gigalaw.com/articles/aba-2000-08-p1.html
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I recently came across a great resource I wanted to share with you. It is located at: http://www.temple.edu/iclt/index.html
It contains the proceedings of the International Conference on Learning with Technology, held at Temple University in Philadelphia in March 2000. What I find particularly helpful is that the website containes the full text of the more than 40 papers presented at the conference, as well as the powerpoint slides of most of the presenters. The topics for the presentations are right on point for most of us who labor in the k-12 technology vineyards. Streaming videos of Linda Roberts' and Don Tapscott's keynote addresses are also available.If you are looking for thoughtful, practical research (as I am always), this may be helpful to you.
Jim Lerman
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ARTICLES
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Taken from Bytes for All 6th issue online
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Ten Ways to make the most of your Internet connectivity time
by: Archana P. Nagvekar Goa - India
When we purchased our Personal Computer at home, it was welcomed with the awe and wonder that accompanies the arrival of a newborn! It went on to occupy the central position in our living room and our lives for the next few weeks. Much like Ganapati, the elephant headed God and his mouse, installed in every Hindu household during the Ganesh-Chathurthi festival. This was until we got connected to the Internet; courtesy 25 hours free Internet access that came with the new PC.
That month’s telephone bill told a different story (read horror story). And my usually cool Dad was suddenly dancing on hot coals!
The Internet may be the "in" thing today. But a lot of technology of on the Internet is obsolete. You may have the fastest Pentium processor available at your end, but the machine you are trying to access might be an old VAX mainframe war-horse. On an average a net surfer may spend 40 % of his/her time on the net in just waiting for web pages to download or to get connected to particular site.
This article is for net-freaks, cyber punks and for all of you who consider yourself bona fide netizens but still get nightmares about mounting telephone bills.
Follow these 10 simple ways and not only will your telephone bill remain a decent moderate every month, but you will also be able to get more out of your rendezvous in cyberspace.
Way 1: After logging to your user account provided by your ISP, download your mails and read them offline and at your leisure. Beneficial to the victim of your ire, who otherwise might have received flaming e-mail from you, if you had replied immediately. Compose your mail offline too. Than upload them all at once to your server to be send. Heave ho!
Way 2: If instead of the e-mail account provided by the ISP, you prefer to use your free floating e-mail account on the net, than too you can save time spent in composing. Just write your mail in any word-processor like MS-Word or Note-Pad. And than cut and paste the mail to your Compose window in your Internet account. However all fancy fonts and colors will be lost as the Compose window takes only characters of default size 10. If however you want to send perfumed (oops! not yet available), mush-stuff to your sweetheart, on pink paper in Gothic heart-renderings than the attachment option always comes to your rescue. Cinderella's fairy godmother this.
Way 3: Enable cashing of previously visited pages, in your browser so that you don't spend time every time loading a page you visit frequently. Helps to avoid the great www (world wide wait!)
Way 4: You've been searching for a needle in a haystack all day. And hey presto! you've found it, but damn! have to rush immediately to pick up mom. But take heart. Either put a bookmark, or still better save the html page to your hard disk to be accessed later.
Way 5: Keep heavy duty downloads as night activity. That is, when telephone charges are minimal. For that matter you can do most of your browsing at night. But this is strictly for owls, bats, cats and other nocturnal creatures.
Way 6: When doing downloads or any other passive activity, you can always utilize the time for browsing by opening another window, instead of sitting and staring beneath the boughs. That, Windows does multi-tasking is not a myth after all!
Way 7: Disable sound, video and animations in your browser, if your interest lies only in the text part of the web page. Multimedia takes longer to load. Lynx fans will finally have inflated chests.
Way 8: Get smart and use keyboard short cuts to navigate around. Extensive mouse users are said to suffer from horrible ailments of the arms and shoulders! Don't say I didn't warn you.
Way 9: Mails selling you shoes, noodles, CD's of 1857 hits and other exotic items can be put directly into your trash can. In short have filters to tackle Spam mail. Also your incoming mail can be directly directed to folders (you may have individual folders for Monica, Sandra, Rhea, Mary and the rest of the clan). This way, you can keep your house in order too.
