ABSTRACT
In October 1999, The Guardian reported that the British Prime Minister Tony Blair was about to ‘take his first tentative steps into information technology’ (The Guardian 25 October 1999: 8). He admitted his incompetence in the face of a computer, and attended a two-hour training session in a shopping centre to be instructed in word-processing, e-mail and the Internet. This was part of a publicity drive to encourage people to get involved in technology through a network of e-libraries. The Guardian accompanied its report of Blair’s introduction to IT training with an article by the Prime Minister in which he marvelled at the ‘speed of change of the new industrial revolution sweeping the world’. He asserted that the future of the nation was dependent upon technological success, arguing that computers and the Internet were powering economic growth, and that ensuring Britain was not divided into computer haves and have-nots was fundamental to the building of a fair as well as a prosperous society.
