Lynn Freedman
Sociology 022 – In the Facebook Age – Spring 2010 – Dhiraj Murthy

In this weeks readings, Keen describes the negative effects the Internet has on our culture while Burgess and Green describe the positive and negative implications of YouTube.

Youtube allows for the circulation and reception of context and allows works to reacher a larger public. YouTube is referenced by mass media often and is deployed or loved. Burgess and Green describe how YouTube is unfair since people have “uneven access to the means of participation and … many are discouraged from even trying” (pg. 124). Although anybody can post a video, not everyone will have interest in looking at it. Visitors tend to only look at the most visible content – the suggested videos, favorites ect. -, especially if they have no interest in the topics or communities involved. This means that certain groups of people are not able to express their opinion to as many viewers as others. Professor Tepper brings up the point that those “who have the education, skills, financial resources, and time required to navigate the sea of cultural choice will gain access to new cultural opportunities… [while those] who have few resources – less time, less money, and less knowledge about how to navigate the cultural system – will increasingly rely on the cultural fare offered to them by consolidated media and entertainment conglomerates.” This goes back to the digital divide, those will the capability to access will benefit much greater than others.

Youtube videos can be easily ported by copying and pasting a code. This allows videos “to be inserted into diverse cultural economies and social ecologies.” People can put a YouTube video on their website allowing users to view the content they are reading about. I’ve had many YouTube videos posted on my Facebook wall which have allowed user to share in depth topics conveniently to me. The uncontrolled flow of media content on YouTube allows for the corrupting or the intensifying of a message or cause. Burgess and Green state how users remix footage of television programs to music and can parody it or intensify the emotional experience of the original, “taking us deeper into the thoughts and feeling of central characters.”

Keen states that as the amount of blogs increase, the abundance of information and opinions on these blogs will collectively corrupt and confuse “popular opinion about everything from politics, to commerce, to arts and culture” (pg. 3). Anything can be publised online; “uniformed political comentary, … to unseemly home videos, to embarrassingly amateurish music, to unreadable poems, reviews, essays, and novels.” The Internet has the potential to give people inaccurate information. The growing population of those who do not know what a good news source is will pull their information from random searches on google and blogs. Keen states how kids can’t tell the difference between credible news and news posted on blogs. As more information is posted, it will be harder to find credible news and inaccurately informed users could increase and confusion could worsen.

Wikipedia allows anyone to publicize anything and edit/rewrite other entries to their liking. Wikipedia “has no reporters, no editorial staff, and no experience in news-gathering” but it is the third most visited site for informatioin and current events. I must say I have used Wikipedia many times for my main information source. It is a bit frightening that I could go on and change a page about a topic I have no idea about. I found it disturbing how Burgess and Green stated how companies will search for their wikipedia pages and pull information from them that make them look bad. In a way these pages are all biased viewed and have the possibility of being extremely inaccurate.

Social networking sites allow individuals to narcissistically broadcast themselves. “Rather than using [the internet] to seek news, information, or culture, we use it to actually BE the news, the information, or culture. Keen states how “social networking” on this sites is false, as these site are used for personal attention. In a way this is quite accurate. I feel that most people use Facebook for attention. They post pictures, comment on other’s walls in the hopes of those other’s commenting back. Users tend to spend a lot of time on social networking sites and will even get their news source from them. Users of a site called Reddit get their new source from the site’s top twenty “hot” stories. Instead of actual current events being a “hot” story, pop culture/useless information is displayed. While one can read a story about the “walking habits of elephants” there is no news relating to “Isreal, Lebanon or Hezbollah.” “It makes a mockery of traditional news media an dturns current events into a childish game of Trivial Pursuit.” These websites are more interested in entertaining us instead of informing us about the world. Our culture could possibility get more narcissistic and unaware of current events as the Internet becomes integrated in our lives. I am interested to see if future generations will even know what a news site is, let alone a newspaper.

Dahlberg and Papacharissi discuss the potential of the net to facilitate public sphere and the flaws in assuming that the internet brings equality and democracy. The Internet has the possibility of creating channels of communication, allowing the spread of political opinion and discussion. The asynchronous nature of computer-mediated communication promotes democracy and community. Information available online is “fast, easy, cheap, and convenient” (383) and online information is unmediated which allows Internet users to find unbiased information. However, these possibilities may not be utilized fully and are restricted to those with access.

