
India bans discriminatory pricing based on source/destination/app/content - scorpion032
http://blog.savetheinternet.in/statement-on-trai-order-on-diff-pricing/
======
dang
[http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-35522899](http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-35522899)
gives the background without an autoplay video like the CNN link has.

------
electriclove
Great quote on a different article covering the same story:
[http://money.cnn.com/2016/02/08/technology/india-facebook-
fr...](http://money.cnn.com/2016/02/08/technology/india-facebook-free-basics-
internet/index.html)

\----------

Mahesh Murthy, a prominent Indian venture capitalist, last year described the
program as "imperialism and the East India Company all over again," carried
out under the guise of "digital equality."

"What Facebook wants is our less fortunate brothers and sisters should be able
to poke each other and play Candy Crush, but not be able to look up a fact on
Google, or learn something on Khan Academy or sell their produce on a
commodity market or even search for a job," he said.

~~~
splintercell
> "What Facebook wants is our less fortunate brothers and sisters should be
> able to poke each other and play Candy Crush, but not be able to look up a
> fact on Google, or learn something on Khan Academy or sell their produce on
> a commodity market or even search for a job," he said.<

Indians use connectivity very differently than the rest of the world(or at
least different from the developed countries). To Indians, phone/internet is a
mode of communication first. It was the thing which has been missing from
their lives the most. This is especially true for the demographics Facebook
was targeting.

The reason is the language barrier. A lot more Indians can read and write
English needed for directions, news headlines, legal documents, store names
etc, than those who can truly express themselves in English. My mom is a great
example of this, she can read and write English, but will have trouble
understanding a conversation going on purely in English.

This is the reason her smartphone usage is almost all reliant upon content
created and generated by others. WhatsApp and Facebook are the two most used
apps on her phone. It isn't that she wouldn't like to read up facts about
politicians and world events from Wikipedia, it's just that Hindi Wikipedia
and Google suck. However, if someone were to forward her a news article, a
recipe or just make posts on their facebook, she's a lot more comfortable
doing that.

It's been less than 5 years since she got WhatsApp and Facebook, but the
social network she has created around the two facilitates her family in ways
it was not imaginable 10 years ago.

BTW "It's East India Company all over again" is a cliche at this point and
should be considered racist in India (because it's almost exclusively used
against any non-Indian entrepreneurship in India).

~~~
unprepare
>it's just that Hindi Wikipedia and Google suck

And you think enabling tens of millions of people to access these resources
will make them....worse?

Wikipedia is a community encyclopedia, by its very nature it gets better the
more people access and use it, the more editors there are translating articles
from other languages, etc.

You have not listed a single thing that would make it a net positive for a
corporation to decide which sites millions of people should and should not be
able to visit.

This is to say nothing of the next whatsapp or facebook - this plan is
obviously about preventing competition.

You say they use the internet for communication first, is it any wonder
Facebook/WhatsApp wants to ensure they control what mediums of communication
are accessible throughout India?

What do you say to the Indian coder who today is working on his WhatsApp
competitor? tough shit, facebook already bought the internet in this country?

~~~
splintercell
> And you think enabling tens of millions of people to access these resources
> will make them....worse?

Nope, just saying that non-English Indian language internet sucks. Yes it gets
better when more and more people are using it, but that still doesn't change
the fact that millions of people currently don't have internet in a form which
they can use to make their lives better.

> What do you say to the Indian coder who today is working on his WhatsApp
> competitor? tough shit, facebook already bought the internet in this
> country?

Same thing you're going to say to that 18 year old kid in the year 2030 whose
life could have been different had he lived in a more connected India.

~~~
kamaal
>>Same thing you're going to say to that 18 year old kid in the year 2030
whose life could have been different had he lived in a more connected India.

There is a patient suffering from a heart disease, medicine arrives in a few
days.

