African Americans And The Internet

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RENEE MONTAGNE, host:

Martin Luther King's civil rights campaign included a call for equal access to public spaces. Today, the internet is one of those public spaces, and access for African Americans differs from that of whites. IT consultant Anjuan Simmons joins us to talk about some of those differences. Good morning.

Mr. ANJUAN SIMMONS (IT Consultant): Good morning.

MONTAGNE: Let's talk about access to the internet. Theoretically, of course, it's all equal, but in fact, there are different ways in which African Americans get on the Internet. What's one of them?

Mr. SIMMONS: What we're finding is cell phones are a common way that people of color are getting online. And one reason for that is, as opposed to a laptop, which often costs several hundred dollars, you can get a subsidized cell phone from a carrier for a lot less. And so you have a cost savings where you can get a cell phone that has a relatively high speed connection to the Internet, and I think that that low cost, ease of access, mobile approach is really attractive to African Americans.

MONTAGNE: So more so than whites, African Americans get on the internet through cell phones. Does that affect how they use social media?

Mr. SIMMONS: Yes, since so many people of color have access to the Internet through their cell phones, then they are accessing sites like Facebook and Twitter online. And the limitation to doing that is it's hard to edit a resume from a mobile phone. We don't see a lot of people starting really sophisticated online businesses through mobile technology and I think that that's one thing that, unless changes are made, may hold back African Americans as they get into the internet and access this brand new open space.

MONTAGNE: So while mobile devices have expanded access to the Internet, they limit the experience on the Internet for African Americans?

Mr. SIMMONS: Correct. For example, the popular movie "The Social Network," which told the story of Mark Zuckerberg and how he founded Facebook, while not a documentary, had a lot of truth to that experience. And when you look at Zuckerberg in his Harvard dorm, when he's beginning to code the initial validation of Facebook, he's not doing it on a cell phone, right? He's in his Harvard dorm on a laptop.

When it comes to doing sophisticated activities like creating the next Facebook, that's where I want people of color to go. And mobile phones really don't do that at this point.

MONTAGNE: Where do you go then if what you can afford is a mobile phone, but what you need is a laptop?

Mr. SIMMONS: Right, I think that there are a couple of avenues that people of color can use. One is to simply budget better, and instead of getting a cell phone from your carrier, why not invest in a laptop or even a netbook. Netbooks can be purchased for as low as $200, which often rivals the price of a full-featured smart phone.

So I think being a little bit smarter and making a better choice and getting a netbook or even the new tablet, you know, craze, the iPad, the Samsung Galaxy Tab, we're seeing low-powered ways to get computing power that I think need to be leveraged by people of color.

MONTAGNE: IT Consultant Anjuan Simmons is director of Adverlyze, an online marketing company. He also writes for Black Web 2.0. Thanks very much for joining us.

Mr. SIMMONS: Thank you, Renee.

MONTAGNE: And you can follow this program on social media. You'll find us on Facebook, and on Twitter, we're @MORNING EDITION.

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