The presentation addresses the complexities of digital divides in both rural and urban areas, emphasizing the need for fine-grained data to understand these disparities. It highlights specific case studies, such as those in Detroit and the UK, illustrating the challenges in assessing access to technology and its impact on education. The conclusion advocates for diverse methodologies in mapping and measuring these divides, urging researchers not to rely solely on conventional data representations.

1. Mapping and Measuring Digital Divides
William H. Dutton
Emeritus Professor, University of Southern California
Senior Fellow, Oxford Internet Institute
Oxford Martin Fellow, Global Cyber Security Capacity Centre,
Department of Computer Science, University of Oxford
Visiting Professor, Media and Communication, University of Leeds
Presentation for the 47th Research Conference on Communications, Information and Internet Policy,
September 20, 2019.

2. Zooming in for Digital Divide Issues
• Across and within Rural Areas
• Geography v Demography
Rural Divides
• Distressed Areas
• Invisible Publics
Urban Divides
• Not technologically determined
• Absence of fine-grained data
Homework Gap

3. Urban-Rural Divides in
the UK (2013)
• Difficult to Discern Impact of
Geography, controlling for SES
• OxIS Random Samples of UK
• Collaboration with Un of Aberdeen
• Disproportionately Sampling Rural
Areas (82% urban)
• Discover Differences between
Swallow v Deep Rural Areas
• Discovered Impact of Speed
See: Farrington, et al (2015).

4. Divides within Urban Areas: the Detroit Case
• Under-sampling of Distressed
Communities in (Sub)Urban Areas
• Fostering Myths of the
Disconnected and Disinterested
• Quello Center’s Study of Three
Communities of Detroit (Rocket
Fiber) – 12.1% response rate
• Great Interest
• Ingenuity in being Connected
• Mobile Only Divide Issues
Focus Group Discussion in Detroit Community Center
See: Fernandez, et al (2019).

5. Student Sourcing Data on the Homework Gap
• More than a technical challenge of infrastructure
• Absence of fine-grained data on student access in households
• MSU’s Quello-Merit Moonshot Project (Keith Hampton et al)
• 3 large intermediate school districts, 3,500 students in 200 classrooms
• Collectively gathering data on BB at home, and conducting speed tests
• Also collected information on possible implications:
• Uncompleted homework
• Career ambitions
• Time on homework
• Grades
See: Yankelevik et al (2019), and Quello-Merit homework gap project at https://www.merit.edu/services/moonshot/).

6. Simple conclusions:
Many ways to map and measure divides
Problems should drive the methods
Be open to multiple methods and modes
Don’t focus only on the ‘Holy Map’ of BB

7. References
Farrington, J., Philip, L., Cottrill, C., Abbott, P., Blank, G., and Dutton, W. (2015), Two-Speed
Britain: Rural Internet Use. Aberdeen, UK: Aberdeen University Press. Available at:
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2645771
Fernandez, L., Reisdorf, B. C., and Dutton, W. H. (2019), ‘Urban Internet Myths and Realities: A
Detroit Case Study’, Information Communication and Society, June. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2019.1622764
Mack, E. A., Dutton, W. H., Rickard, R.V., and Yankelevich, A. (2019), ‘Mapping and Measuring the
Information Society: A Social Science Perspective on the Opportunities, Problems and Prospects
of Broadband Internet Data on the United States’, The Information Society. Available online at:
https//:doi.org/10.1080/01972243.2019.1574526
Quello-Merit homework gap project at https://www.merit.edu/services/moonshot/
Reisdorf, B.C., Yankelevich, A., Shapiro, M., and Dutton, W.H. (2019), ‘Wirelessly Bridging the
Homework Gap: Technical Options and Social Challenges in Getting Broadband to Disconnected
Students’, Education and Information Technologies, (July): https://doi.org/10.1007/s10639-019-
09953-9