You seem to be suggesting that another drug, which can relieve the patient of
some of the pains for the next hour, but is sure to kill the patient in the
next few months be administered to the patient immediately.

~~~
splintercell
> There is a patient suffering from a heart disease, medicine arrives in a few
> days.<

We fundamentally disagree upon the nature of net neutrality. I do not believe
net neutrality is a good thing, and getting rid of it would be a good thing.

The fundamental fact is that all bits aren't created equal. Facebook wants to
pay for some bits by attaching the economic value of future customer, and that
is fundamentally a justified thing.

In America T-mobile recently launched Binge On program under which Netflix and
Youtube won't count against a monthly data plan. People on HN are hell bent on
claiming that somehow this is a bad thing, but the fact is, for most people
this makes their lives better.

I'm surprised that TRAI (an organization which should be gotten rid of
completely according to me) caved in to Net Neutrality proponents. In future
you'll see when in America Net Neutrality will be removed and how much benefit
it brings to the people.

~~~
kamaal
>>Facebook wants to pay for some bits by attaching the economic value of
future customer, and that is fundamentally a justified thing.

Facebook realizes there is very little value they can add to whatever they
have done so far. So now the only way to be safe from competition is to create
a monopoly and prevent others from even getting a chance from competing with
them.

>>People on HN are hell bent on claiming that somehow this is a bad thing

It is.

>>for most people this makes their lives better.

Its the first step these companies take before they start charging for VoIP
calls.

>>I'm surprised that TRAI (an organization which should be gotten rid of
completely according to me) caved in to Net Neutrality proponents.

I'm only surprised it took them this late, after this much activism.

------
scorpion032
Probably the most progressive regulation among anywhere in the world.

Enforcement of these #NetNeutrality principles is the literal granting of the
Liberties and Equalities of opportunities, granted to individuals and as such
this is a landmark order that will have far reaching repercussions.

Worth noting how this played out. A bunch of folks on the internet, organised
themselves and campaigned to stop a $300B market cap corporation and a bunch
of telecoms with strong lobbying capabilities. Who would have thought they
would win? The situation is worth a Harvard case study or a Nate Silver book.

The future of influencing policy making is right here; and you ain't seen
anything yet! Save The Internet team clearly seems to understand the virality
of social networks better than Facebook does!

~~~
intended
While the David's won this round, it was against an opponent (or group of)
which made several tactical errors.

We need to build a more lasting institution to prepare in advance for future
papers, have lists of people it can reach out to, and manage the hidden
minutiae required to combat these issues.

Because Next time it may not be Facebook, it may be the GoI itself, or
reliance.

~~~
jace
> We need to build a more lasting institution to prepare in advance for future
> papers, have lists of people it can reach out to, and manage the hidden
> minutiae required to combat these issues.

Which is exactly what we will do.

~~~
lifeisstillgood
And does #savetheInternet have or want branches outside India. It's not a
local problem? Is there somewhere I can go and lend support ?

------
dingo_bat
>Two key aspects of the Net Neutrality consultation that remain: firstly, the
proposed requirement for providers of VoIP services like Whatsapp, Viber and
Skype to obtain a government licence, which would mean that telecom operators
could be required to treat traffic from unlicensed VoIP providers differently
from the rest, and secondly, allowing telecom operators the ability to slow
down and speed up websites, giving them the ability to play king-makers and
gate-keepers. Citizens should be vigilant, as always, and should consider
participating in this process in the future. SaveTheInternet opposes any form
of licensing of Internet Services. This includes VoIP.

So even though discriminatory _pricing_ is not allowed, operators can still
slow/speed down/up apps and websites. Seems to me a key aspect of net
neutrality has not been upheld.

For eg, what if an ISP decides to "slow down" Netflix to 0.1 kbps? I believe
this is a wholly unsatisfactory outcome of the entire national debate over the
last several months.

