YOU have to socio-economically privileged/english speaking/White/male to read this. OH wait your most likely a american college student !!!

What groups of people seem to be the most technologically adapted? Well obviously people that can afford to own computers, however with efficient production the cost of electronics and computers has gone down drastically over the last 20 years making computers affordable and accessible to almost anyone with the desire to have a computer. Vaidhyanathan believes that “digitally adept young people” are usually socio-economically privileged, English speaking, white and male. Technology has become so affordable and accessible that of all sorts have the opportunities to have access to computers especially in the United States.
The mentioning of people with computers and people without computers is not complete without the concept of “digital divide”. The term digital divide is flexible to count people with computers and Internet and people without computers at all. Vaidhyanathan believes that “digitally adept young people” are rich, English speaking and male. In the technologically changing world, computers have almost become essential for people to remain an asset in the work force. According to a study regarding the digital divide, forty-nine to eighty-nine people in the United States “do” have access to computers. Unless over seventy percent of Americans are male, white, rich the digital divide in the United States is not that bad considering that most of America is middle-class and half and half on gender in respect to the overall population. Vaidhyanathan belief of white/male/rich computer supremacy seems to be off. If Vaidhyanathan was speaking of the digital divide in other parts of the world such Africa and Asia Vaidhyanathan would correct. With new projects to promote technology to narrow the digital divide, the digital divide may some day come a single digit problem.

Technologies that help narrow the digital divide include low-cost laptops. The “One Child One Laptop” project has created laptops that would only cost one hundred dollars. Even in third world countries the digital divide is slowly narrowing. The laptop has the ability to network with other laptops such, like (ad-hoc) but with many computers networking and sharing Internet together. The laptop is very rugged, made for third world countries it has solar panels and crank arm to recharge the laptop when other power is not available. The laptop is not the only combatant of the digital divide.
AMD(advance Micro Devices) is the world leader in computer processers, AMD created the 50X15 project which hopes to have fifty percent of the world population with computers and internet the project was started in 2004. With projects like the 50X15 and the one child one laptop it is clear that the digital divide is slowly breaking down.
The United States, which Vaidhyanathan specifically targets on the users of computers and Internet. The first claim that they digitally adept are white is fading away, the department of commerce reported that almost 40% of African American in the United States use computers and almost thirty-two percent of Hispanics. The most impressive report by the department of commerce is that Internet users that are low income (less then$15,000 per year) increased twenty five percent in one year, if the trend continued the number of “socio-economically underprivileged” would be obsolete.
What Vaidhyanathan forgot to mention was some people simply do not want to use computers; some people tend to be old fashion. The same group of people may also refrain from using voice-mail on cell phones and other “difficult” technologies.
I believe that people have the ability to have access to computers if they wish. It does not matter if they are poor or rich, white or black, English speaking or any other language, male or female, it is all a matter of having desire to use the product. We all know that computers do not discriminate on any bases. Vaidhyanathan claim is invalid, and with projects to fill in the gap of the digital divide Vaidhyanathan argument falls short of being true, especially in the United States. The department of Commerce’s statistics clearly show that technology has a level playing field. In the past Vaidhyanathan claims of possessors of technology may seem valid, but with technologies advances, Internet and computers have become available for anyone with the desire to possess them.