It's an all-out blitzkrieg. I've seen full page ads in newspapers, banners at bus stops, even ads on local Indian websites.
It's one of the scummiest things I've seen from a major company.
Free Basic....get only the limited things we want you to have and the companies who are willing to pay for it. Fuck. That. Shit.
Want to do something that will actually help people; what about Free 1GB. Ensure every person gets 1GB of mobile data a month. Then they can go anywhere...use healthcare, government, facebook or....porn. or whatever the fuck they want. I agree, Free Basic is total bullshit.
when was the last time someone in the valley/sf even tested their sites/apps on 3g? let alone 2g...
"internet services like ... farming"?
"Banning free basics on the basis of net neutrality [...] means 1 billion people cant afford to access any services."
It isn't a choice between having facebook, or having the full internet.
Its a choice between having facebook, or having no internet at all.
Surely no internet at all, is the worst option.
Nobody else is going to give full internet to them for free. They will be stuck with nothing.
Such as having lots of subsets of the internet being offered for free or cheap, and the real internet being gradually priced out of the range of most people(citing 'infrastructure costs" of course). This can't be prevented as long as there's a loophole for Free Basics in the net neutrality regulation.
If any carrier chooses to provide full Internet access for free, they may do so.
So far they haven't, though. Which is why company-sponsored basic service that's free to the users emerged in the first place.
(I realize that "unlimited communication tools" is the best answer here, but no one provides it at the budget specified, at least yet).
with only one tv channel/radio station/available free web site to billions of poor, bad politicians can focus much easier on praying them. this worked very well when their only entertainment was religion cults.
everything has a consequence that will indirectly affect your ivory tower.
If there's an alternative way to expand connectivity, then why doesn't it exist now, or why doesn't someone set it up in competition to Free Basics? No one will use Free Basics if they can get real internet at an affordable price.
And your characterization of "one station" is wholly inaccurate. Even if the service included only Facebook (which it doesn't, as anyone can apply to have their web service included in the system), that's millions of profiles and pages with differing opinions, competing products, etc.
Also, altruism is perfectly at home with modern evolutionary theory because it assumes a more enlightened, rather than simple minded, understanding of altruism.
To add to your point, which I'm sure is in reference to macro-level phenomenon such as the interdependence of species, symbiosis, ecosystem complexity and the like, it's important to note that multi-cellular organisms are the epitome of individuals (cells) working for the greater good rather than local self-interest. Eons ago single cells started working together and specializing. White blood cells, neural cells and muscle cells don't compete against each other, much less is there white blood cell on white blood cell competition. When cells behavior breaks from the greater good, we call it cancer.
A perfect example of pure self interest is the virus.
Interesting that many people do consider capitalism akin to cancer, or that it behaves virally.
But whereas altruistic solutions to problems require continual interest from the donor class (which is subject the same fads as the rest of our culture), or government coercion (which eventually gets co-opted by political considerations), market solutions are robust because people are profiting from them. We'd all love to feed the starving people of the world, but sending ships full of free food isn't the solution (and can actually be harmful). It's much much more effective to set in motion the market forces that will create a stable food supply year after year.
The Internet is a basic utility and public good. Monopoly usually doesn't seem to be a good model for these kinds of systems.
Without that regulation, multicellular organisms wouldn't exist.
Feudalism may have lifted more humans out of poverty than any other system in the history of the world at the time. It's a good thing we didn't decide to stop there. What would you have written at the time?
If what is required for people to act in a way that benefits others is for the people to be motivated to act that way, it seems that people being motivated by the benefit that their actions have for others would be a good motivation for them to act that way, as far as it is an available motivation.
Which, seems compatible with some senses of the word "capitalism". People value their own well-being, and the well-being of others, by some amounts, and based on that, take actions and make agreements with others so as to serve these ends as they see fit.
Of course, in that sense any system could be seen as a sort of capitalism, leading capitalism to be almost like a tautology?
Which doesn't seem to match how people use it, so either I don't understand the intent behind how people use it, or, uh, it's almost kind of empty? Probably the former.
One carrier is already trying this.
Also, facebook isn't even financing the actual data (the carriers are), and the carriers' business plan (get people hooked onto the Internet so they migrate to a full plan) works on any form of "free limited internet" plan, where the plan is limited by speed or a data cap instead of by limiting what "Internet" means. Facebook is a third party which has wedged itself into this with extra deals; but the situation from the carriers' point of view shouldn't be much different if they set a free data cap or provide a free slow internet plan.