Both Dahlberg and Papacharissi bring up the issue of the digital divide. The illusion of openness of the Internet is only theoretically possible. People have different accessibility to online technologies and information. Those without access to these materials are deprived of online representation. It seems that those with the biggest contribution to the online public sphere are elitist. Even if there is online information available to all, one still needs to require the skills to access and apply information. “Organizing, tracking, and going through information may be a task that requires skill and time that several do not possess” (pg. 383). Those who have the skills to effectively access and use online information have an enormous advantage over others as these individuals are able to be more active citizens and have a higher participation in the public sphere. Additionally, certain groups may not want to participate in political discourse, which gives a false perception of the political opinions of the majority  of internet users. Papacharissi states how in researching political Usenet and AOL groups, it was found that demographically conservatives were a minority among internet users. However, it was found that conservatives dominated political discourse.

Yet, the internet might not even have the potential to be democratic and have rational discourse. Papacharissi cites a study that “emphasized that the technological potential for global communication does not ensure that people from different cultural backgrounds will also be more understanding of each other” (pg. 385). People tend to vent emotions and express hasty opinions when communicating online instead of creating rational focused discourse. This could mean that online political discussion does not promote democratic ideals. Although the Internet allows users to express themselves, their words are not necessarily read and may not even have a slight impact. Online expression might give the false perception of empowerment. Their expressed opinions may not have any social value in their current political spectrum.

Although the internet may promote a sense of sociality, it might not give way to solidarity. The internet contains vast amounts of information and networks. Those with similar prospectives could join other with the same goals and views. Additionally, the anonymity creates a lack of solid commitment. People can express themselves differently online than in real life. Papacharissi states how “much of the political discussion taking place online does not, and will not, sound different from that taking place in casual or formal face-to-face interaction” (pg. 389). Hence, the internet may not have the potential to bridge the gap between “politicians, journalists, and the public” and online discussion could give the false notion of enhanced political awareness and solidarity.

The internet allows a diverse variety of people to discuss and argue about political matters allowing these individuals to be confronted with culturally diverse viewpoints. However, it does not have the potential to become democratic. Political discussion is dominated by those with access and those groups who decide to express their political opinion online. Even if equal access was supplied to the other 94% (pg. 387) of the global population without access, these users would have to have the skills and literacy to express political opinion. Many may not even have the urge to. Interestingly, Papacharissi brings up the point that ”political discussions online are a privilege for those with access to computers and the internet, [however,] those who would benefit the most from the democratizing potential of new technology do not have access to it.” (pg. 387)

My first thought of twitter users was that they were people with too much free time who found the need to broadcast their every thought. Although there are plenty of these people, there are also other cool uses. It can be used to get immediate updates on news, events and what people are talking about. Also, you can find out what people are saying about a company or school. I found it particularly interesting how Bowdoin searches for tweets containing the word “Bowdoin.” In this way, Bowdoin gets to see what people are thinking about the school. It allows people to connect with similar interests and allows people to take a break and talk.

Posting your every thought and move on twitter really shows how the gap between private life and public life is shrinking. Online privacy is defined as a user controlling who can see their information. However, Twitter can be publicly seen, so users really don’t have control over their privacy. Not only can you find out lots of information about someone from facebook – school, friends, pictures, personal views – you can find out where that person is and what s/he is thinking in real time from twitter. This makes it even more easy to track, harm and steal an identity of someone. In class it was mentioned that someone posted that they were going to sleep. If someone was looking to hurt you or rob you, this would be prime information for them, and this information was publicly posted!

It is interesting to observe what my classmates picked as user names. While many people put their names or initials, some people choose names that they associate with or things they like (the other user names are a mystery to me). I chose not to use my name. I chose my user name, Rugger0312, because I want to be associated with my rugby identity. In a way a user name allows a user to pick what part of themselves they want to define. I like being associated with rugby culture and am very proud to be a rugby player, so I decided to pick that name to kind of show off. Maybe meet other rugby players.

Another reason why I didn’t choose to use my name was because I did not want to be obviously identifiable on Twitter. A google searcher would have a much harder time finding my Twitter account than if my user name was, for example, lfreedman. Enough stuff comes up on google about me already; my name is listed on my high school’s website, pictures of me are on google images and my Facebook account comes up. I do not need people being able to find out this information plus what I’m thinking and doing synchronously.