Way 10: Finally netizens of the world unite. Your slogan, "more bandwith". Have a strong consumer movement to have lesser telephone tariffs and more bandwidth. Maybe Civil disobedience or Non-Cooperation will work. But you didn't hear this from me!
Have fun exploring wonders along the way. Romantic isn't it! But newbees beware; this is directly proportional to your telephone bill, and your Internet hours. I'm sorry for having burst your bubble. So than, what? Have a determined plan of action before hand, and than approach surfing with reckless abandon. Cheers!
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Copyright 2000 The New York Times Company
http://search1.nytimes.com/search/daily/bin/fastweb?getdoc+site+site+113497+5+wAAA+greenman
August 10, 2000
PRINTED PAGE BEATS PC SCREEN FOR READING, STUDY FINDS
By CATHERINE GREENMAN
SOME skeptics may believe a thing only when they see it in writing, but is the writing more believable when it is seen on paper rather than on a computer screen?
Apparently it is, based on a recent study at Ohio State University. The study involved 131 Ohio State undergraduates and looked at differences in comprehension of something read on a printed page and the same thing on a computer screen, said Karen Murphy, assistant professor of educational psychology at Ohio State and co-author of the study.
The students were divided into three groups and asked to read and answer questions on two magazine essays, one on school integration, the other on doctor-assisted suicide for terminally ill patients. One group read the articles on paper and answered questions on paper, another read the articles on a desktop computer and answered questions on paper, and the remaining group read the articles and answered the questions on a desktop computer.
The articles had the same formats in print as they did on the computer screen, but the students who read the paper versions found the articles more interesting and persuasive than the students who read the articles on computers.
The group that read the essay on doctor-assisted suicide, for example, gave the essay an average understandability rating of 7.76 (on a scale of 1 to 10). The group that read the same article and answered questions on the computer gave it an average understandability rating of 6.85, and the group that read it on the computer and answered questions on paper gave it an average understandability rating of 6.55.
Dr. Murphy said the study brought to light the effectiveness of using computers and the Internet in middle and high schools if students were not as able to understand material they read on a computer. What's more, she said, younger students with lower reading abilities might have more trouble comprehending material online than the college students in the study.
"While it's true we can use online mediums to give students access to information they would never have had before, it raises the questions about how much they can comprehend from the texts," she said. "Computers are put into schools to enhance learning, but if it's difficult for some students to comprehend online material, then the computer access isn't necessarily enhancing learning."
Although students can print articles they find online, some schools lack printers. "Many of the urban schools we have been working with barely have decent computers and monitors, much less printers for the students to use," Dr. Murphy said.
Michael Martin, a senior who participated in the study, said that, in general, he can comprehend both print and online articles to the same degree, but that he has to focus more when he reads articles online because he finds Web pages to be distracting. "Most Web sites are designed to look fun," he said. "There are all these great graphics, and it takes concentration to home in and focus on the actual information."
Mr. Martin often finds himself struggling to digest the information on a Web page before being lured away by links to other pages. And like others who use the Web as a research tool, he frequently makes printed copies to read later.
Other students who do a lot of research on the Web print copies of what they find because it is hard for them to read lengthy texts on the computer. "Scrolling through 30 pages on the screen is not so comfy on the eyes," said Allison Boyle, a law student at the University of Maryland. "It's a good scanning tool, but when it comes to using what I find, I print it out."
Printing portions of case law and other articles also lets Ms. Boyle make notes in margins and highlight paragraphs. "You can't really do that on a computer screen," she said.
Gregory Rawlins, a professor of computer science at Indiana University in Bloomington, said students have to work a little harder when they read articles on a computer screen because they don't have the same visual cues that they would have with a book or typed or written material. "There might be a coffee stain or a fold in a page, supposedly incidental things, but they help the mind associate what's on the page with what is being read," he said. "You might have the same information on a computer screen, but it's much harder to reconstruct the information that's there."