Now this is what I think. Facebook is interested in being a monopoly and this step will ensure its rivals don't get in (because facebook pays for it). This is what all the argument is about. Saying billion people will get free internet is just an eyewash. They don't give you full internet, just the part which serves their interest.
Carriers should not control/discrimintate internet access. This should apply to other companies as well.
End of the day it's all about barriers for entry - the barrier to provide free WiFi is relatively low, and one can do it at the cost of an uplink connection and a wireless router. If you find a way to lower the barrier for wireless telecom space, the market forces will take over.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/internet/aircel-to-...
Its easy for us to say this is no good and it should be stopped because Facebook access is not as good as the full internet. But who are we to deny poor people what little they can get?
Indians who can afford smartphones and electricity, but not a basic data plan (how many?), will be getting Facebook access at the price of being subjected to advertising, tracking, etc.
Second hand smartphones are getting pretty cheap. 2.8 billion people live on less than 2 dollars a day. A second hand smart phone might go for 20 dollars. So its a few weeks worth of savings.
Imagine all those people getting on Facebook. They will find a way to use it for what they need.
Ten weeks income, and someone who lives on 2 dollars a day can't afford to save 100% of their income to buy a smartphone.
And how much would used smartphone prices increase if a billion people wanted to buy one?
Sharing or renting makes more sense, but in that case, why not share the cost of a data plan?
Internet is built on principles of neutrality. It is built on public property (airways, land) that government leases to companies on our behalf. Internet is what it is today because of this neutrality principle. It has given rise to so many companies out of nothingness and created so much opportunity for disruption and growth. So any
We do not want to turn Internet into something useless and backwards (like cable/tv networks). That is what Facebook is trying to do here by lobbying the government to change policy. This has to be stopped no question.
Now let's talk about affordability. Government should look into programs that will lower the overall cost of Internet by reforming how they license spectrum.
They can also provide free access to Internet in public places - like public schools, public libraries, train/bus stations, agri markets etc where most information hungry people who cannot afford are already there. They can also encourage large city/town center operators to provide free wifi.
All said, most poor people in India who don't have Internet are in tier-2/3 cities and villages where there is no connectivity at all today. So, it is not a question of affordability but connectivity.
Facebook is being irresponsible and evil in this case and exploiting the situation and not doing anything to help. In contrast, google recently launched a program to provide high-speed Internet free wifi in 400 train stations in India. This is the largest public wifi program in the world that will actually help poor people.
>Even a delay in getting people online is better for the people's interests than locking them into a shitty closed system for the long-term.
That's because you have the luxury of having Internet access and are not affected by lack of it. Why don't you let those without any access at all get some access and let them decide whether they want to be locked in or not? Or are you saying you know what they want better then they do?
So, given that, we're doing what we would've wanted to be done if we were in their position.
Locking me into a particular website (or a set of) , especially the one which misuses my personal information is not something i want to be locked into.
Hence, we shouldn't stand by silently letting them be locked into "Facebook and partners".
Facebook is so asking for it, this time.
Actually, I'd rather get any connectivity I could get.
High inequality and mega-rich charity are a related issue. Rich people is not contributing with taxes as they should. If that were the case the states will have more resources to help where help is needed.
This was in the news some time ago: "Germany's super-rich have rejected an invitation by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett to join their 'Giving Pledge' to give away most of their fortune. The pledge has been criticized in Germany, with millionaires saying donations shouldn't replace duties that would be better carried out by the state."
I completely agree with that position. The state, voted by its citizens, should decide not the super-rich even when they have good intentions.
is the same logic as, "let people sell themselves into slavery". Sure, who is X to stop someone from selling themselves into slavery, right? But it's also an extreme asshole response to a situation where a rich and powerful slaver goes to poor people and says, "my goal is to help you, when you choose to become my slave, I will clothe and feed you and even educate you, I'm doing this to help you" and someone criticizes that.
It doesn't matter if it's not MY business to stop FB or take away others' freedom to use FB. FB is still doing this to gain power, and the ramifications of this long-term are terrible. And your statement amounts to "FB has a right to lock people in (and to misrepresent their motives), and people have a right to choose to be locked in" which is a shitty pathetic reply to my criticism.
It's Facebook's fault that many Indians can't afford the Internet? Okay...it's also Facebook's fault that there is poverty in the world. You know, poverty that spontaneously started to exist in 2004, when Facebook was founded.
The Internet is a global communications network. It allows you to connect with anyone anywhere on the planet and nearby space. Without access youbare severely limited in what you can learn and do.
