
2.5 Bn people can’t afford Internet access. Need your opinion on our solution - jibla
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dang
You'd be better off posting this as a Show HN. See
[https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html)
for an overview and look at
[https://news.ycombinator.com/show](https://news.ycombinator.com/show) for
examples of how people do this. Make the submission link to your site, and add
your text as a first comment to the new thread. (Don't make it a text post;
those are penalized compared to posts with URLs.) If you have questions, email
hn@ycombinator.com. Good luck!

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kjs3
I suspect you're trying to solve the wrong problem: figure out how to deliver
content at connection speeds these underserved areas can sustain. Not DSL, 4G,
3G...but GPRS/CDPD bandwidths (circa 56K-384Kbps). Dictionaries & textbooks
can be delivered as text (or slightly more overhead, Unicode/UTF-x for
multilingual), encyclopedias/wikis slimmed down, images downsized, many
instructional videos can be delivered as something much less than 420p, etc,
etc. More...you shouldn't need 2MB of JS to read the internet equivalent of
the newspaper. Proxies/Gateways can translate. Make it efficient for people to
access information at speeds that are accessible and affordable to their
circumstance without the glitz/useless eyecandy and you could change the
world.

Oh...you'll have to deal with all the folks claiming life-as-we-know-it-will-
end if they can't deliver a dozen or two multiMB ads and gobs of clickbait to
those 2.5B people, whether the users can afford to receive them or not. That's
probably what'll kill the idea.

~~~
jibla
Thanks for your feedback. Shrinking content is really what can solve the
affordability issue at some point. But still, internet fees are pretty high
(according to average income) in many developing countries and also people
aren't able to buy devices. But we'll definitely discuss your point!

~~~
kjs3
Happy to discuss further if you care to. Helped build out cellular networks in
less developed countries (LA) in my younger days and we looked at these
issues. I haven't been deep into it in a while, but issues of high cost in
these markets was as often as not a function of monopoly or other
protectionism (i.e. there was often a government backed incumbent carrier or
other government fees/tariffs/taxes that inflated end-user costs). So
maximizing the content/bandwidth ratio was always a priority. The WAP protocol
was one thing we thought would help, but it never really took off. Good times.

~~~
jibla
Hey, thanks for your insight. The challenge we have at the moment is that we
are not as technical as needed for this. And this might be a totally different
direction for us, which is out of our expertise field. But I've heard you and
will keep that in mind. Here is my Linkedin account
([https://www.linkedin.com/in/george-
jibladze-23923b17/](https://www.linkedin.com/in/george-jibladze-23923b17/))

I would be glad connecting with you and if you allow applying with some
questions if we have any.

