The internet is not as prevalent as you think + check out the FT’s list of the year’s 25 most influential women
Thinking of investing mns of USD in metaverse real estate? One of this year’s more preposterous investment trends — an impressive feat given 2021 was the year that gave us Dogecoin mania — was made all the more absurd last week by a UN report which told us that more than a third of the world’s population still have never even used the internet.
Highlighting the stark inequalities between the digital haves and the digital have-nots, the UN’s IT agency said that some 2.9 bn people (equivalent to 37% of the global population) living in developing countries have never once logged onto the web.
But covid is changing this: The pandemic caused the largest annual increase in internet users since 2010, with covid lockdowns, school closures and increasing access to online banking and government services growing the number of internet users by almost 20% between 2019 and 2021. The strongest growth was seen in the 46 lowest-income countries in the world, which saw a 20% increase in internet penetration.
Although the digital gender divide has narrowed in most of the world, Arab and African countries continue to have large gaps, with internet usage being more common among youth, men and urban dwellers. The report found that the digital divide is created largely by factors like poverty, illiteracy, lack of access to electricity and digital illiteracy.
One very good reason for less internet penetration? Donald Trump’s Truth Social, which will have most of us either decamping for a permanent vacation in Zucker-verse or setting fire to our routers. The SPAC being used by The Donald to launch his new social media venture has raised USD 1 bn from institutional investors, it said yesterday (pdf). The social media messaging app “Truth Social,” TMTG’s flagship platform, was due to launch in November with an invitation-only beta version but has apparently failed to meet its own deadline. The share price of DWAC has dropped dramatically since the initial announcement.
This year’s Financial Times’ list of the year’s 25 most influential women asks what influence is and how it is changing, with an unranked list penned by influential women themselves including a diverse group of female activists, whistleblowers, truth-seekers and business heavyweights. The list features the likes of the director-general of the World Trade Organization Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Ark Investment Management founder Cathie Wood, Sudanese foreign minister Mariam Al Mahdi, and Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen.