The Fourth industrial revolution and the digital divide

Published date02 September 2019
Date02 September 2019
Pages12-17
DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1108/LHTN-07-2019-0048
AuthorDonna Ellen Frederick
Subject MatterLibrary & information science,Librarianship/library management,Library technology,Library & information services
The Fourth industrial revolution and the digital
divide
Donna Ellen Frederick
Twenty years ago, many public
libraries in North America and
elsewhere around the world were
actively involved with addressing a new
“problem” which came to be known as
the “digital divide”. The digital divide is
a gap between those who have access to
computers and the internet and those
who do not. This gap is the result of
several barriers confronting socially and
economically disadvantaged persons,
the elderly and some with disabilities.
These barriers range from the cost of
access to technology to the unsuitability
of interfaces for some users. Over the
years, public libraries developed many
programs and services which were
targeted to address the social,
vocational and educational inequalities
associated with the digital divide.
Services include the provision of public
computers with internet access and
productivity software; accessibility
equipment and applications; computer
classes for seniors and low-income
citizens and technology-focused
information literacy training. While
they were originally designed to target
disadvantaged audiences, these
programs and services are “business as
usual” for many public libraries today
and are appreciated by more than just
those who are on the disadvantaged side
of the digital divide. For example, even
in the age of smart phones, both locals
and travelers still use the technology
made available at public libraries to
copy, scan and print documents. While
the digital divide will undoubtedly
continue to exist to some degree,
libraries have done much to narrow the
gap for many users.
An awareness and understanding of
the importance of the digital divide took
a few years to trickle through to the
news and policy discussions. The author
of this article recalls that in the 1980s
Canadian schools and universities
began to introduce computers into their
learning environments. There was, for
example, a “computer club” in her high
school whose members were typically
intelligent but often unathletic
adolescent boys. Hence, a new
unfortunate and unfair stereotype was
born. One of the ways that the
stereotype was “unfortunate” is that it
created an identity wherein computers
and technology was not considered
feminine. For example, the same group
of adolescent boys were in a small
“computer science” class where
typically there were few or no girls. In
this course, students wrote simple
computer programs in the BASIC
language which they saved on audio
cassettes and then demonstrated the
results of their programing to their less
technologically inclined cohort. While
the exclusion of girls from the circle of
the teenaged technologically savvy was
likely neither intentional nor desirable
for the young computer enthusiasts, it
none-the-less was the beginning of a
digital divide.
A few years after her high school
experience, the author took a course on
library administration from a middle-
aged professor who wrote on the
blackboard one day “Computers in
libraries.... The next big thing? Or, a
flash in the pan?” The topic of the class
that day was a debate on the potential
and actual usefulness of computers in
both managing libraries and supporting
education. There was no question as to
where the professor stood on this issue.
In his estimation, computers were a
“fad”. As such, he felt that they
distracted from the real work of
libraries. At that point, the tide was
already turning for libraries. Many
public and university libraries were
automated to at least some degree by the
end of the 1980s. Yet, the author recalls
that many experienced librarians and
teachers remained reluctant, if not
downright suspicious, about the trend
toward the use of computers in schools
and libraries. It was clear that at the end
of the 1980s there was a new digital
divide in the education and library
fields. This divide, she observed,
existed largely between the older
established professionals who often
took an “if it’s not broken, why fix it?”
attitude and their younger colleagues
who saw new technology holding great
potential for creating new opportunities
and breathing life into their respective
professions. While the divide existed,
the author felt that most professionals
did not consider the emerging digital
world as anything more than something
existing on the fringe of their work life.
What was the turning point for
acceptance of the new digital reality and
when did a concern for the digital divide
begin to emerge? The author recalls her
early days of doing reference work in a
public library where the reference
resources were still overwhelmingly
print-based. Electronic resources were
the CD-ROM type. However, when in
1991 a new Integrated Library System
was installed in her library, it brought an
interesting change. Not only was a new
thing called “email” introduced, the
“new system” allowed reference staff to
access information and resources on
computers using something we were
told was called “Gopher”. This was the
beginning of an important change in
reference work but not all librarians and
library assistants were comfortable with
using Gopher. Among those who were
intrigued by the technology and the
potential it held, there was still a level of
suspicion about the veracity and
reliability of the information which was
retrieved. Around 1995, the library
started to use the Lynx text-based web
browser at the reference desk. Shortly,
thereafter, a local “Free-net” club made
a computer with text-based internet
access available for public use. These
new “internet” computers were very
12 LIBRARY HITECH NEWS Number 7 2019, pp. 12-17, V
CEmerald Publishing Limited, 0741-9058, DOI 10.1108/LHTN-07-2019-0048

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