Readers Respond - As well as& but not instead of

Recently Arts Council England announced a new set of policy documents which included, for the first time, a dedicated distribution policy and a new focus on using technology to increase access to the arts (AP issue 139, 12 February, p1). The policy has provoked debate, both in the pages of AP (issue 140, 26 February, p2) and more widely. Here, Bernard Martin argues that digital distribution needs to work alongside traditional methods for promoting and presenting the arts.
There is a generation now entering the workplace whove never known a time before the Internet, never experienced the non-digital age. And at the same time, access to the Internet increases every year. Digital delivery offers huge advantages, including access to knowledge that was unimaginable before the digital age and opportunities to network that make geographical boundaries irrelevant. Ideas in politics, engineering, science and the arts can spread, be adapted, grow, spawn new ideas in seconds, a process that would once have taken weeks or months. New artforms are sprouting and so are new opportunities to deliver older artforms in new ways. Government and other agencies (including Arts Councils and audience development agencies such as TEAM in Merseyside) can communicate information at a fraction of the cost they used to incur. The digital world is exciting, liberating and literally fantastic. Most of us love it!

Access

But& after 15 years of digital availability, only about 57%1 of households have access to the Internet; only 60% have access to a computer. That leaves 43% 10.5m households out of about 24m which can NOT get online at home. Almost half. (Guess which half&). And if they dont access the Internet at home, they are relatively unlikely to access it anywhere other than for work purposes. Only 15% of the population do so in a place of education; fewer still (10%) in a public library and 8% in Internet cafés. Public offices and community organisations between them serve just 6% of those who ever access the Internet.

What is more, the initial enthusiasm having waned, the rate of new take-up is slowing down. Yes, access to the Internet increases every year but every year it is by fewer than the year before. The curve of those with access is flattening; the rate of growth declining. At the current rate it will be many decades before universal access is achieved.

Technology

The 57% of households with access to the Internet (and bearing in mind this is a national average so the actual figure will be considerably less in some areas) compares with about 80% of households having access to at least one mobile phone. As long ago as 1999 there were more mobile phones than households.

This suggests that we are not a nation of technophobes: weve embraced mobile phone technology. So people who are not going digital must either be choosing not to or have some overriding reason not to. They are rejecting the option, not waiting to be converted.

Indeed the Office of National Statistics (ONS) figures suggest over 40% of those with no Internet access say its because they have no interest in access (despite the daily bombarding with go to our website messages in the more established media); 30% of them have no computer, and 15% say they have no need. About 6% say they cant afford it. When we build mailing lists of the public, its only a minority seldom more than 30% who say they want to receive information electronically. Most want old-fashioned paper communications.

So, overall, digital delivery excludes almost half the population. Which is a shame for us, because not only is it exciting, not only does it offer fabulous new opportunities it is also cheap for the provider. Compared with using print, its peanuts! And lots of the costs are borne by the consumer, not the producer.

Exclusive

Arts Council England (ACE) is, quite rightly, committed to inclusivity. Every taxpayer pays for the Arts Council; ACE is concerned to ensure the arts it supports are available to everyone. But digital delivery is delivery to only about half the population. It is exclusive, not inclusive. This above all else is the reason why for the time being at least whilst digital delivery should certainly be welcomed it must be as well as, not instead of other forms aimed at the general public. However much they have altered the marketplace, mobile phones have not ousted landlines; email has not replaced the paper envelope or even the fax. In the same way, it is unlikely that digital delivery will completely supplant more traditional media, at least for the time being.

How long is that? Well, by the end of next year, when the telly goes digital in Cumbria and effectively, as I understand it, the distinction between the TV and a computer will be eroded (will that make everyone with a laptop liable for a TV licence?) we may have a clearer idea. Will there be a huge jump in Internet access in Cumbria, then? And will that presage developments in the rest of the country for 2012 when everywhere else goes digital&? If it does, aiming for exclusively digital delivery but after 2012 may be an equitable aim.

But only may be. Imagine, for example, that the digitisation of TV deals with all those who currently say they cannot afford Internet access or fear they lack the skills or have no computer if most of those who say they have no need are in fact enticed by the delights of TV channels web output. Will the proportion currently 40% of non-users who say they just arent interested change if access via the telly becomes universal? Currently, the refuseniks represent some 17% of the population: more than twice the size of the vegetarian community, twice the size of all the UKs ethnic minority communities put together, massively more than the audiences for arts such as ballet or opera& one person in six. What if they dont change? What if they continue not to be interested? Can we ignore them? Do we have the right to ignore them?