~~~
cmadan
Its a step in the right direction. TRAI was only deciding on differential
pricing not slow/fast lanes and currently no ISPs are implementing slow/fast
lanes whereas differential pricing (i.e. free plans for Facebook, Whatsapp,
their own shitty apps etc) were all over.

~~~
anoncow
Definitely a step in the right direction, but there are plenty of ISPs who
provide preferential treatment to Google by peering with their servers.
YouTube HD videos stream without buffering on 512kbps connections.

[https://www.quora.com/I-am-from-Mumbai-I-have-an-Internet-
co...](https://www.quora.com/I-am-from-Mumbai-I-have-an-Internet-connection-
of-a-fairly-low-speed-I-get-the-normal-speed-while-surfing-or-downloading-
some-files-But-I-get-high-speed-while-watching-YouTube-videos-or-downloading-
from-a-torrent-or-Google-Drive-How-does-this-happen-and-can-I-get-the-high-
speed-for-everything)

~~~
devdas
Nothing stops anyone else from peering. There's no differential pricing
involved here, just regular infrastructure.

~~~
sa1
While peering enables this, the real problem is that all these ISPs provide
YouTube at a much higher speed than the rest of the web, which means that your
bandwidth is not enough to stream videos without buffering for any other video
site, while YouTube is always smooth.

Peering should just be a step towards enabling ISPs to fulfill their bandwidth
promises, not a justification for fast lane/slow lane.

------
dhawalhs
Couple of articles I would recommend reading about Free Basics

1\. Here’s How Free Basics Is Actually Being Sold Around The World
[http://www.buzzfeed.com/carolineodonovan/heres-how-free-
basi...](http://www.buzzfeed.com/carolineodonovan/heres-how-free-basics-is-
actually-being-sold-around-the-worl)

2\. How India Pierced Facebook’s Free Internet Program
[https://medium.com/backchannel/how-india-pierced-
facebook-s-...](https://medium.com/backchannel/how-india-pierced-facebook-s-
free-internet-program-6ae3f9ffd1b4)

For the second article, reporter asked Facebook to put her in touch with Free
Basics users. All the people that Facebook connected her were already internet
users. But Mark Zuckerberg in an FB post claimed that "19 million people were
connected to the internet for the first time with free basics".

Both these articles present examples of how Free Basics is actually advertised
in rest of the world.

~~~
nileshtrivedi
Indeed.

"Free Basics was ostensibly targeted at Indians who had never experienced the
Internet or could not pay for data plans. However, Facebook recently struggled
to provide a reporter with the name of a single Free Basics user in India who
had never been online before."

Source: [http://www.buzzfeed.com/nitashatiku/india-ruling-trai-
free-b...](http://www.buzzfeed.com/nitashatiku/india-ruling-trai-free-
basics#.oxy4QoMy8)

------
jasonkester
I'm having trouble parsing this article through all the propaganda speak.
Clearly whoever wrote it is happy that a victory has been scored and that the
Internet is no longer broken (and has possibly even been saved) with the help
of some agency that did _something_ important that we should know about.

But it's so thick with its own team's code language that I can't actually
parse out what happened.

Anybody know what's going on?

~~~
scorpion032
I wrote up a "let's get this straight" message earlier, may be that will
appeal to you more:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10932166](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10932166)

------
titomc
Mark "tried to solve a non existent problem" and fell over.

India is not a country where everyone rides on bullocarts or tuk tuks. Its a
fast developing nation. Its not what you see in Hollywood movies or western
medias. India do not need help on the internet side of things.

~~~
tzs
> Its a fast developing nation

The benefits of development are very unevenly distributed. Some areas are the
equal of any first world country...and others lag behind even the poorest
African countries.

> India do not need help on the internet side of things.

The 800 million Indians [1] without internet might disagree with that.

I think you've forgotten just how freaking _big_ India is. They have 400
million people online, which is the second most of any country (only China has
more, with 670 million online)...yet they are so big that this is only 1/3 of
their population.

[1] Indian population: 1200 million - 400 million with access [2] = 800
million without.