Dr. Murphy said the Ohio State study suggested that students may need to be better trained to absorb material from a computer screen. The fact that information found online often contains links to other pages is an example of how reading a Web page differs from the more linear nature of reading a paper page.
"We're not really sure, but it may be that the skills students use when reading plain paper, such as linking what the text says to their prior knowledge, don't necessarily transfer online," she said. "It may be a matter of teaching different types of strategies for processing information online."
Copyright 2000 The New York Times Company
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Content and the Digital Divide: What Do People Want?
(c)Benton Foundation 2000. Redistribution of this email publication – both internally and externally -- is encouraged if it includes this message.
Introduction
A narrow definition of the digital divide focuses on access to computers and the Internet. But access alone does not bridge the technology gap. To realize the potential of today's information tools, people need the skills to operate them -- to better their lives and the health of their communities. The ability to create and share community-relevant information is part of that equation.
In March, The Children's Partnership (TCP) published Online Content for Low-Income and Underserved Americans: The Digital Divide's New Frontier (available online at www.childrenspartnership.org). The report examines a key element of the digital divide that is often ignored in debates about access to information technologies. During five years of work to bridge the digital divide, TCP has found that it is as important to create useful content on the Internet -- material and applications that serve the needs and interests of millions of low-income and underserved Internet users – as it is to provide computers and Internet connections.
"There's been so much focus on the boxes and wires to connect to the Internet that we almost forgot to ask what people are getting once they connect," said Wendy Lazarus, co-author of the study and founder of the Children's Partnership. "We found a strong desire among people for practical, local information about their neighborhoods that seems to fly in the face of the way the Internet is moving in terms of national portals" like Yahoo, Netscape and Excite.
What People Want
Although the release of Online Content for Low-Income and Underserved Americans garnered some press coverage earlier this year, not enough attention was paid to TCP's groundbreaking work determining just what content is desired by people who have low incomes, live in rural communities, have limited education, or are members of racial or ethnic minorities. For Americans at risk of being left behind, useful content includes: 1) employment, education, business development and other information; 2) information that can be clearly understood by limited-literacy users; 3) information in multiple languages; and 4) opportunities to create content and interact with it so that it is culturally appropriate.
Through focus groups and interviews, TCP found that underserved adults want to engage in social, cultural and professional activities online with special emphasis on local information about entertainment, jobs, places of worship and educational opportunities.
People want practical information focusing on local community like local jobs listings including jobs requiring entry-level skills; local housing listings; and community information about neighborhood events, local schools and near-by destinations for family outings. Although the Internet contains many job resources, these sites often do not include entry-level positions. Similarly, low-rent housing is in great demand across the country, but it is hard to find such information online. This population is also interested in finding information about local service organizations - like job agencies, day care and after-school programs - and activities at local churches.
For the large population of non-English speakers in the US, there's a desire for online translation tools since so much of Web content is currently in English. Many of these people would like to develop linguistic and other skills and need tools - like interactive Web sites - to provide grammar practice, vocabulary development and reading assistance. But information also needs to be available in other native languages – especially information related to government like taxes and voting.
Over 3.4 million Limited English Proficient (LEP) students are enrolled in schools throughout the United States, according to 1998 figures from The National Clearinghouse for Bilingual Education (www.ncbe.gwu.edu). Over the next five years, it is expected that another 1 million LEP children will attend U.S. schools. In June, Lightspan Inc announced it would be teaming up with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to provide interactive and online content including: math and reading activities aligned with state standards; an online English/Spanish Parent and Family Center to provide homework assistance; and a series of online research tools, including an interactive encyclopedia, dictionary and thesaurus. The initial programs will be established in Delaware, where Governor Thomas R. Carper provided leadership in facilitating this partnership on behalf of lower-income families.
The American Association of Museums is also committed to closing the achievement gap by encouraging museums to meet the needs of Hispanic students by providing teacher training, using technology to link to schools with large Hispanic populations, and making curriculum materials available online.
