henry jenkins; the particpation gap

CNET News.com interviewed Henry Jenkins about the new digital divide, and how digital environments are influencing children. He makes a number of important points;

“…there still are some fundamental differences between those kids who have 24/7 broadband mobile access to every new media appliance and those kids who might have 10 minutes of access a day if they’re lucky”

“(Research has shown) that 57 percent of teens online have produced media and about a third of them have produced media that they shared with people beyond their immediate friends and families. A good chunk of those produced media by remixing it, so this is a generation that is not just consuming media, but producing media.”

“…these are kids who are learning to share knowledge, to collaborate over distances, to work with people from diverse backgrounds, to participate in a global culture–those are really powerful things that are emerging in this generation.”

Jenkins points to the changes needed in schools to counter this growing “participation gap”.