[2] [http://gadgets.ndtv.com/internet/news/india-to-
have-402-mill...](http://gadgets.ndtv.com/internet/news/india-to-
have-402-million-internet-users-by-december-end-iamai-766216)

------
thetruthseeker1
Note in the USA, Verizon does not ding uses of their data cap if they use
Verizon's video content Go90, however it does if the users use YouTube. It is
interesting that in India the net neutrality has been taken to a much higher
degree than in the US itself. But I don't think what India did is a bad thing
in the long run(even though the acceleration of people moving to use Internet
for first time will get hurt a little bit in the short term)

~~~
rohmish
As stated above, even Facebook themselves couldn't point to a single user that
for to internet for first time using the free basics campaign. People who want
internet and a smartphone required to connect to internet can already get to
internet. On other end, people don't have a smartphone to access the free
basics program and Facebook doesn't solve that problem. Facebook is jsut
trying to get more people to use Facebook by giving access for free and
bundling a few low usage apps people rarely use in name of charity

------
madaxe_again
So - I wonder how Facebook will respond to their market penetration and lock-
in effort being declared illegal, as granting access to one set of sites for
free and not allowing access to others surely falls under this legislation.

I expect that they'll continue business as usual, and will drag out the battle
until they have a captive and indoctrinated audience (after all, they control
the content, so you can be sure folks won't be reading about this, but they
will be reading about how internet.org gives you freedom and is great and
wonderful) who will push the government in favour of banning _non-
discriminatory_ pricing.

~~~
icebraining
_they control the content, so you can be sure folks won 't be reading about
this_

Unless they just go to
[https://www.facebook.com/netneutralityin/](https://www.facebook.com/netneutralityin/)

~~~
mbrutsch
You are undermining the popular narrative with your facts and what-not.

~~~
ikeboy
I've been here over a year, so I'm allowed [0] to complain that this comment
is contributing to HN morphing into reddit.

[0]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

------
atroyn
Could Facebook not simply have outmanoeuvred the problem here by providing
free access to the wider web, perhaps in a rolling fashion? Does Facebook have
any real 'native' competition in India?

~~~
scorpion032
If their motive were genuinely connectivity, as they advertised it, they can
still do it. #EqualRating is allowed, so are charitable initiatives such as
Free Data to everyone.

But what do they really want? The next billion internet users hooked onto
their platform. That's what they paid Whatsapp a whooping $19B for.

I can't presume to know for sure. We'll both see what will they do of their
Freebasics program now.

~~~
atroyn
But won't they be just as hooked as in markets where Facebook has already
penetrated? Seems like the smart play is just getting people on-line, and
getting them onto Facebook the same way they always have.

Why wouldn't that work in India?

~~~
cmadan
I don't believe they ever had any intention of getting the poor online. They
have so far never released ANY data regarding how many of the users of Free
Basics are first time Internet users despite it being one of the top demands
of critics of the Free Basics program. Some independent third party analysis
suggest that the overwhelming majority of users of Free Basics are existing
Internet users, many of them who have no idea they are on Free Basics.

Reliance (the telco that Facebook has partnered with) doesn't advertise the
Free Basics program as "access for the poor" but as "Free Facebook" and
doesn't even mention the additional websites available for free on Free
Basics.

My guess is that with Free Basics rolled out in 36 countries without any
issues, Facebook never expected any opposition.

~~~
saalweachter
The "many of whom have no idea they are on free basics" part is a little weird
to me. Are these "users" like my father, who technically has internet access
but doesn't use it?

Aside from that, I don't think Facebook needs to find "new" internet users to
be providing access to the needy. If the users' previous access was the
internet equivalent of a polluted river 15 miles away, building a clean well
right in the village is still a benefit, even if they're only allowing
livestock with an odd number of toes to be watered, which everyone admits is
kind of weird.

~~~
cmadan
A friend of mine was on Free Basics. She found out only when she tried to
navigate to a video outside of Facebook from a link that she clicked on
Facebook and was prompted to purchase a data plan.

------
randyrand
1) I think it's ironic that the people most opposed to Free Basics are the
ones who already have internet.

2) I'm curious how the legislation prevents FB from charging for this service.
And what the minimum cost is regulated at.

------
Magnets
Where does the article mention anything about discriminatory pricing based on
source/destination/app/content in the linked article?

