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Measuring the information development and its differentiation in modern Russia
The paper is focused on the problem of balanced information and communication technologies development in modern society and its measures. Existing indices allow estimating the progress of this development, but they are mostly constructed for between countries comparison. At the lower level, we face the problem of different data set structure that does not allow us to use same indices immediately. Another problem is a lack of measures that provide both the estimation of the overall progress in ICT and the progress in its particular aspects at the regional level. Additional attention should be paid to the possible increase of regional differentiation in order to prevent its transformation into extreme form of digital divide. We propose the model in the form of hierarchical system of indices that includes the advantages of information development measurement in particular aspects and as a whole. Sub-indices in the system are just orthogonal, and widely used principal component analysis is not functional for their aggregation. That is why a measure of closeness of the aggregate indicator to the best possible value is used to create the main index. The output oriented data envelopment analysis is used along with the aggregate indicator construction technique to compare the positions of the most advanced regions. We also introduce the method of measuring the differentiation in some aspects of information and communication development to assess the dynamics of this differentiation. The results of the study can be used to stimulate progress in information and communication development that prevents an excessive increase in regional differentiation.