Browsing by Author "Hilbert, Martin"

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    How Much of the Global Information and Communication Explosion Is Driven by More, and How Much by Better Technology?
    (2014) Hilbert, Martin
    Technological change in the digital age is a combination of both more and better technology. This work quantifies how much of the technologically-mediated information and communication explosion during the period of digitization (1986-2007) was driven by the deployment of additional technological devices, and how much by technological progress in hardware and software. We find that technological progress has contributed between two to six times more than additional technological infrastructure. While infrastructure seems to reach a certain level of saturation at roughly 20 storage devices per capita and 2 to 3 telecommunication subscriptions per capita, informational capacities are still expanding greatly. Besides progress in better hardware, software for information compression turns out to be an important and often neglected driver of the global growth of technologically-mediated information and communication capacities.
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    One step, two step, network step? Complementary perspectives on communication flows in Twittered citizen protests
    (2017) Hilbert, Martin; Vasquez, Javier; Halpern Jelin, Daniel Matías; Valenzuela, Sebastián; Arriagada Cardini, Eduardo Sergio
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    Technological Information Inequality as an Incessantly Moving Target: The Redistribution of Information and Communication Capacities Between 1986 and 2010
    (2014) Hilbert, Martin
    This article provides first-time empirical evidence that the digital age has first increased and then (only very recently) decreased global, international, and national inequalities of information and communication capacities among and within societies. Previous studies on the digital divide were unable to capture the detected trends appropriately, because they worked with proxies, such as the number of subscriptions or related investments, without considering the vast heterogeneity in informational performance among technological devices. We created a comprehensive data set (based on over 1,100 sources) that allows measuring information capacity directly, in bits per second, bits, and instructions per second. The newly proposed indicators provide insights into inequalities in access to, usage of, and impact of digitized information flows. It shows that the digital divide has gone into a second stage, which is based on a relative universalization of technological devices and a continuously evolving divide in terms of communication capacity.