However, it should be noted that there are at least two major problems
in employing demographic variables as the primary predictors of community
network use. The first problem relates to wide diffusion of the
Internet to the society. Since the U.S. National Telecommunications and
Information Administration (under the Clinton administration) recognized
the digital divide, “the divide between those with access to new
technologies and those without” [15, par. 1], there have been considerable
government and local efforts to provide ICT services to traditionally underprivileged
populations by supporting local organizations working for
this cause [7, 14–17]. Because of those efforts, more recent studies indeed
reported that a community network user profile is no longer limited to
educated, affluent, young men [6]. Also, when three out of four Americans
have access to the Internet [29], it is questionable whether demographics
would maintain the same predictive power as they had in the mid-1990s.
This environmental change allows us to assume that the previously underprivileged
population may no longer be as excluded from the Internet.
Accordingly, demographic characteristics may be reduced as informative
predictors of use.