The increasing popularity of social networking sites has raised concern about the online disclosure of personal information among users. However, it seems that certain groups of people are more apt to disregard the potential harm of revealing sensitive information. Younger generations, single people and those craving popularity are more willing to disclosing personal information. They tend to more readily post information such as personal views, relationship status, and pictures on their Facebook profiles than others because they find that the perceived benefit of attracting attention outweighs the potential harm of privacy threats. I will present Amanda Nosko’s study which examines the information disclosure patterns of single and younger Facebook users as well as Emily Christofides’s research on the influence of personality factors on users’ choices in levels of internet disclosure and control.

Livingstone states that the definition of online privacy “is not tied to the disclosure of certain types of information, rather a definition centered on having control over who knows what about you” (2008). Hence, online privacy is still present even if one decides to make a large amount of personal information potentially accessible. A Facebook user has the ability to limit who can see what on their profiles by implementing privacy controls. In spite of potential harm, including “damaged reputation due to rumors and gossip, unwanted contact and harassment or stalking, surveillance-like structures due to backtracking functions, use of personal data by third-parties, and hacking and identity theft” (boyd & Ellison, 2008) (Debatin, 2009), single, younger and popularity seekers post an abundance of personal information on their Facebook profiles. These people may indeed care about their privacy, but they value the social benefits of greater exposure so much that they are willing to endure the risks of relinquishing privacy controls.

Nosko examines the lack of privacy controls on profiles of users who indicate they are single on Facebook (2009). On a scale from 0 to 14, Nosko analyzed the amount of stigmatizing information in a sample of 400 randomly selected, accessible, personal profiles from 8 Canadian Facebook networks. Stigmatizing information included items such as photos, interests and activities. She found that users who indicated that they were single disclosed the largest amount of stigmatizing information on their profiles (M=8.61), followed by users in a relationship (M=7.16). Those without a relationship status disclosed the least amount of stigmatizing information (M= 6.03). It seems that users who indicated that they were single were more inclined to reveal information about themselves, particularly personal views and relationship information (Nosko, 2009). It may be that those seeking a relationship are using Facebook as an online medium “to self-present or to advertise themselves to potential dating partners” (Nosko, 2009). Nosko cites how research by Madden & Lenhart, 2006 indicated that a large majority of people use the internet as a means of finding a partner (2009). For these users, it might be necessary to include a variety of personal information on a profile to attract a potential mate, which in their perspective is worth the risk of the potential for harm.

Privacy controls have also shown to vary among different age groups. Nosko shows that younger users disclose more sensitive personal information, such as details that could be used to locate or identify an individual, and stigmatizing information on their default profile than are older users (2009). With the same sample as the relationship analysis, Nosko used three linear regressions to explore whether age predicted disclosure of information for default/standard information, sensitive personal information, and potentially stigmatizing information. She found that as age increased, “the amount of default information present in person profiles decreased” (Nosko, 2009). We can conclude from this that older users tend to be more cautious about revealing information about themselves online. It seems that stating large amounts of personal information about one’s self online has begun to become integrated into the lives of younger generations. Younger users may feel more comfortable and less cautious about what they reveal about themselves online (Goodstein, 2007) (Nosko, 2009). Another possibility of the difference in disclosure could be that online social networks such as Facebook are not comfortable mediums for communication among older users. Older users may prefer different mediums for socializing despite being open to new technology (Bucur, Renold & Henke, 1999) (Nosko, 2009). However, Facebook is one of the most popular ways of communication among younger generation and it is almost taboo for a college student to not have a Facebook profile. As well as being used for communication, Facebook allows users to have exposure to groups promoting various issues as well as and the potential to be invited to events. Those with publically accessible Facebook profiles are able to receive these invitations by a larger range of people than someone whose profile is only accessible by a few friends. Therefore, those who restrict their profile may be left out of social opportunities.

Christofides (2009) analyzed the general likelihood of disclosing information in regard to the need for popularity. A study of 343 undergraduates at a mid-size university in Ontario, Canada examined how trust, self-esteem and the need for popularity affect personal disclosure. The results showed that trust and self-esteem were not significant factors, but the need for popularity predicted an additional 1% of the variance, “which is notable considering the strong impact of general disclosure within the model” (Christofides, 2009). These results show that the desire for popularity is a factor in whether to disclose information. Hence, those craving popularity will disclose more information about themselves than will others. A Facebook identity is constructed by disclosing information “such as pictures, discussions with friends, and shar[ing] personal interests and information” (Christofides, 2009). Those with a more constructed identity have a greater presence on Facebook and seem to have the largest amount of participation by others on their profile; hence, they are more popular. As a result, limiting access to personal information significantly hinders one’s ability to construct an identity and thus reduces his or her popularity. For these individuals, popularity is a large factor to consider when deciding whether to reduce access to personal information.

