On May 1, 2004, the Swedish Justice Department released a report by the name of Digitala klyftor – förr, nu och i framtiden (Digital rifts – past, present and future). It investigated the rifts in society between those that are attuned to and able to benifit from the new technology and those that can not, made from a perspective of age groups, gender and social classes. It concluded a very interesting thing:
Age can, at a superficial concideration, look like an important factor. The reason, however, that people over the age of 65 are using the Internet less than those that are younger, is mainly because they were not introduced to the use of Internet during their professional lives. They were already retired when the Internet came. The age cleft will thus shrink as the new senior citizens will have a habit of using the Internet in their professions. People doesn’t stop using the Internet because they retire.
[...]
Thus we see that the age cleft is significant in a short-term perspective, but it will diminish. It can only be diminished by a lesser extent from economical measures, however social networks can have a positive effect for those that already lacks these from the time prior to retirement.
This is an important conclusion, and one that works on several levels, the political level nontheless.
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