Holdouts manage to resist Net's lure

[SOURCE: San Jose Mercury News, AUTHOR: Mike Langberg]
[Commentary] Brace yourself for a shock: There are people in the United States who don't see any reason to use the Internet. There's hardly anyone left in the United States who wants to go online and isn't already there. This means newbies, those innocent first-time Internet users, are now an endangered species heading toward extinction. Two-thirds of the 109 million households in the United States now have at least one home computer connected to the Internet. Of households online, two-thirds have high-speed or ``broadband service,'' such as a cable modem or DSL line. One-third still have slower dial-up phone line connections. Three out of every four Americans are online; most at home, some only away from home at work, school, libraries or Internet cafes. That leaves about 25 percent of the population not online at all. There are at least three important lessons to be learned from this data. First, Internet companies are entering a new and much more competitive era. There won't be flocks of newbies to help support start-up companies or established companies offering new services. And existing users aren't willing to spend more time in front of their computers, giving companies the much harder task of luring users away from their competitors. Second, the so-called ``digital divide'' is much more of a social issue than a financial problem. Simply offering subsidies or setting up generic training programs won't bring many holdouts online. Instead, the private and public sector must work on creating applications that give the holdouts a compelling reason to turn to the Internet. Third, the so-called ``broadband gap'' is likely to resolve itself. The United States lags a number of nations in Europe and Asia in percentage of homes connected to broadband. But that's only because many dial-up users can't overcome the inertia to switch, not because they lack access to broadband or find it too expensive. Even if it takes another 10 years for 90 percent of the population to be online, the arrival of the Internet Age will still have happened with record-breaking speed. We just need to be patient as the holdouts slowly join us online.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/business/technology/14028023.htm