Week 9/10 - What difference would this make to a digital divide - B

The internet has enabled for people to be connected all over the world which we’ve looked into the over the last few weeks of blogging, i.e. online learning, virtual communities, online relationships etc. yet when we look at Wenger’s Community of Practice, the digital divide disable from everyone being part of an online community if they have limited or no access at all. This is just as applicable to the factor of online learning from a global perspective. In the journal I looked at in the a) section of this question, by Newholm, T et al, they proposed 4 different types of community in terms of their ICT skills being taught in a community – Learning community, Excluded community, Individuated society, elsewhere concerned. These four types all differ in the amount of time and access they have to a learning community, and Brady would describe ‘elsewhere concerned’ as having bigger problems that getting connected to the internet. Therefore is this diminishing and dividing the digital divide further by neglecting those without access.
In terms of online communities too, as the number of internet users is increasing, Davies and Crabtree would argue the internet is becoming ‘more local’, (2004) and research has been undertaken to show that technology is also coming to communities as well as communities going global. Now although this shows globally how societies are able to advance, there is still nothing accommodating the digital divide. Communities of Practice are still not available to everyone globally because of access issues, and digital immigrants wouldn’t be able to teach digital natives through video games for the same reasons. An advantage of online communities is that they connect people with similar cultural views, interests in a wide range of factors globally, but the digital divide still restricts this notion is fulfilling its extent within online community.

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