Show HN: 2.5B people can’t afford internet – need your opinion on our solution
giveinternet.org
giveinternet.org
"Studets" should have an "n" ;) (https://giveinternet.org/en/our-work/projects)
What kind of work is going on to provide alternative methods of Internet delivery, be they sharing from other parts of communities, buying Internet in bulk, working with ISPs to get discounted pricing, et cetera?
We work with the incumbent operators and smaller Wifi providers. They offer free installations for our families and in some areas discounts on a monthly fee. Btw we thought we were solving the affordability problem, but it turned out some local Wifi operators are willing to deploy infrastructure in areas where they considered not profitable before. As part of our partnership in September, they launch a new base station in a rural area of Georgia and we are excited about it.
Through monthly recurring donations from up to 700 individuals, we have equipped 350+ students with Chromebooks, Internet access, educational resources and our constant online mentorship. Our donors receive monthly transparency reports with details on every cost, student success stories, and our progress. Now we are working to incorporate a 501(c)3 nonprofit in the US and expand operations to the Middle East and Africa by collaborating with partners on the ground.
As we expand and refine our product, we need your honest feedback on our platform! Let us know what you think about the website, our business model, etc.
How?
Comment here; Fill out this 3-5 minute survey - http://bit.ly/2P3wDj6 Schedule a call with us for an interview-https://calendly.com/gjibladze/giveInternet
Maybe used laptops, can usually get leased business laptops for a similar price, and they don't actively spy you at all times.
Chromebooks have a "Search" key instead of CAPS lock, and the F1..F10 keys are Back, Forward, Reload, Full screen, Switch Window, Brightness Up, Brightness Down, Mute, Volume Down, Volume Up. F11 and F12 might use Search with + and -
Also to make rollout cheaper they negotiated some exclusive deals with Samsung; wrote their own operational support systems instead of buying off the shelf ( very expensive for deployment and integration) and probably did a whole bunch of other stuff.
It's not something that can be repeated without having large sums of money to support it
Have another business segment which makes lot of money and also use lot of debt.
Reliance Jio's parent company Reliance is a big player in oil refining.
Youtube is full of conspiracy theories and reddit seems to be catering itself to white supremacy. Definitely not paragons of good or ethical internet companies.
The most difficult challenge will be demonstrating effectiveness relative to other charities operating near this space. Computer Aid International focuses on refurbishing used computers and providing them to those living at income levels 1 or 2, spending only around $42 per recipient. Room to Read specializes in building low cost libraries and schools, serving communities at a cost of $5 or $25 per child respectively, and they are really highly rated on transparency and effectiveness.
I think you can justify the focus on Internet and Georgia, but I think you should be mindful of where the bar is set and aggressively try to push towards that. That might involve some hard choices, like whether Chromebooks can help as many students as lower cost options.
Emphasizing that donors choose how much is allocated to administrative costs seems like another odd choice to me. If you are serious about that, then you could get in an unstable situation. Donors could easily have unsustainable preferences here, because they generally lack experience running charities.
If you're just trying to convince donors that you are not wasting their money, I'd focus instead on independent audits on effectiveness. Then be vocal when you make hard choices about expenses, like through a blog of some kind, so you can show you're trying to save money where possible, and trying to spend money in ways that will maximize your impact.
Spreading access to information can be incredibly powerful, so I hope you find a way for your program to take off, thanks for taking on this challenge.
Why should we, ordinary citizens contribute to this company? And have you brought it to Google and Facebook for sponsorship? Would you accept $$$ from them if they offered it?
Facebook tried something along these lines in India. It did not go well.
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/02/net-n...
Facebook: "well I want to give out FaceBooks that an only access our websites, but I'll settle for more eyeballs on the ads even if they use the devices to surf the web too."
I think the OS choice also reduces the hardware cost a little bit -- at least windows laptops usually have a bit more hardware to support more standard interfaces. Some of the Chromebooks have i2c keyboards, which I don't think passes WHQL standards, but must be a little less expensive; the ssds are tiny, and sometimes mmc which is slower, but less expensive; the keyboard have fewer buttons which reduces cost a smidge too.
But, more importantly than the hardware cost, Chrome OS is easier than Windows for a novice to manage -- updates are less intrusive, just reboot when it asks and wait about 10 seconds to be ready to work again. There's not as much to mess up, and when you do, it's usually easy to get back to factory fresh.
Also, you should consider approaching canonical about sponsorship. Considering their relationship with amazon there has to be some funding to be found there.
I think what you are doing is very important thing but it's not scalable to 2.5b people.
