

Bill Gates's barbed comments pop Google's broadband balloons - eplanit
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/08/08/bill_gates_google_smackdown/

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ihsw
A reliable and ubiquitous means of communication is essential for logistics.
If we need to know where and when we need vaccines, food, and water then what
do we have now? Shoddy cellular infrastructure that's poorly reliable and
easily disrupted.

What is logistics?[1] The management and flow of resources from the point of
origin to the point of consumption, for example food items, materials,
equipment, liquids, and staff. Abstract items like inventory information and
security information are also essential to everyday life in developed
countries.

Materials, distribution, and supply-chain management -- the bedrock of
business development in developed nations -- require consistently available
communications infrastructure, and there is no Comcast or AT&T in Africa.
Those that rise to meet the challenge get embroiled in political infighting
and corruption.

There's something to be said about air supremacy, and there certainly is none
in Africa. What other air-based telecommunications infrastructure is there?
Satellite communications is expensive and extremely difficult to implement.

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistics](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logistics)

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marshray
> What other air-based telecommunications infrastructure is there?

Radio.

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tzs
In particular, look at what the hams have done with cheap, low power radios.
Many take it as a challenge to see how far they can reach on low power. This
is called QRP.

The QRP hobbyists regularly communicate over hundreds or even a thousand miles
on a few milliwatts of power. The record is 1650 miles with a 1 microwatt
(micro, not milli!) transmitter.

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cup
Hes right and hes wrong.

Bill (and Melinda) Gates is having a phenomenal effect in Africa which I have
the privlige of being involved in first hand.

Yet at the same time, Africa doesn't stop with health issues. The local
information technology knowledge base in Africa is exploding and improving
hard infrastructure to the continent will have a profoundly positive effect on
African countries breaking free from the oft stereotypical mould of 'poor
chaotic corrupt third world nations'.

~~~
shirro
Many countries in Asia that were poor and underdeveloped when I was a child
now have better standards of living than I had in a developed country at the
time. Africa is a big place but some countries are making clear progress. It
is wonderful to have Bill and Melinda come in and give your free access to
drugs but if you have a strong economy you can look after your own which is
far more sustainable.

Cheaper rockets might seem like a plaything until you consider poor countries
having better access to geospacial data for crops planning or easier access to
education. Same goes for Internet.

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pasbesoin
Something to reflect upon: With this deployment, Google will -- frequency
licensing agreements and such aside -- own the physical layer. Presuming
encryption keeps it opaque to outside scrutiny.

