> In my opinion, no internet is better than a limited internet.
All of the proposed charitable objectives(as opposed to Facebook's own interests) would be served by just providing free internet with a limited data cap.
Customers would want more data badly, local entrepreneurs would be free to make any kind of app to serve the poor, rather than being restricted by Facebook's guidelines, and can even be not disallowed to compete with Facebook.
The problem with internet connectivity in India is that rural areas do not have good coverage or fiber or even copper. Internet.org doesn't address any of this, so this is NOT aimed at the poor.
It is instead aimed at teenagers, who can't pay for their own data packs yet, but still have access to smartphones. Facebook is trying to ensure that no startup ever takes mindshare away from Facebook.
This is a good point that both supporters and opponents of this initiative should gather more information about: who actually accesses services using this Facebook program? Is it in fact the previously unconnected?
And vice-versa: when you talk to the unconnected, what is preventing them from getting online? Are data costs the main barrier? Anecdotally (and admittedly my personal conversations aren’t an exhaustive survey) in India even from lower-income people I hear people talk a lot more about needing money to buy/repair a phone compared to anyone saying they can’t afford a data plan.
Most of the "previously unconnected" are people who know the value of the Internet (It's used pervasively enough that people who don't use it still have an idea of what it is), have the capability of using it, but don't want to. Very few of them are ones who can't afford it. I mean, they exist, sure, but for them the cost of a phone that can handle the internet well is probably the deciding factor, not the data plan prices. These phones cost Rs. 5k+ (cheapest I can think of) and last maybe two years without repair. Basic data plans can come at Rs 100 a month, prepaid data is generally even cheaper. No, the data plan is not the deciding factor here.
Internet.org is probably more likely to move existing Internet users onto the walled garden, because everyone loves free things.
I don't know if this is practically true for a lot of these countries. In a lot of these countries, a vast majority of the population doesn't have easy education, and are often poor.
Countries like India have a much better percentage (but still small) of the population that can afford the internet, that ISPs are incentivized to grow and expand. Countries like Zambia -- not so much (I don't actually know if internet.org is in Zambia). I don't know that a small business in Zambia has the capital to expand considering how many people can afford it.
> All of the proposed charitable objectives(as opposed to Facebook's own interests) would be served by just providing free internet with a limited data cap. Customers would want more data badly, local entrepreneurs would be free to make any kind of app to serve the poor...
Great point. "Small data payloads" would become a factor in competition, too.
All of the proposed charitable objectives(as opposed to Facebook's own interests) would be served by just providing free internet with a limited data cap.
Customers would want more data badly, local entrepreneurs would be free to make any kind of app to serve the poor, rather than being restricted by Facebook's guidelines, and can even be not disallowed to compete with Facebook.
The problem with internet connectivity in India is that rural areas do not have good coverage or fiber or even copper. Internet.org doesn't address any of this, so this is NOT aimed at the poor.
It is instead aimed at teenagers, who can't pay for their own data packs yet, but still have access to smartphones. Facebook is trying to ensure that no startup ever takes mindshare away from Facebook.