This issue of Netmarketing is about data and statistics (with a short summary of the analyses that are in the data section.)  As always, sources aren’t accurate and no numbers are “certain.”  However, after several years of working with statistics and observing how they evolve, I think some trends are relevant and worth watching.

The internet continues to grow. Not “exponentially”, with ups-and-downs, but overall quite consistently – and pretty fast. Many things can and will change, sometimes unexpectedly. But there is a clear growth pattern that has been clearly visible for at least twenty years.

We can divide the world, approximately, in three parts.

In the first, the internet has been well rooted for many years – and growth continues. Of course it includes North America and a substantial part of Europe – plus Australia, New Zealand, Japan (and a few other countries in Asia.)  There are considerable changes, and there will be more; but they occur in an environment where the internet isn’t “new.”  Though apparently ignored by many so-called “experts”, there is a relevant heritage of relationships, communities, culture, that may have its “historical” core in a relatively small number of people but has its own way of growing and evolving regardless of political, social or economic change – and regardless of technologies.

The second is “developing.”  It includes those countries (or parts of society in each country) where the internet was unknown, or experienced only by a very small number of people, until a relatively short while ago. In some of these areas there is fast growth. As in parts of Latin America and in a few places in Asia. The internet is growing rapidly in these parts of the world, reaching levels that are still far behind United States or Scandinavia but are getting quite close to “European” levels.

The third, that unfortunately includes three fourths of humanity, is almost completely excluded – and there are scarce signs of evolution. There are four types of problems.

There are political restrictions. In many countries there is hardly any freedom of information – and there is especially harsh repression of the internet, that is either prohibited or allowed only under strict control of the authorities.

There are cultural blocks, not because of difficulties in learning how to use the net (those can be overcome with some good training and patience) but for a lack of openness and willingness to understand diversity.

There are, of course, money problems. People in a state of extreme poverty can’t afford the cost of connection or of the necessary equipment. Many don’t even have a telephone – or electricity. What makes things worse is that often internet connections (and devices) are more expensive in low-income places that in the “rich” countries.

And there are technical problems. Not because using the net is difficult per se, but because the evolution of technologies, aimed at those people who are more prone to wasting money on unnecessarily expensive devices and useless “innovations”, is grotesquely unfit for those people who need reliable, stable, simple solutions –; and as cheap as possible. Technologies are moving in the wrong direction for all of us, but especially for the people who need them most. Information and dialogue can’t, by themselves, bring water to the thirsty, food to the starving, medicine and care to the diseased, freedom to the oppressed. But they are an essential tool for all effective solutions. The trend needs to be reversed radically if information technologies and communications are to be used as a key tool for the solution of humanity’s biggest problems.

back to top