The biggest problem for those 2.5b people are:
- Availability of network infrastructure. It starts with whatever network backbone and ends with either mobile internet or wifi network. In most cases there is no business case to build out this kind of infrastructure as there is essentially no way to recover investment unless its subsidized by government or world bank or something.
- Availability of electricity. There is many place that simply has none or it's very unreliable. It has twofold influence - its hard to build infrastructure that will work and people have no place to charge phones/laptops
- The actual price of devices. Even if you are talking about advanced feature phones or low end smart phones (laptops are way out of price range for most of 2.5b people) its still expensive. There is all kind of schemes with operators subsidizing the device over few years but it's bring arpu to very low numbers making it hardly viable business.
Edit. I actually lived in Georgia during the "fun" time, late 80s - early 90s. Good luck.
Electricity might be an issue in some areas but according to our assumptions, more than 160 million secondary students in low and low-middle income countries live in cities and areas where electricity is not an issue.
Btw by working with the local communities, providing resources, training and constant assistance, we also seem to encourage them to see the relevance of an Internet connection. We hope to prove that most of our beneficiaries will be willing to continue paying for their Internet fees long after we have stopped paying for them. According to preliminary studies most of the families are ready to reprioritize their costs and maintain an internet connection.
The "Fun" times you mentioned is one of the reasons why we've started GiveInternet.org since we have experienced first-hand the transformational power of connectivity in improving people's lives.
I don't have the data anymore so I can argue with you on exact numbers , but even when you are talking about 3/4g networks, in most of the cases it will be 3g and rolling out 4g is too expensive and backbone wont have enough capacity to serve all the people that are lacking access.
>Electricity might be an issue in some areas but according to our assumptions, more than 160 million secondary students in low and low-middle income countries live in cities and areas where electricity is not an issue.
You cant really just buy enough hardware for everyone. It doesn't work well on scale. See one laptop per child.
But lets just to narrow it down to one country - US. One of the worlds strongest economy. Only in the US more than 3 million families with school-aged children can't afford internet connection (Sprint claims it's 5 Mio families) That's why these programs exist: http://1millionproject.org/, https://www.internetessentials.com/, https://www.fcc.gov/general/lifeline-program-low-income-cons...
Now imagine other countries and cities even developed ones. Not talking about developing countries. Btw 160 million secoindary students which I mentioned exclude rural areas, only those who live in urban areas.
Regarding the devices, I agree that might be challenging but the prices for devices are decreasing dramatically. Plus some models of monthly installments can make it plus 5-10 USD to monthly internet fees, which is pretty acceptable. So we believe in the long run the device problem is also solvable.
Will play devils advocate a bit: there is a lot of projects that attempt sponsoring model. Why one should choose yours over, lets say, this one https://www.worldvision.org/sponsor-a-child-in-africa .
I don't understand the point of this. I thought the people who cared about being on the Internet already were.
People can either afford the Internet or not. If they can't afford it, there are good chances they can't afford to pay any other bills.
These people are usually not in developing countries, but the developed ones. The developed ones where no amount of government laws can bring affordable Internet to the public, nor any places with free WiFi nor good libraries with free browsing facilities.
So clearly, there is something bigger at play, and it is about artificially pricing people out of a market being the ultimate goal.
The people who do really need to be on the Internet in such a society would have already worked their way around it. And if not, they have other issues to take care of before they go to artificially high priced internet.
One thing is, what we think people need and another is what they really need. It will be more relevant to use so-called LSM's - Lifestyle measures while evaluating the importance of the internet. That said how do we explain the resident of the village with no clean drinking water, buying a cell phone or kitchen appliance? or a mother paying for her son's education tutoring, even when she goes hungry? A farmer investing in cattle before improving his house? These are all facts and I am sure many of us have heard these stories. One thing is what we perceive and another is what people really need.
Btw by working with the local communities, providing resources, training and constant assistance, we also seem to encourage them to see the relevance of an Internet connection. We hope to prove that most of our beneficiaries will be willing to continue paying for their Internet fees long after we have stopped paying for them. According to preliminary studies most of the families are ready to reprioritize their costs and maintain an internet connection. Because of the high price barrier, they couldn't afford the internet and now since they understand its role in their lives and its relevance, their priorities have changed.
Is the answer - job opportunities, free education, survival skills? The truth is that the internet does provide these, but how many of them actually use it?
Young people adopt technology easily and use it the same way their peers in wealthy countries and sometimes even more consciously because their problems are much different from the first world ones. They use it to serve their basic needs, but also it becomes a window to the world and opportunities for them - a chance. Internet helps them discover their interests and passions, trying things out and learn about new professions they've never heard about.