Free Basics isn't the answer, but going from no-internet to just-a-tiny-bit-of-internet can have a big impact on someones life.
Funnily enough, having worked for a while on projects in rural Maharashtra, the children are the path to information for those villages - they're the ones who can read and write and know the prices and share information upwards to the adults.
(the conclusion being, back then, that one should market to children...)
Plus: provides "some" internet for a billion people ... including wikipedia and various info apps. Includes photo sharing, chat, ...
Which of these is more important ? That's the big question being discussed here. And of course the people discussing how this might stand in the way of their future profits feel absolutely no need to provide an alternative ...
I do understand why telcos won't give all internet for free. In fact I'm amazed fb got them to allow any chat app at all, given that it'll kill SMS.
What I'm asking is why is potentially raising entry costs in the Indian market worth, morally speaking, denying internet to millions of people?
Chat, fb, etc is free for now, because Facebook "allows" it to be free. Once everyone is on free basics, they can do a U-turn and say only Facebook messenger, Facebook website, Facebook * is free. What are you going to do then?
What prevents them from doing this?
Letting FB or any company be a gatekeeper to net is wrong on so many levels. There are so many devious things they can do and we as people or other companies will be totally helpless.
Point 2: FB is not a gatekeeper in free basics. FB simply provides a convenient door for the local telcos to open.
Point 3: The telcos, better known as the Indian government's corrupt cronies (meaning the Indian government gave ownership away to specific individuals), were, are, and will be the gatekeepers.
Making it slightly more difficult for some multinationals (other social networks, MS, linkedin, ...) to make profits in the future does not justify taking this away. If you feel this is unfair, then either convince the Indian government to provide your brand of free internet. I'm sure the amount of money that requires is a factor 10 less of what you'd think it is, which of course still makes it half a billion dollars or so.
In case you've missed it somehow. The internet is centralizing. That's the whole point of the cloud. That is what's being defended here. You're just defending one company centralizing against another. Amazon (including ec2), Google, Microsoft, LinkedIn, Oracle, ... all are centralized computing platforms that give you zero say in how your software runs, how your data is kept, and you can bet your ass all of these will lock you out. That is the thing they all agree on.
You seem to think this hasn't happened yet, but think about it. This has happened, it's too late.
So.. a choice between having no internet with a chance to be part of the effort to destroy it and having no internet ?
It is critical to understand that there can be no internet without net neutrality, if you support in any way a choice that goes against net neutrality, you're taking part in destroying the internet.
"Its a choice between having Facebook, or having no Facebook at all."
Do not let them confuse you into comparing the two... What you just said is why this sort of think makes my fucking blood boil (no anger at you friend, it's with the institution manipulating you).
What they are trying to do, and this really pisses me off, is rebrand "internet" to "Facebook," for poor Indians. A group who as of right now is unaware of the difference and less apt to understand the evils of the marketing engine behind it because they are not yet connected.
Tangent: they are making this so much worse by using government built spectrum. What the fuck kind of perverse asshole thought that would be okay?
... Back to the point.
Think about this, from an infrastructure standpoint: it will cost them more in firewalls and configuration to limit the Internet than to simply allow unfettered access.
I'm not even kidding, they are going to spend more money implementing basic access than by just giving out plain ol' Internet. Knowing that, I find it pretty fucking audacious Facebook thinks we are all so fucking stupid to accept that line of shit.
Okay... they know we won't but we don't matter to their growth target. They need mobile users, that aren't already users, that they can exploit for money (ad views, sponsored content) or their stock will tank because they aren't going to hit their growth target for Qn.
So where do they look? The world's poor. They go in and offer "internet," and market it to them as a "right" or some sort of moral high ground. Then back home they market their "humanitarian" efforts making for some touching PR moments.
/slow-clap "nice work, assholes."
And finally for how this is actually worse than "no Facebook at all," is because FB's marketing machine will go around saying to governments and media "don't worry about India's Internet, we fixed it." This, I promise, will slow the development, if not halt it, because other organizations non-profit or for-profit will think it's a done deal. Even scarier is that the people in those areas won't want "internet," because "Facebook is good enough."
Digital slavery is what this should be called. It should be abhorred. It should be vilified. It should not be tolerated. We should all be angry.
Edit: Updates for grammar and to let person I was replying to know I'm not at all upset at them or trying to direct anger their way.
About that tangent: what makes you think of restrictec spectrum as "government-built"? It's spectrum.
> "having no internet at all"
because what Facebook is offering is anything but the Internet. It's not even close to being the Internet.
It is Facebook's walled garden which they control, they decide what lives there and what remains, what gets kicked out.
