Martha Lane Fox Wants Everyone Online by 2012

There’s already a number of different initiatives in place to get Britain online, but one of the more bold claims has been made today by Martha Lane Fox, the UK’s Digital Inclusion Champion and head of online initiative Race Online 2012. Today, the initiative changed their overall goals from getting 4 million UK adults online to attempting “to get 100% of the UK population online by the time of the London Olympics.”

Like most, the scheme is aimed at bringing online those who want to get online but can’t due to lack of solid connection in their area. However, unlike most schemes, Race Online 2012 actually focuses as much on social exclusion as it does digital, aiming to encourage internet use from people that have been excluded due to their environment or financial concerns.

Here’s the update from the site:

“PwC figures show that if everyone in the country was online, total benefits to the UK will be in excess of £22bn and households will save £560 a year. With increased numbers of people online, IAB member organisations will also have the opportunity to extend their customer bases and grow the increasingly vital digital economy.

We believe Race Online 2012 is a vital initiative which will not only bring huge social benefits, but will help in the development of a crucial area of growth for this country.”

With 10 million adults who have never been online – by Race Online’s own figures – getting them all connected is monumental task. Not only do many of these people not go online due to a lack of connection, many more don’t have computers. There’s also going to be a fairly good percentage of that group that simply don’t want to use the internet.

The other main commitment to the UK people was the government Universal Service Commitment (USC), which aims to provide access across the country by 2012, to a minimum speed of 2 Mbps. However, the USC has now been moved back 3 more years due to funding, and even then may on ‘alternative’ broadband methods to achieve these goals. Many of these, like Satellite broadband, are very expensive for end users and will further widen that social gap.

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