Anyway, it is better to be connected in today's world, than not. Why? because of the same reasons why none of us here on HN would give up their connection.
Yes we also provide devices which are funded either by individuals (via online donations) or corporate sponsors
First, we wanted donors to choose a student (according to their profiles) but this led to many challenges including the one you mentioned. So now donors can see profiles of every student waiting but they usually donate to the platform. We don't have one time donations. only monthly donations.
But still, we are at the MVP stage and figuring out what the right models could be.
Btw on Wifi operators is willing to deploy infrastructure in areas where they considered not profitable before. As part of our partnership in September, they launch a new base station in a rural area of Georgia.
I disagree with this. This doesn't event make sense [EDIT: to me]. The internet is simply a very large network of private systems. You don't have a right to access this network, nor do you have a right to force someone to join this network.
If your "human rights" can be negated by the power going out, they are quite weak.
I am being nit-picky, but I just don't like this marketing tactic.
While I am a hypocrite to suggest this, your statement does come off "god-like" (because I am also doing that here). They are stating a widely held belief that many people agree with.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_Internet_access
> If your "human rights" can be negated by the power going out, they are quite weak.
If that's the case then ALL human rights are "quite weak" - whether it is the power going out or a bullet in a brain - effectively all human rights are terminatable. I don't know why suggesting a human right and someone's ability to "negate" it would be related concepts.
Also, I don't think anyone said anything about forcing someone onto this network.
Your reference material has a section titled Critiques of the human right to Internet access.
> If that's the case then ALL human rights are "quite weak"
I believe the issue you bring up is mostly around peoples differing opinion on what a human right is, so I don't exactly disagree with you. I mostly have an issue with this new theme of everything being a "human right". At some point it will be a "human right" to own a Lamborghini and have someone feed me grapes while I lay by a pool (kinda sarcasm).
> B) I don't think anyone said anything about forcing someone onto this network.
If everyone left the network, then it would not exist. Therefore, a human right to the internet requires that people maintain the network.
It also says 83% of the population generally agrees that it should be a right - which is why I said it was widely held. I didn't say it was an absolutely held belief.
> I believe the issue you bring up is mostly around peoples differing opinion on what a human right is, so I don't exactly disagree with you. I mostly have an issue with this new theme of everything being a "human right". At some point it will be a "human right" to own a Lamborghini and have someone feed me grapes while I lay by a pool (kinda sarcasm).
I'm not here to argue rights like lambos and grapes at the pool. To put internet access in that category is quite honestly disheartening. Having or NOT having internet access these days quite literally be the difference causing someone to lose a house, not get a job, not find legal help, be unaware of a disaster - this is not heard to imagine. I just can't put it in the category of grapes at the pool.
All of these problems can be solved without the internet. Also, access to the internet does not absolutely solve these problems.
I can say the same thing about wearing clothes (human right to have clothing) - I can get a job, not lose a house, find legal help, and be aware of a disaster if I was completely butt naked all the time. So you're argument is that because you CAN get through it, it's not necessary to call it a human right? Also owning clothes doesn't absolutely solve those problems either right?
I don't think its a human right to have clothes though. I don't think anyone should be able to steal your clothes, but I don't think anyone should have to give you clothes either..
To think that a "human right to have clothes" means your clothes will be stolen or you will be forced to give clothes is pretty strange. If you are a developer lead at Apple I assume you pay taxes? Those Taxes are fundamentally supporting lots of initiatives like, giving homeless people clothes, food, housing.
https://datalab.usaspending.gov/homelessness-analysis.html
I'm going to take a quick guess that you don't think humans should have "any" rights?
I could be wrong. If you enlighten me on what human rights you DO believe in, I can walk you through my argument a lot better.
That's a pretty weak argument. If the power goes out due to a storm, no one is depriving you of your human rights. If the power is cut with the explicit purpose of denying you access to the Internet, that's a different story. The intention behind the statement "Internet access is a human right" is that governments should not have the right to disconnect Internet service in order to oppress their population. It has nothing to do with forcing someone to use the Internet or making sure it's always available no matter what.
Actually I think the entire comment is weak... the Internet is not "a network of private systems", there are plenty of publicly-owned websites. Government websites are just one example, and these government websites contain information of vital importance for many people (like laws, for example).
No one can force anyone into exercising any of their human rights... I have the right to be happy but if I'm not, no one will force me to be happy. I have the right to life, but I'm not arrested if I die. I have the right to freedom of movement, but I'm currently sitting still and the police are nowhere to be found. Human rights aren't things people must do, they're things governments must allow the people to do.