The studies by Nosko and Christofides show how those indicating they are single, younger users and those craving popularity disclose more personal information on their profiles than their counterparts. For these individuals the benefits associated with disclosing a large amount of personal information online allow for communication, potential mates, and popularity, which overshadows the risks associated with revealing personal information. Interestingly these three categories tend to overlap among younger people. Therefore, as new generations become more integrated with the Internet, we should continue to see an increased amount of personal information posted online and ultimately see a reduction in the gap between private and public selves.

Bibliography

CHRISTOFIDES, E. (2009) Information Disclosure and Control on Facebook: Are They Two Sides of the Same Coin or Two Different Processes? cyberpsychology and behavior, 12, 341 -.

DEBATIN, B. (2009) Facebook and Online Privacy: Attitudes, Behaviors, and Unintended Consequences. JOURNAL OF COMPUTER-MEDIATED COMMUNICATION, 15, 83 – 108.

LIVINGSTONE, S. (2008) Taking risky opportunities in youthful content creation: teenagers use of social networking sites for intimacy, privacy and self-expression. new media and society, 10, 393 -.

NOSKO, A. (2009) All about me: Disclosure in online social networking profiles: The case of FACEBOOK. COMPUTERS IN HUMAN BEHAVIOR, 26, 406 – 418.

David Smith’s article brings up some interesting points about the internet and self-expression. The Internet is one of the easiest fastest ways to spread an opinion and feelings. Smith states how dozens post YouTube videos “confiding the anguish of eating disorders as they might to a diary or therapist.” “Sophie” by Eleanor McEvoy, a song about an anorexic girl written 10 years ago, has been able to spread rapidly recently among anorexic girls due to the internet. This song is inspiring to these girls and many of these girls have decided to seek help after listening to it. The article states how collectively, the “Sophie” Youtube videos have been viewed more than 1.5m times. Multiple comments are left on these videos expressing support and asking where they can get the song.

The fact that the Internet was able to allow 1.5m views of this song is astonishing. Without the internet, this song would have not been spread as rapidly or even at all. Out of those 1.5m views, I bet at least 1/8 of those views were people who seeked help or rethought weather they really had a problem. In a way, the internet changed these girls lives. It’s quite interesting to observe just how much the internet can affect people. In this case, it changed and even saved some girls lives. We see Youtube stars become famous, almost any information, type of support and groups are able to be found online. If you take advantage of the Internet, it can really have impacting affect on your life.

Livingstone examines youth and how they use social networking sites. The article brings up the point that “creating and networking online content is becoming an integral means of managing one’s identity, lifestyle and social relations.” (pg.394) This is supported by the fact that about 1/3 of Myspace users and over half of Bebo users in the US are under 18 years old. I found this article to be very relatable to my environment and myself as social networking (mostly Facebook) is a part of many Bowdoin students routines.

Privacy on the web is one interesting point brought up by Livingstone. She states that the definition of privacy is “is not tied to the disclosure of certain types of information, rather a definition centered on having control over who knows what about you.” (pg.404) She goes on to state how teenagers are concerned with “inappropriate others” reading their profiles and not absolute strangers. Jason explains how he doesn’t want his parents seeing his profile because it’s almost like they are are looking through his room (both are private spaces) but he doesn’t mind if strangers read it. Additionally, it seems that “friends,” the people that are able to view one’s profile, are defined and allowed differently by people. While Jason has only 39 friends, all which are his real friends, Ellie has 554 friends. Hence, Ellie is allowing individuals that she once had some kind of connection with to view personal information about herself, while Jason only allows his real friends to view his profile content.

Lack of privacy could overlap with digital skills. The ability to navigate the interface design of social networking sites depends on internet literacy. Livingstone states that a large portion of those interviews paused when asked to show how to change their privacy settings. Ellie does not know how to change her network from the London network to her school network. Interestingly, she is able to see private information for thousands of Londoners but not that of her schoolmates. Danny’s father who works in computers was confused whether he was in any groups on Myspace. This indicates that there is a difference between being able to navigate these sites and having the skills to use a computer.