People also want more spaces on the Internet that allow for cultural exploration and development, reflecting unique cultural characteristics and attributes. Spaces that allow for interaction on art, music, food and sports would allow people to share information about their heritage and cultural practices. There's also a need for health information to be presented with the interests of particular racial and ethnic groups in mind and with local connections.
Not surprisingly, The Children's Partnership included a focus on the needs of young people. With more hands-on experience, young people see the Internet as a medium for self-expression - much more than adults do. Young people want to communicate with other kids all over the world and expect interaction and multimedia from sites. They want all-in-one sites that offer games; downloadable plug-ins, music, video, and pictures; tips and strategies; email; and user profiles. They are also interested in youth-friendly tutorials and training.
Effective searches are a problem raised by both adults and children during TCP's research. As recently reported by the San Jose Mercury News, the World Wide Web is 500 times larger than the maps provided by popular search engines like Yahoo!, AltaVista and Google.com. BrightPlanet, a South Dakota company that has developed new Internet searching software, estimates there are now about 550 billion documents stored on the Web, while all Internet search engines combined only index about 1 billion pages. Until affordable, more effective searches are available, people want coaches and mentors to guide them in finding what they want on the Web and suggestions for sites and activities to get started. Many underserved people turn to family, friends and other trusted people to get the information they need, so there's little "felt need" to go to the Web or the library. This lack of motivation is reinforced when people are confronting by confusing, slow, or text-heavy searches.
Identifying Content-Related Barriers
TCP's research found a number of barriers between the content people want and what is available online. Although underserved communities are gaining access to computers and the Internet, their benefits are limited because of the following factors:
Lack of Local Information. Perhaps the most far-reaching barrier of all is the scarcity of the kind of information that users want most – local information about their community. While this barrier potentially affects a great many Americans, it disproportionately affects Internet users living on limited incomes, especially the nearly 21 million Americans over age 18 whose annual income is less than $14,150 for a family of three (the level used by the federal government to define poverty). TCP estimates that 21 million Americans are affected by this barrier.
Literacy Barriers. Online content has been primarily designed for Internet users who have discretionary money to spend. The vast majority of information on the Net is written for an audience that reads at an average or advanced literacy level. Yet 44 million American adults, roughly 22 percent, do not have the reading and writing skills necessary for functioning in everyday life. TCP estimates that 44 million Americans are affected by literacy barriers.
Language Barriers. Today, an estimated 87 percent of documents on the Internet are in English. Yet, for at least 32 million Americans, English is not their primary language. They are often left out of the benefits the Internet offers.
Lack of Cultural Diversity. The Internet can be a powerful tool to share and celebrate the uniqueness of cultures in this country and beyond. However, despite the tremendous surge in ethnic portals, there is a lack of Internet content generated by ethnic communities themselves or organized around their unique cultural interests and practices. For many of the 26 million Americans who are foreign born, the lack of cultural diversity in available content serves as a real barrier.
As with all digital divide efforts, the Digital Divide Network (www.digitaldividenetwork.org) is seeking to profile and highlight the initiatives around the country working to close content-related barriers. If you are connected to or know of such an effort, please let us know through this form (www.digitaldividenetwork.org/dd_form.adp) and we will add it to our growing database of community-based organizations. Or write to: Kade Twist (kade@benton.org)
Digital Divide Network
c/o Benton Foundation
950 18th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20006.
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TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS
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Taken from NEWS-ON-NEWS/The Ifra Trend Report: No. 55 (9 August 2000)
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NEW TECHNOLOGY BRIDGES THE GAP BETWEEN PAPER AND PIXELS
(USA) -- A number of companies are introducing technology intended to bridge the gap between print and digital media, most by incorporating tiny bar codes representing Web addresses into the pages of newspapers, magazines and catalogs. A handheld scanner reads the bar code, launching a PC's browser and pointing it directly to the Web site. One of the most useful versions of this technology is GoCode, which lets you create and print your own GoCodes that can be scanned to issue commands to a PC. When you print out any Web page using the HyperPage software, hyperlinks are automatically translated into GoCodes and printed within the document. If the technology catches on, the days of printed material cluttered with lengthy URLs may soon be nothing but a memory. (Industry Standard 19 July 2000)
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000719/wr/standard_dc_25.html
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SIMPUTER -- SUB-$200 INTERNET DEVICE to help non-literate users: In an effort to bring the Internet to the masses in India and other developing countries, several academics and engineers have used their spare time to design a sub-$200 handheld Net appliance, writes Bangalore-based John Ribeiro of IDG News Service (June 23).
