disenfranchisement

Last night, the VoxPolitics event left me with a thought that the increasing use of technology in politics will leave a large group of people behind. Several speakers mentioned that the public facing nature of blogging means that they reply to emails and comments ahead of the more traditional means of communication. Thus their attention will turn to the desires of the 40 odd percent of people who are online.
I think that this is a bad thing, but I suppose it is inevitable. Small pressure groups or lobbys have always excerted much more influence on MPs than the normal voter. Even the letter writers are smaller in number and will probably move to email more quickly.
A while back I commented that all this technology is great fun, but if it is accessible to only the top 10% then it is not very representative. A question from the floor last night raised the issue of literacy and how this, which is often coincident with poverty, stops people getting involved with politicians. It is a broader point rather than being directly about blogging, as illiterate people are just as unlikely to write a letter.
However they are more likely to fall to the bottom of the heap if the emphasis moves to more technology driven tools, as getting a PC or paying for time in a webcafe are not priorities for them.
If blogging enables an emergent democracy for only the wealthy, then what will it really have achieved for the whole population.