Livingstone goes on to support how social networks are only part of their social relations with their friends. Sophie states that “When you’re moody, MySpace isn’t really the best thing to go on… you can’t really get across emotions on there because you’re writing. It’s good for making arrangements and stuff, but it’s not good if you want a proper chat.” (pg. 408) This supports the idea that social networking cannot fulfill real life relationships and allow for and be able to portray true expression. I use Facebook in my normal daily routine. I don’t think I’ve ever had a meaningful conversation on it. I use it to keep up with my high school friends, make arrange plans, and look at pictures. I don’t think I would ever use it to express myself. I would turn to texting or calling someone for a semi-meaningful conversation and talk to someone in real life if I wanted a really meaningful conversation. For me, there’s a problem about making my emotions public/semi-public/semi-private (I still don’t know what kind of space Fb is!). However, I do have friends that express their emotions in their status. Recently, my friend posted as her status “Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience.” This was eluding to a fight that she had just had with our mutual friend. Our mutual friend was not to pleased. In the article, Danielle’s friend also expressed her emotions by posting about her parent’s divorce. However, doing this seems to be quite rare and uncomfortable for most people.

Social networks allow for a person to choose what to say about themselves and how to describe themselves. The choice to make a false perception of one’s self or not. It seems that younger teenagers are found to make their profile’s more flashy to create a “highly-decorated, stylistically-elaborate identity.” (pg. 407) While older teens tend to have plain aesthetic that expresses “a notion of identity lived through authentic relationships with others.” (pg. 408) I remember how my Facebook has changed throughout the years. When I first created it, I put lots of pictures, tried to friend as many people as I could and would post on lots of people’s walls in hopes they would respond to portray the view that I was cool and popular. Now, I simply use it for my own use, and do not care what other’s see it as. I only friend people I actually want to talk to (I have even unfriended hundreds), and use it to talk to people I actually care about rather than trying to get lots of posts on my wall. Much of this comes with maturity I feel. I have grown apart from caring what other’s think and caring more about what I think.

http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/dan-macsai/popwise/evolution-murder-facebook?nav=inform-rl

I found the part where you could trade 10 friends for a free burger king whooper particularly entertaining.

Poster and McLelland discuss the idea of virtual ethnicity in cyberspace. I was particularly interested in how technology can affect culture and perspectives.

Poster was asked by a Maori reporter about the possible implications of a Western company producing a CD-ROM on Maori culture and distributing it throughout the world. (pg. 186) If this were to happen, sounds, images, and texts of the CD would be controlled by a non-Maori entrepreneur and other cultures would learn the “stories, customs, and secrets of her culture without participating in them in real life.” Poster states that “The technical reproduction of culture then transforms the constitution of identities, even ethnic or national identifies.” In this way, technology can change culture and even devastate tribes. This example portrays other cultures learning about Maori culture from a bias source. Bias perspectives can be spread and created much faster with the rise of the Internet. Our opinion about an issue can dramatically change according to what news source we read. False claims about culture can be easily distributed in a negative way or just incorrect way. Opinions can be made on this false information and then societies have a false representation of a culture. This can lead to stereotypes, pity and other negative effects.

Poster states Walter Benjamin’s argument about how the “technical reproduction of art alters the nature of art by changing the relation of the audience to the author, the conditions of reception, and the authority of the author.” This is another negative example of the rise of technology. I do agree that technical reproduction of art does distort the piece. It’s just not the same feeling. In a real painting you can see the brush strokes clearly and kind of feel what the artist was trying to do. I was absolutely astounded to see the real version of my Andy Warhol Campbell’s Tomato Soup Can poster at MoMa. The authentic piece makes such a greater impact than my flimsy poster.

On the other hand, technology can establish a “more intimate connection between nations.”  (pg. 187) Briggs and Maverick state that with the telegraph connecting all the nations of the earth, “It is impossible that old prejudices and hostilities should longer exist, while such an instrument has been created for an exchange of thought between all the nations of the earth.” Technology can bring people together. Beyond the telegraph, communication sites, news sites all bring nations together. The Internet makes it possible to contact almost anybody with an Internet connection and allows everyone to have access to the same information. The Internet allows other nations to view different perspectives and learn about different cultures.