The Simputer, or SIMple ComPUTER, will enable India's illiterate population (some 48% of the country of one billion) to surf the Web. The device was designed by professors and students at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) at Bangalore, and engineers from Bangalore-based design company Encore Software. A prototype of the appliance will be available in August.
The Simputer is built around Intel's StrongARM CPU, with Linux as the operating system. It will have 16 MB of flash memory, a monochrome liquid crystal display (LCD) with a touch panel overlay for pen-based computing, and a local-language interface. The appliance will have Infrared Data Association and Universal Serial Bus interfaces, and will feature Internet access and mail software.
Its designers expect the Simputer to be used not only as a personal Internet access device, but also by communities of users at kiosks. A smart-card interface to the device will enable the use of the device for applications such as micro- banking.
"We expect to change the model for the proliferation of information technology in India," says Professor Swami Manohar, professor in the computer science and automation department of the IISc. "The current PC-centric model is not sustainable because of the high cost of the PC, and also because we expect that most of the users will not be literate."
A subsequent version of the Simputer will also offer speech recognition for basic navigation through the software menus. The speech dictionary will be customizable to support different languages. A text-to-speech system will also be developed to take the technology to India's illiterate population. Later versions will also offer wireless technology.
The intellectual property for the device has been transferred free to a non-profit trust, called the Simputer Trust, and both the software and the hardware for the appliance have been offered as open source technology. In the open source model of development, users and developers, often unpaid, work together to update technology. Manohar says that the trust decided to put the technology in Open Source to enable third party software developers and designers to add value to the platform. The technology for the product will be licensed to manufacturers at a nominal fee of $1150, which is to be used to finance upgrades to the Simputer. A number of large manufacturers have shown interest in licensing the technology, though the interest is currently confined to Indian companies, according to Vinay Deshpande, chairman of Encore and a member of the Simputer Trust. He says that the designers have been able to achieve the sub-$200 price point since the electronic components used in the device are all off-the-shelf volume components, and the software is primarily open source software such as Linux.
http://www.pcworld.com/pcwtoday/article/0,1510,17401,00.html
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Taken from "The Rapidly Changing Face of Computing"for Aug. 14, 2000
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Storage Update -- If you've been impressed with how much disk drive you can buy for a dollar these days, you might be amazed at a real-world perspective into just how quickly disk drives have been simultaneously increasing their capacity, while dropping their prices.
In the March 14, 2000 PC Week, Maxtor announced that its DiamondMax 60, a 60 gigabyte drive, would be available in April for $329, or a half-cent per megabyte. Now, in the July 17 PC World (http://www.pcworld.com/cgi-bin/pcwtoday?ID=17666), Maxtor indicates that in August, they'll be selling an 80 gigabyte drive for $349!
In just FOUR MONTHS, commodity drive capacity rose from 60 to 80 megabytes, while the price per megabyte fell from .54 cents to .43 cents/megabyte.
And we thought that the Moore's Law growth of semiconductors was fast...
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Telematics for African Development Consortium
P.O. Box 31822
Braamfontein
2017
Johannesburg
South Africa
Tel: +27 +11 403-2813
Fax: +27 +11 403-2814
neilshel@icon.co.za
www.saide.org.za
* To view an archive of previous updates visit: www.saide.org.za/tad/archive.htm
* For resources on distance education and technology use in Southern Africa visit:
www.saide.org.za/worldbank/Default.htm
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