Good Luck With That One

Martha Lane Fox wants everyone to be online.

UK digital champion, Martha Lane Fox, wants to get everyone of working age online by 2012

The Networked Nation Manifesto, published today, also highlights the lack of net access “among the disadvantaged, unemployed and retired”.

David Cameron backed the campaign, saying that “digital inclusion is essential for a modern dynamic economy”.

There is a fly in the ointment, though.

However, the issue of who will pay for it all has yet to be addressed.

Quite. I pay my own bills. I see no reason why I should pay others’ bills.

The report outlines various strategies to get the UK population online, setting itself the challenge of getting “everyone of working age online by the end of this Parliament”.

However, despite all these “strategies” there is another fly in the ointment…

And one other problem – amongst those targeted by this mission, a stubborn minority continue to see few reasons why they should bother with the internet.

Indeed. I have at least five family members who feel this way. Don’t need it and don’t want it. Given this, they won’t pay for it, either, so Ms Lane Fox is going to miss her target. Why not just leave people alone to do their own thing?

As an aside, I note the use of language to describe these people as a stubborn minority. If you don’t go along with the latest edict, you are a stubborn minority, rather than someone who simply has no use for what is on offer and prefers to choose for themselves how they spend their own money and would prefer, on balance, for Tzars or champions to mind their own business; and for government to leave them alone to make their own lifestyle and purchasing choices.