Mclelland states how there is no ‘digital divide’ along ethnic lines in Japan, since “Japan’s minority communities of Ainu, resident Koreans and Okinawans are not economically disadvantaged to the extent that internet accessibility becomes a problem via the near-ubiquitous imode mobile system.” I wonder if there is there is still a usage divide. Having access to the technology can only bridge the digital divide.

Although minorities in Japan can get Internet use, they are greatly discriminated against. Those who are blood and culturally Japanese are only displayed on mainstream media. Additionally, it seems that many Japanese are very close-minded to non-Japanese perspectives. However, there is a limited interaction between Japanese and non-Japanese viewpoints, “both via code shifting from Japanese to English, the use of traslation software into Japanese, and the not-inconsiderable number of non-Japanese posters using the Japanese language.”

2-Channeru is a large Japanese Community site that functions as a “contact zone in which, for example, Japanese racism is contested, intersects with and is confronted by white, western racism.” However, It seems this site is mostly voiced from a Japanese perspective and it’s main focus is to criticize Japan’s proximate neighbors. For example one post states “poster no. 1 says that they hate the Chinese the most since their use of Furan gas endangers the environment.”

Although there seems to be a great present of virtual ethnicity solidarity in Japan, the rise of this 2-Channeru site and technology might allow Japan to become more open minded and multicultural. It seems that this is starting to happen with Japanese racism already being contested so it will be interesting to see what happens in the future.

Our previous exercise to unfriend people really got me thinking. People who I’m “friends” with on Facebook can see what I’m doing and so much personal information about me. I want to know who has access to this information. Having 746 friends does not allow me to keep track of who I’m allowing to see my information. So I decided to continue unfriending. I currently have 499 friends. I will keep going until I am sure that everyone that is my “friend” is actually my friend and they are people that I want to have access to what I’m up to and my personal information. Although I doubt I will ever get down to 150, I hope to have around 350 friends.

The Digital Divide by Pippa Norris examines how equal Internet access can bridge inequalities within societies and the inequalities which are currently present. The Internet using population is growing rapidly with over 377 million users in the late 2000 compared to about three million users in 1994 (pg. 274). This over 100% increase means that more people are becoming connected and able to obtain information. Metcalf’s law suggests that “the value of a network is proportional to the square number of people using it: the more people that are linked to the Internet, the greater its utility, the more it attracts” (pg. 274) meaning our society will exponentially increase in Internet use in the future.

Those without this access are being deprived of the Internet’s information. While wealthy, highly educated individuals can obtain plentiful information at low cost and high speed, those without a connection become dependent on outdated information as they don’t have the connection, time and money to connect (pg. 274). If poorer societies were to connect, they can obtain multiple opportunities for socioeconomic and democratic development. “Digital networks have the potential to broaden and enhance access to information and communications for remote rural areas and poorer neighborhoods, to strengthen the process of democratization under transitional regimes, and to ameliorate the endemic problems of poverty in the developing world” (pg. 275). The Internet can function as a “public library, school classroom and medical database, post office and telephone, marketplace and shopping mall, channel for entertainment, culture and music, daily news resource for headlines, stocks and weather, and heterogeneous global public sphere” (pg. 275) which allows for greater access, more cost efficient and ease of everyday activities. Instead of paying for a phone, you can use Skype for free; there is no need to go to the mall when you can shop right online; you can be entertained by going online instead of going out or paying for television service. Additionally, the internet can provide access to education and health information. This means that teachers in third world countries will be able to access the same electronic journals, books and databases as students at the top colleges. Hospitals and health professionals in these countries can access the latest research on diseases. In this way, the Internet can bridge the educational, health and informational gap between societies.

Currently, the internet is reinforcing existing divisions of inequality instead of bridging the gap. The Department of Commerce has stated that there are notable divides in Internet use between “Americans with different levels of income and education, different racial and ethnic groups, old and young, single an dual-parent families and those with and without disabilities” (pg. 278). If Metcalf’s law shall be true, these divides should decrease in the future as more people are attracted to using the internet. However, even if everyone has access to the Internet, it does not mean that everyone can use and take advantage of it in the same way. People who have grown up with the Internet will have innate digital skills and be able to navigate through and find information easier. I sure can use the Internet way more effectively than my grandparents who struggle to use something as simple as a search engine. Those with high income can afford better, faster internet and can therefore search and obtain information much faster. So although the Internet has the potential to equalize members of societies, it will only go as far as bridging inequalities.