~~~
jace
Here's the order this article is referring to:
[http://www.trai.gov.in/WriteReadData/WhatsNew/Documents/Regu...](http://www.trai.gov.in/WriteReadData/WhatsNew/Documents/Regulation_Data_Service.pdf)

------
known
FB should have donated/bribed appropriate people in India
[https://twitter.com/rss_org](https://twitter.com/rss_org)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality_in_India](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_neutrality_in_India)

------
kaka189
[https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10102641883915251](https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10102641883915251)

Everyone in the world should have access to the internet. That's why we
launched Internet.org with so many different initiatives -- including
extending networks through solar-powered planes, satellites and lasers,
providing free data access through Free Basics, reducing data use through
apps, and empowering local entrepreneurs through Express Wi-Fi. Today India's
telecom regulator decided to restrict programs that provide free access to
data. This restricts one of Internet.org's initiatives, Free Basics, as well
as programs by other organizations that provide free access to data. While
we're disappointed with today's decision, I want to personally communicate
that we are committed to keep working to break down barriers to connectivity
in India and around the world. Internet.org has many initiatives, and we will
keep working until everyone has access to the internet. Our work with
Internet.org around the world has already improved many people's lives. More
than 19 million people in 38 countries have been connected through our
different programs. Connecting India is an important goal we won't give up on,
because more than a billion people in India don't have access to the internet.
We know that connecting them can help lift people out of poverty, create
millions of jobs and spread education opportunities. We care about these
people, and that's why we're so committed to connecting them. Our mission is
to make the world more open and connected. That mission continues, and so does
our commitment to India.

------
mwsherman
I don’t see any quotes from users of the service, in this article or in the
CNN article. Seems salient.

------
gamekathu
full regulation paper from TRAI :
[http://trai.gov.in/WriteReadData/WhatsNew/Documents/Regulati...](http://trai.gov.in/WriteReadData/WhatsNew/Documents/Regulation_Data_Service.pdf)

------
tn13
As an Indian I feel a bit sad that a few elitist managed to hijack the entire
propaganda and denied access to millions of poor people.

US readers: Please note that T-Mobile Binge on and other similar services
would be illegal under new TRAI guidelines in India.

------
retube
As I understand it this effectively this stops "richer" people being charged
more, which is being universally applauded as a good thing.

But isn't this contrary to the whole inequality issue? Shouldn't richer people
be charged more? Richer people are being charged more for state infrastructure
via higher taxes - which is also generally applauded as a good thing amongst
the young/liberal demographic (in fact it doesn't go far enough many would
argue).

So why is it bad for companies to charge more to certain demographics? If
people are prepared to pay why's that wrong? Isn't value pricing actually
intrinsically "fair" as richer customers are effectively subsiding poorer
customers?

~~~
toyg
The internet is not "a product", it is an essential utility. Rich people pay
more than poor people for roads, but they get the same access to them as poor
people. This is what the internet should be like.

Historically, price differentiation for network infrastructure has been due to
costs, not artificial market segmentation; it's important this continues to be
the case for the majority of net citizens. As we've seen over and over again,
removing cost barriers for utility infrastructure is a tremendous spark for
all sorts of economic activity.

~~~
icebraining
_This is what the internet should be like._

The thing is: how does banning Free Basics / Internet.org provide that?

That's what bothers me about this movement: it should be about giving poor
people free access to the Net (which would just render Facebook's toy platform
irrelevant - no need to ban it).

Today a bunch of activists are celebrating victory, but tomorrow the poor will
still have no Internet access. It's hard not to feel like these campaigns are
little more than middle-class people patting themselves on the back.

~~~
Manishearth
> but tomorrow the poor will still have no Internet access

That would still be the case if the verdict was the other way around. There's
no evidence that Free Basics actually brought a significant number of new
people on the internet (the rate of people cited as joining Free Basics is
comparable to the rate of people joining the internet in general, so it didn't
change anything)

Note that data plans are pretty cheap in India. The cost of a smartphone that
can handle modern websites ( _especially_ Facebook, which breaks on old/slow
phones and browsers) is more than the cost of a few year's worth of data.

~~~
tzs
> Note that data plans are pretty cheap in India.

