[Air-l] new technologies: diffusion comparison diagram

[John Daly]

I think about the diffusion of the Internet to developing countries.

Getting onto the Internet depends on having a computer and a telephone
connection. Most people who have computers already have telephones.
Diffusion of the Internet to people with both is a relatively easy,
inexpensive process.

In developing countries few people have either computers or telephones. I
suspect that the process of diffusion of the Internet will become much
slower when it has exhausted the installed computer and telephone capacity,
and new linkages will require both a new computer and a new telephone.

I have seen estimates that a billion people in the world still don't have
electricity. I suspect that the diffusion of Internet technology to
illiterate people who not only don't have computers and telephones, but who
don't have electricity will be quite a different process still.

John Daly
http://www.geocities.com/stconsultant
http://stconsultant.blogspot.com