Tim Berners-Lee Says Too Many Young People Are Excluded From Web (theguardian.com) 40
Too many young people around the world are excluded from accessing the web, and getting them online should be a priority for the post-Covid era, Tim Berners-Lee has said. From a report: In a letter published to mark the 32nd birthday of the web, its founder says the opportunity "to reimagine our world and create something better" in the aftermath of Covid-19 must be channelled to getting internet access to the third of people aged between 15 and 24 who are offline. "The influence of young people is felt across their communities and online networks," Berners-Lee writes. "But today we're seeing just a fraction of what's possible. Because while we talk about a generation of 'digital natives,' far too many young people remain excluded and unable to use the web to share their talents and ideas.
"A third of young people have no internet access at all. Many more lack the data, devices and reliable connection they need to make the most of the web. In fact, only the top third of under-25s have a home internet connection, according to Unicef, leaving 2.2 billion young people without the stable access they need to learn online, which has helped so many others continue their education during the pandemic." Even though young people are more likely than the typical global citizen to have internet access -- roughly half the world is online, but the figure rises to 70% of people aged between 15 and 25 -- Berners-Lee argues that aiming to connect every young person in the world to the web would reap dividends. He also says doing so would be relatively cheap compared with the cost of many government programmes launched over the last 12 months. He estimates that an investment of $428bn over the next decade would provide everyone with a quality broadband connection.
"A third of young people have no internet access at all. Many more lack the data, devices and reliable connection they need to make the most of the web. In fact, only the top third of under-25s have a home internet connection, according to Unicef, leaving 2.2 billion young people without the stable access they need to learn online, which has helped so many others continue their education during the pandemic." Even though young people are more likely than the typical global citizen to have internet access -- roughly half the world is online, but the figure rises to 70% of people aged between 15 and 25 -- Berners-Lee argues that aiming to connect every young person in the world to the web would reap dividends. He also says doing so would be relatively cheap compared with the cost of many government programmes launched over the last 12 months. He estimates that an investment of $428bn over the next decade would provide everyone with a quality broadband connection.
Too many women (Score:2)
Too many black people. ... you name it.
Too many poor people.
Too many
Internet should be a choice, not a duty.
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really.
but lets look at reality.
if one has a smart phone.
one is already accessing the web.
inner city children appear to have use of smart phones.
it is a generalized statement.
but it is more true than false.
could it be that the problem is that the h 1 b visa holder doing the software has not tested their work with samsung and apple phone.
damn it.
now i am starting to fidget about programmers that think minimum work effort is acceptable.
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really. inner city children appear to have use of smart phones.
"Inner city children" are only a small fraction of the people "15 to 24" worldwide, and most people in the 15-24 range wouldn't classify themselves as "children" anyway.
The claim is that 1/3 of all people in that age range lack internet access. That may be true.
Considering the vast amount of disinformation on the internet over the past few years, perhaps it is best to shield them from exposure to that.
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possibly.
shielding folks from the truth leads to more viewers for fox news.
and u s capitol police can tell folks what is next
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Broadband? (Score:3)
Don't kids (and adults for that matter) that aren't planted at a desk much of the day, mostly tend to access the internet via their phones?
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Don't kids (and adults for that matter) that aren't planted at a desk much of the day, mostly tend to access the internet via their phones?
People use Wifi when available instead of cellular. So they are using broadband on their phones.
But on the POSITIVE Side... (Score:2)
So...maybe it is a net win for them in the long run?
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Before social media, kids wasted their lives on TV and telephones.
Before that, it was cars and that newfangled radio.
Before that, they wasted time talking to each other around the campfire.
Kids socialize. Get over it.
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But with TV and telephones (land lines), you didn't have kids with their heads stuck on them for most of their waking hours.
They also weren't being actively manipulated in the fashion that social media sights are doing today to increase engagement.
No, its really not in the same ballpark.
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But with TV and telephones (land lines), you didn't have kids with their heads stuck on them for most of their waking hours.