Cheap enough for the 60% of rural Indians who live on less than 35 Rs/day [1]?

> The cost of a smartphone that can handle modern websites (especially
> Facebook, which breaks on old/slow phones and browsers) is more than the
> cost of a few year's worth of data.

The vast majority of mobile phones in India are feature phones which are
considerably cheaper than smartphones [2]. To be included in Free Basics,
sites have to work reasonably on feature phones. Free Basics sites are
accessed through a proxy which modifies requests so that the sites can tell
that they are being viewed by a Free Basics user, and so the site can present
a version that works without requiring "modern" features like JavaScript, SVG
images and WOFF font types, iframes, video and large images, or Flash and Java
applets.

[1]
[http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2012-05-04/news...](http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2012-05-04/news/31559329_1_rural-
areas-mpce-nsso-survey)

[2] [http://www.igadgetsworld.com/india-smartphone-and-feature-
ph...](http://www.igadgetsworld.com/india-smartphone-and-feature-phone-market-
share-in-q3-2014/)

~~~
Manishearth
> Cheap enough for the 60% of rural Indians who live on less than 35 Rs/day
> [1]?

Perhaps not; but I was including only people who can afford the phone.

> The vast majority of mobile phones in India are feature phones which are
> considerably cheaper than smartphones

They're still ~Rs 1k (you can get cheaper ones, but I don't think even proxied
sites will work well on these). Monthly data plans are less than a tenth of
this.

IIRC Free Basics' Facebook still needed a good phone (higher end feature phone
or a smartphone), but I can't verify that right now.

And that really brings us back to the question; how is this bringing people to
the Internet? Even if Facebook worked well on a Rs 400 phone, only the Free
Basics sites would work well there. This just underlines that Facebook is
trying to give people Free Facebook, nothing more. People who cannot afford
these phones would not become "Digital Indians" by using Free Basics, they
would use Facebook and only Facebook.

------
suyash
Congratulations..this is great news for India!

------
Sven7
This has been like watching one form of misinformation battling another form
of misinformation. One set of misguided people battling another set of
misguided people.

NetNeutrality is a concept that makes sense in a western context where
carriers are basically monopolies. It's unbelievable how good arguments in one
context, have been blindly applied to a completely unrelated context.

Activists in the West (who's rep and rent are based on their commitment to
netneutrality) without knowing anything about the local context have been
cheering on local activists.

Local activists (led by stand up comedians ofcourse similar to Glenn Beck\Jon
Stewart) getting carried away by this support (cause Urban India has this
strange craving for western validation which I still don't fully understand)
have now convinced the regulator to step in and are celebrating victory.

This is similar to how the Egyptians celebrated victory after the army stepped
in to depose a democratically elected govt. Just Unbelievable! Free markets
are dead. Regulation driven by manufactured outrage or vested interests
manufacturing outrage are alive and thriving.

Ofcourse it doesn't help that Facebook and their games are involved which
automatically swings every debate into deeply religious territory. As much as
I can't stand Facebook and will have nothing to do with them ever, the point
of a free market (which produces innovation) has been lost.

If Christian missionaries or Hindu missions go and setup schools and libraries
for free in Rural India is someone protesting differential pricing in Urban
India. It's ridiculous.

The people who loose out are the farmer\weaver who just need an email address
to be linked to the cities. Who is going to provide that now? Rural India is
so vast and voiceless that they are the automatic loosers in such a debate.

Congratulations NetNeutrality activists! Well done.

~~~
slaxman
Wow! This comment is really far away from reality.

1/ There are no studies that show correlation between free basics and increase
in internet penetration. In fact, Reliance Telecom, Facebook's free basics
partner in India, marketed it was a way to surf facebook & whatsapp for free.

2/ Google is giving away free internet in Railway stations in India. Unlike
free basics, it gives access to the complete internet and not to a set of
websites that have done a deal with facebook. No one opposed it, since it does
not break net neutrality.

3/ I find it ridiculous that some folks in Western countries can start
dictating what's good for the poor in India and think that the arguments of
people actually living there are invalid.

