Without a Net

Confronting the Digital Divide

Jessamyn West
librarian.net/talks/txla11


"The 'digital divide' refers to the fact that certain parts of the population have substantially better opportunities to benefit from the new economy than other parts of the population." - Jakob Nielsen

Notes and Resources

• Slides & notes - PDF , Keynote format, PowerPoint format
• Without a Net: Librarians Bridging the Digital Divide book companion website
• Two talks I've given at SXSW: 2010, 2011

Further Reading

Where we are

• Rural Electrification program history
• National Broadband Map
• Broadband availability in VT (pdf)
• Connected Texas: Broadband Inventory, Map of Speeds
• Connected Texas Report: The Broadband Landscape in the State of Texas
• Pew Research Center's reports on Internet & Technology
• Broadband Adoption and Use in America & NY Times summary [pdf]
• Competing media messages image

Why Libraries?

• ALA: State of America's Libraries 2010
• NYC Broadband landscape report
• FEMA adds libraries to "essential services" in Section 403 of Stafford Act (Cedar Rapids story)

Common misconceptions

• Flowtown Teens & Cell Phones infographic (related Pew report Teens and Mobile phones)
• Pew Internet & American Life Project August 2010 report about adoption slowdown
• Arbitron smartphone slide
• Non users would need help getting online graphic from Pew Home Broadband report
• The Broadband Landscape in the State of Texas (pdf)
• William James and the Will to Believe

Working Examples

• Texas Funding for Library Digitization Projects
• Other funding: Smart Investing, NLM
• READ Posters from Brattleboro DPW
• County of Brant Library: Home page, digital collections, Our Brant Wiki, Cemetery category & page
• Green Mountain Library Consortium & Vermont Library Association
• Many more real-world digitzation stories
• Jakob Nielsen's Three Stages of the Digital Divide

A few websites that work

• 23 Things Projects
• Mousercise
• LibSuccess wiki
• How to help someone use a computer by Phil Agre

Image credits

• Texas panhandle background image from Wikimedia Commons
• Lego magician by kennymatic on Flickr
• My NYPL photo
• Cedar Rapids flood photo from State Library of Iowa
• William James image on Wikipedia
• Reference desk photo by Wendt Commons
• Camera within camera photo by [F]oxymoron
• WPA Book Week poster by marxchivist
• Photo of Maggie and Bill Gates from Coldchef

Jessamyn West is a community technology librarian in Vermont and the editor of the weblog librarian.net. She teaches email classes for seniors, builds tiny websites for tiny libraries and advocates for sensible technology use for everyone. Her book Without a Net: Librarians Bridging the Digital Divide is coming out in May 2011.