The digital divide is not just about the haves and the have-nots. It's also about the yawning gap between those who are comfortable using technology and those who fear or despise it.
It's a gap strewn with broken computers, faulty ISPs and confusing technical manuals, as well as various other financial, social, psychological and physical factors.
The usual suspects turn out in conspicuously low numbers online: minorities, people with lower incomes, the elderly and disabled people, according to a new study from the Pew Internet and American Life Project.
But another group is gaining among the offline population. Seventeen percent of people surveyed are Internet dropouts.
They were online once but were tripped up by technical problems that have kept them offline sometimes for a year or more. And 25 percent are online now but have dropped off in the past for a lengthy period of time for the same reasons, the study found.
"People don�t actually have a progression from a nonuser to new user and then onto broadband user," said Amanda Lenhart, a research specialist at the Pew project who wrote the new report. "That's the case with some people, but with others there are more fits and starts. They try it, then they don�t like it, or they get knocked off and spend a year trying to come back online."
Another emerging group left out of the Internet revolution are those who have the opportunity to go online if they want to, but don't.
A total of 80 million American adults -- 42 percent of the adult population -- say they don't use the Internet, the study found. But 20 percent of them have Internet access in the next room and choose not to go online. Or, some of them get family members to go online for them.
"Many of the people whom we talked to define themselves as people who don�t use technology," Lenhart said. "They view themselves as high-touch versus high-tech."
About 27 percent of Americans are completely removed from the online world, according to the study. They've never tried going online and aren't surrounded by anyone else who uses the Internet.
People surveyed cited social and psychological reasons for not using the Internet. Those who feel "personally empowered" are more likely to go online, while those who feel less in control of their lives are less likely to go online, the study found.
Disabilities also keep some Americans from using the Internet. Almost 75 percent of disabled Americans do not go online, and 28 percent of them said their disability or impairment made it difficult or impossible to go online.
About 40 percent of nonusers think they will go online some day, and 56 percent believe they will never go online, the study found.
The Pew study is based primarily on a national telephone survey of 3,553 Americans, as well as focus groups in the Washington D.C. and Baltimore areas.
Experts working to narrow the digital divide say focusing on the subtleties of why people don't go online and helping them incorporate technology into their daily lives is the key to narrowing the digital divide.
One Economy, a nonprofit in San Francisco, works with government and private organizations to bring technology to low-income housing residents around the country. The organization also takes the next step to help individuals use the Internet to seek health information, pay bills or apply for low-interest loans online, among other tasks.
"One of the major focuses of our company is to create a culture of technology in the home because that's where it makes a bigger difference, not at a computer center or a library because single mothers don't have time to go there," said Francisco Mora, director of programs at One Economy. "They have 15 minutes after they put their kids to bed or finish their two jobs."
The Pew study also found that while the Internet population has grown, the same inequalities that have existed for years remain in force when it comes to those who are not online.
"The population of the Internet growth has really flattened, in fact it's almost stopped since 2001, when you balance the number of people coming online versus people going offline," Lenhart said.
While understanding the subtleties of offline populations might be helpful, the biggest reason for not getting online still comes down economics, experts said.
The East Bay Alliance for a Sustainable Economy in Oakland, California, which has studied the boom and bust of the 1990s, found not surprisingly that the decade created many high-tech jobs. But there was also an explosion of low-pay service jobs during the same period, a trend that has played out across the country, according to Amaha Kassa, co-director of the organization.
The majority of people in these positions, including retail clerks, janitors and hotel housekeepers, are not using the Internet because they don't have enough money for basic necessities, let alone to pay for a computer and Internet access.
"When people are really struggling to make ends meet," Kassa said, "access to the Internet and the use of this incredible tool of electronic communications is pretty low on their list of priorities of what they're trying to accomplish."