I would encourage you to try to understand the issue from a local perspective
by speaking to the people who live there rather than have unsubstantiated
assumptions.

~~~
Vickor
1\. Facebook has provided studies that do indicate increased internet adoption
after free basics (real internet adoption, after having been introduced via
Fed basics). You're welcome to read the studies and debate their bias, but the
studies exist.

How the telecoms market is irrelevant to this discussion. Of course they're
going to market having access to the most popular websites and apps. Hell,
they probably use the same advertising when selling real internet service.

2\. Also irrelevant. Internet in train stations is not comparable at any level
to cellular data connectivity for 10's of millions of people.

3\. You are right in this point, but I also find it presumptuous that the
Indians with enough money to have internet are the ones dictating what is good
for the Indian people without enough money for internet.

~~~
slaxman
1/ Telecom marketing is absolutely central to this discussion. It is THE way
that free basics in sold on the street. Even the world bank has said free
basics breaks net neutrality ([http://www.scoopwhoop.com/The-World-Bank-Has-
Said-Free-Basic...](http://www.scoopwhoop.com/The-World-Bank-Has-Said-Free-
Basics-Is-The-Expresses-Doubts-Over-The-Venture/))

2/ Clearly you haven't the slightest idea of the number of people that travel
by trains in India. In Mumbai alone, close to 8Mn people use the train to get
to their place of work EVERYDAY. Many of them travel for over 2 hours at a
time (over 4 hours in total).
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mumbai_Suburban_Railway](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mumbai_Suburban_Railway))

3/ You have no idea how rich/poor the ones fighting for net neutrality are.
You shouldn't be making such statements. It reflects badly on you. The fact is
that a bunch of few activists with no financial backing were able to put an
end to intense lobbying by multi-billion dollar telecom and media companies.

This is exactly what you expect from a good regulator. I am extremely happy
with TRAI. They saved my bootstrapped education startup.

------
jiraaya
It is extremely dubious if someone turns up with a "Knight in shining armor"
plan for saving the world. It would be safe to say that outsiders who are not
a part of the "plan" do not have all the information to figure out the true
motive behind these initiatives. It is also safe to say that direct or
indirect monetary profit is almost always behind such initiatives.

First it was monsanto exploiting farmers
[http://www.globalresearch.ca/independent-india-selling-
out-t...](http://www.globalresearch.ca/independent-india-selling-out-to-
monsanto-gmos-and-the-bigger-picture/5395187)

Then came Bill Gates with his vaccines and testing them on tribal children
just because the regulatory environment makes it easier to test them in India
[https://vactruth.com/2014/10/05/bill-gates-vaccine-
crimes/](https://vactruth.com/2014/10/05/bill-gates-vaccine-crimes/)

And now comes Mr. Zuckerberg with dubious claims about "one person brought out
of poverty for every five people who get access to internet" which seems to be
a textbook causation-correlation misinterpretation.

The general public must awaken to the fact that the so called third world is
seen as a market with potential for double digit growth and the easiest way to
enter them might just be through false pre-texts of heart warming charity.

~~~
spatulan
I suspect a website called vactruth may not be the most impartial website
around.

~~~
jiraaya
I agree. CNN may be?
[http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-1170073](http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-1170073)

~~~
ascorbic
That's not CNN. That's an "iReport", which anyone can post. This one was
posted by an anti-vaxxer called "VaccineThis". Zero credibility.
[http://ireport.cnn.com/people/VaccineThis](http://ireport.cnn.com/people/VaccineThis)

~~~
jiraaya
Ah. My bad. It says "Not verified by CNN" clearly on the side pane and within
the image. I just jumped straight to the main content. I agree with you that
the post does not have much in the way of credibility. Thank you for pointing
out and apologies for wasting your time.

~~~
ascorbic
No problem. The iReport thing is perfect for polemicists and conspiracy
theorists, as it means they can post something and say "look, it's on CNN" and
many people will miss the disclaimer. If anything is about vaccines I always
check sources very carefully, as there is so much misinformation out there.

