Internet use in the DR

The use of internet by girls in the DR differs from those in the U.S. and other developed countries in a few ways which were mentioned in the test on page 14. The author touched on the fact that internet use was mostly restricted to use at public facilities, thereby making the length of time and how frequently girls in the DR go online is significantly less than girls who have the internet readily available to them in their homes. It’s interesting to see that in the U/S/ the average teen spends approximately 11.5 hours on the internet per week, whereas in the DR girls spend approximately a few days a week online for anywhere between 15-20 minutes. This difference is due highly to availability and affordability. Girls in the DR must pay to use the internet in the telecenters, whereas girls in the U.S. typically have their internet use paid for by their guardians. Another reason as to why the girls in these different countries spend different amounts of time on the internet is because of availability. For instance, in the DR girls must travel outside of their homes a lot of times to get to a place where there is internet access, as opposed to the girls in the U.S. who typically have their computers in their own homes, readily available to them. Aside from just the time and frequency girls in these different countries access the internet, they also view the internet in different ways. It’s apparent that girls in the U.S. take their ability to get on the internet for granted and don’t realize how great a tool it is to have and how lucky they are to have it so readily available. When seeing what some girls from the DR said about the internet though, it’s apparent that they know that the internet is a great tool and has many possibilities built into it. For instance, when Norma, 13, from the DR says “many beautiful things, there’s so much to see on the Internet.” It’s interesting to consider how many girls from the U.S. would think this and would see the internet as a place where they could see beautiful things and be entertained for a bit from their daily lives.

One thing that made me a tad uneasy was that, while reading this article I thought to myself, “I’m going to have to blog about this.” It was weird to think that I was reading about this place where access to internet was rare, where girls did not have a great digital literacy and in the end, after I was done learning about it all, that I would have to go online and talk about it. The fact that I knew I would be able to sit in the comfort of my own home and post on the blog about my thoughts and what I read, made me feel pretty guilty. I felt like I was sitting here, reading about a problem that, if resolved, could help further the well-being of the women, heck of the people, in this country and all I was going to do was blog about it. I thought about ways that I could make an impact and help to change internet use in the DR, but I don’t really know where to even start. How does one even begin to help a developing country gain affordable access to the internet if they, themselves, have limited funding to do anything? Reading the article in general just made me feel a bit bad for being privileged and able to have such availability to the internet, whether it be at home or in the palm of my hand. I guess this article definitely helped me, one of those U.S. girls, stop taking the internet and my access to it for granted.