In the 1980s, teens spent an average of seven hours per day watching TV.
40% of American families had the TV turned on during all three meals.
They also weren't being actively manipulated ...
In the olden days, TVs had "commercials", and everyone could sing the jingles.
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Before social media, kids wasted their lives on TV and telephones.
Before that, it was cars and that newfangled radio.
Before that, they wasted time talking to each other around the campfire.
Kids socialize. Get over it.
A TV is in the living room and allows the parent to control it, cellphones are much harder. Also, talking around the campfire or texting are social activities while watching youtube or tv is not. There are differences and I don't get why you lump all of these as if they were the same. Society changes, history is not monotonous.
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Kids socialize. Get over it.
Bloody kids, having fun. I hate them.
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The audience here is so fucking old. Those kids and their darn social medias! Those darn electric cars, those darn smart phones with their tiktok and their innagrams!
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Yeah but new technology or working on modern cars doesn’t scare me like the rest of these people.
Okay (Score:2)
It is time for the stick, let the carrot go (Score:2, Interesting)
In the US, at least, it is time to get aggressive with the infrastructure companies. They need to be told to "Do it" instead of "have some money and do your thing".
The US's "Rural Broadband" program is a farce. It is giving away money with little to no oversight of those it is given to. Instead, we need to go with something like a "you build it, and if we deem it good enough we will pay you back" or a "We have paid you enough. Time for you to build it or we start stopping your access to things". Thing
Priorities (Score:3, Insightful)
Food.
Shelter
Education
Lack of internet is a first world problem, and many first world young people make a choice to party rather that learn to use tools that could make their future more flexible. All we can do is make sure opportunity is equitable
For example many are going to access resources on their mobile devices over their cellular connection. Yet I know of one alleged organization that claims to want to educate the underserved that designed their site for laptops first, saying the mobile design would come later. It makes no sense.
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Agreed that safety, food, and shelter come first, but then if you have internet education becomes easier.
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For instance we see all time educators and parents complaining how horrible it is that books are online, testing is online, assignments are online. Yet if we canâ(TM)t leverage the cost savings and diversity of electronic resources, the value of the internetâ(TM)s is ze
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Water should come before food, and literacy is a requirement for education.
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True, but I think OP was going for broad definitions here, which means food and water get lumped together - perhaps more accurately as 'sustenance'. It's a reasonably rare situation, as far as I'm aware at least, where you can only get water but no food or vice versa.
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Meh, if we're going to be pedantic then shelter should be top of the list, before either water or food. One night without shelter can be fatal, but you won't die of dehydration for a couple of weeks, or starvation for even longer. (ymmv - condition dependant)
^ This is somewhat to miss the point he was trying to make though...
Sanitation (Score:2)
Re: Priorities (Score:1)
Tim berners lee hypocrite and useful idiot... (Score:2)
... you can't be pro drm and pro out of control copyright aw and then say the youth don't have access to the internet.
If anything we desperately need property rights for software at this point in time, pre internet software being licensed was fine because there was a firewall seperating applications on our PC's from servers in Micrsoft's/adobes/activisions/EA's offices, now every fucking software company is holding software applications hostage and can remotely disable and hack into everyones PC's legally
Hold up. (Score:3)
Did he say this before or after he approved the inclusion of DRM that violates the fundamental mission of the W3C?
Frankly, I don't think he has any right to speak on matters of access anymore.
Also... (Score:1)
I have an idea (Score:1)
The Web is dying anyhow (Score:2)
With fewer and fewer browser engines, and web traffic being more and more concentrated to just a few websites, I believe it's safe to say that the Web is dying.
Even today many people need to filter it just to get it useful. They do this by things like "ad blockers" or "Javescript blockers".
What we need to do now is to dream up potential successors. For example I've explored the "Videotex" standards which might give inspiration to such a successor:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Is Bildschirmtext the future
Yes (Score:2)
Don't feel excluded (Score:1)