You know what is worse, it is not that Facebook is providing something that is not the Internet, but the worse is - it will give a precedence to such business practices that may effectively kill the Internet as a medium, as we know it today, in India and turn it into the cable company model commodity where we have to buy packs of "access X, Y, Z services at speed A", or even "access sites X, Y, K" when there is another pack "X, K, M services pack".
It will affect innovations, new services in a drastic manner. Can you imagine what the status of Facebook would have been if the Internet all over the world was in a way that provided Orkut for free because Google paid for it by including it in its "Google Free Basics" pack? I don't think Facebook would have been here at all.
Now, let's say Amazon arrived in India before Flipkart, Snapdeal (Indian e-commerce portals) and jumped on an "India Free Basics" plan and now people have free access to Amazon but this guy in Bangalore who started Flipkart couldn't afford to jump on that "India Free Basics" because hey, they didn't have deep pockets from the beginning. The list of what-if examples can be endless here, I just hope you get the idea.
> Nobody else is going to give full internet to them for free.
Indian Govt actually provides highly subsidised Internet in rural areas and is working to make it more accessible. And ideas like Facebook Free Basics are actually going to harm such initiative by the Govt giving them a reason that people already have "Free Basics". I mean not saying this is how it's gonna end up exactly but let Facebook and Network operators have their way right now and something similar is waiting for us in the future. Sounds like a mild dystopian story? Well, read about "license raj" in India and related stories.
> They will be stuck with nothing.
No, they won't. They will get the Internet, maybe few months, or a couple of years down the line - slowly (and this is already happening) which is better than not getting "the Internet" ever, or when it's too late.
By the way, what stops Facebook from kicking WikiPedia and Khan Academy out (let's just say they are there) later on and rather bring Snapchat, Vine and Instagram in its place? Now, you may say it's better to watch cat gifs and share selfies than having "no Internet at all", where again you'll be missing the point that "this is NOT the Internet" and that line of thinking is unfortunate in my humble opinion.
A lot of these points have been covered in these videos by a local standup comedy group (in order): https://youtu.be/mfY1NKrzqi0, https://youtu.be/W0w_YhZUYeA, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAQWsTFF0BM
* -- Perhaps you could try tracking your time and see how much of it you spend on facebook. I recommend rescuetime.com
But that's such a slippery slope to go on.
What prevents other companies to hop on the bandwagon to provide their own services for free?
And one day, lo and behold, we're on an Internet where the cost of entry to compete with the big blue (or any big gun) is almost insurmountable.
I feel so angry at their persistence in this case. My feeling at this time is for the SaveTheInternet petitioners to also up the ante in return, by starting a movement to get people off Facebook.
As such it was lucky that WhatsApp founders did not have the bxxls to wait another year, when they could have acquired FB instead. All my school friends use WhatsApp more over here. And recently I am seeing increasing no. of people sign up on Telegram. (WhatsApp groups suck, that's another story, but kind of suggest that social networks are far from done. FB is perhaps the version 0.1 in social network maturity)
We should convey a clear message to Facebook, play fair or pack up. Early. I am glad I did not login to that stupid thing for over 3 months now.
PS: I have signed this petition as well as at least one earlier. I request other people based in India to do the same.
edit: minor
The messaging is extremely misleading.
How do we up the ante against Facebook? This is just not done.
One way, I can think of is to quit Facebook altogether[1], if Free basics is passed by TRAI. Yesterday I saw a bit of momentum on Indian twitter, and last date is 30th, so hopefully even this 3rd attempt now, can be defeated. Lets see. Good to see more of my fellow country mates feel the same way.
To Downvoters: Can you please allow us to have a civil discussion. See we are determining the future of our country. If you must do so, do. But please also explain, why you don't like what we are talking. Please.
edit: minor
edit 2: [1] Should have explained that this quitting should be en masse. Ideally, all the folks who signed the SaveTheInternet.in petition should quit, and urge their friends also to quit. It will be noticed by media for sure. Already AIB has a nice video ('aib save the internet part 3' on YouTube). Vishal Dadlani has a nice 2 minutes video in Hindi, calling out Facebook's fraud on this. I don't think people will take this lying down, if free basics is allowed. Or that's what I hope for, and I am willing to make my small contribution of quitting FB, and urging my friends to do so. If SaveTheInternet folks decide for it, should it be needed.
Facebook, despite the fact I use it, is a slimy ad platform that creates stories at the expense of those that use it. I mean they "market their customer usage".
I've yet to see an explanation for the fictitious likes.