Local and global inequalities practice questions.

A national report counts as an internet user anyone who has been online in the past three months, and gives 62 per cent. A separate study counts those who have a 4G-capable smartphone, an unlimited connection at a regular place and daily use, and gives 19 per cent. What does the second measure add?

• It separates occasional access from a connection good enough to work or study with
• It corrects an error in the first figure, which had counted the same subscribers twice over in several districts
• It measures the reach of the network rather than what people are able to do with it
• It counts only those who pay for a connection themselves rather than sharing another household's

Answer: It separates occasional access from a connection good enough to work or study with

Headline user counts are satisfied by one session in three months, so they record contact rather than capability and a country can look connected while almost nobody can file a form or attend a class. Meaningful-connectivity measures exist because policy built on the first number funds the wrong thing.

India's telecommunications regulator prohibited discriminatory data tariffs in February 2016, which ended zero-rated packages offering free access to a selected set of services. Which barrier to internet use did that ruling leave untouched?

• The share of a low income that a general data bundle costs.
• Whether an operator may zero-rate traffic to selected partner services.
• Whether an operator may price traffic by the content being accessed.
• Whether a package may bundle free access to one company's platform.

Answer: The share of a low income that a general data bundle costs.

The regulation settled how operators may price traffic; it did not make a general bundle cheaper. A rule against differential pricing addresses what a subscriber can reach and leaves affordability where it was.

A city installs identical free public Wi-Fi points at community centres in two districts. In one district women's use of the internet rises sharply; in the other it barely moves. Which contextual condition best explains the difference?

• Whether both districts were joined to the national backbone in the same year.
• Whether women can travel to that venue and stay there without objection.
• Whether the access points transmit on the same radio frequency in each district.
• Whether the community centres were built before or after the city was connected.

Answer: Whether women can travel to that venue and stay there without objection.

Public access moves the barrier from cost to presence: an access point only serves someone who can be at that place, at those hours, without social or safety cost. The technology is identical, so the difference lies in the context.

After a state moved its scholarship applications to an online form, applications from one rural district halved, although mobile coverage there is complete and submission is free. The form expires after fifteen minutes and cannot be saved and resumed. Which single design change addresses the fall most directly?

• Adding a short video that explains what the scholarship pays for.
• Publishing the number of applications received in each district weekly.
• Letting an unfinished form be saved and returned to at a later visit.
• Moving the form to a server hosted inside the same country.

Answer: Letting an unfinished form be saved and returned to at a later visit.

On a shared handset or an intermittent connection, a session that cannot be resumed turns every interruption into a lost application. The barrier here is neither coverage nor price but one default in the form's design.

Many countries in sub-Saharan Africa reached majority mobile broadband use without ever building dense fixed-line telephone networks. Skipping an established stage of infrastructure in this way is called ___. (one word)

Answer: leapfrogging

Leapfrogging explains why a new technology spreads fastest where the incumbent system was weakest rather than strongest. It is a claim about sequence, not about superiority: the skipped stage often carried protections, such as regulated universal service, that the newer system has to rebuild.

In a country, 62 per cent of men and 43 per cent of women used mobile internet in 2024. The mobile gender gap is reported as the percentage by which women's use falls below men's use. Calculate that gap. (give the number only, as a percentage, to the nearest whole number)

Answer: 31

(62 - 43) / 62 = 0.306, so 31 per cent. The gap is expressed relative to the male figure, not as the 19-point difference between the two percentages; the two are routinely confused when such reports are quoted.