I wouldn't categorize this comment as "nit-picky". I'd categorize it as completely and fundamentally wrong.
I agree with you. I think people should be allowed to access the internet. That is different from forcing the government to give everyone a network connected computer [one example].
> Actually I think the entire comment is weak... the Internet is not "a network of private systems", ...
My point here being that the internet is just a large network. I don't have access to the internal network of a company I do not work for, and I don't think I have a human right to that network. If I get blocked by FB/Twitter/[any site/network] have my "human rights" been taken away? I don't believe so.
That's not what "Internet as a human right" means though. It doesn't govern what private companies do. Facebook banning you from their site is not a violation of your human rights. Syria shutting down Internet access nationwide to keep protestors from communicating is a violation of human rights.
>That is different from forcing the government to give everyone a network connected computer
No one has ever conflated "Internet as a human right" with "governments must give everyone a free computer". Just like "the right to work" as a human right doesn't mean the government has to give you a job. They just can't prevent you from accessing your job, and they can't prevent you from access the Internet.
I would think access to the internet is worth more than that. There's some implicit assumptions making with the conversion to dollars that make me think it isn't that simple.
eg > 49 students are now equipped with laptops, Internet access and online courses. Our partner Georgian Airlink, a local Wifi operator, covered the end-user device installation costs while our online donors sponsor the monthly Internet fees.
To have access, you need a stable living location, with say...wiring or a working wifi access point. You know, a place with a mailbox for a bill or equivalent. Schools are a decent proxy, where there are schools. You need to have a device to access it and of course, a nontrivial amount of knowledge to safekeep/operate these fundamental requirements within poverty conditions.
Ever seen someone brick an ethernet card trying to jam in a phone line? It happens, even with a 20-something that has had a smartphone almost their entire life. So maybe some stewardship is needed.
(From your website: "In the poorest countries, only 1 out of every 10 students has Internet access at school.")
It might be a fun experiment to let donors choose either school or individual.
Perhaps, this was a previous project name and the links haven't been fixed?
What works in one society may not be best in others. I think countries should organically grow their information infrastructure in parallel with their physical infrastructure and economy.
That being said,China's belt road initiative is also building out internet infrastructure along the belt road's route.
Schools don’t need computers or Internet to provide a breadth of education. I don’t know if computer literacy should even be taught in schools considering there’s so many different kinds of computers and they keep changing.
On a weekly basis, we post in an online group different educational content, free offers from our partners and education organizations who provide their courses for free (both online and offline), we post different scholarship opportunities, fellowships, programs, etc.
We plan to provide tailor-made educational content separately to each student according to their interests and challenges. Also thinking to test different models.)
So we think that by giving internet connection we don't just give certain things. We try to bring an environment where people can find their passions and interests, discover professions, try out things, leave and try another, acquire relevant information, etc. Internet might be a huge step towards equality of opportunity.
Terms like “Russian occupation” are loaded. The Abkhaz certainly don’t feel Georgian, and it was Saakachvili who shelled them first (albeit after a string of Russian provocations).
Regarding the political issue, I'd rather don't step into these discussions as this thread has another purpose. The fact is Georgia has 250K IDP's (Internally displaced people) in the country not able to go back to their homes.
There's other solutions too, like reducing corruption and cost of doing business in developing countries. But there's little westerners can do to implement those solutions. Trade and immigration are things western nations have control over.
Additionally, while we want to magically give internet to all nations and I think that is a wonderful gesture, it seems to me that the very best thing we can do for the whole of mankind is to improve the impulse control of every single person alive today. With proper impulse control comes the ability to want to be educated and make a difference. Internet certainly makes it possible to become more educated, but without proper impulse control I'm afraid it would all be wasted on uselessness. I say this as someone that has themselves looked at way too many cat pictures and Netflix videos. Also the internet seems to be awash with types of vendors that are trying their very best to remove the impulse control of others. I don't think giving Candy Crush to the entirety of any continent is going to benefit if impulse control is the issue that is causing them the most struggle. Perhaps we should better focus on giving people the types of applications and access that are scientifically proven to improve lives? Just a thought.
Regarding your second question I am copying my answer from a post below:
Besides connecting students, we run an online mentorship program via Chat, online groups, sometimes phone/ video calls. First Students receive a link with a "welcome package"-list of most popular and relevant educational platforms which are available in the local language. We also partner with the local EdTech partners who provide their services for free for our students, so if anyone is interested in any platform we teach them how to use it and provide free access. We are also long term partners with Khan Academy and Code.org and actively promote these platforms to the students.
On a weekly basis, we post in an online group different educational content, free offers from our partners and education organizations who provide their courses for free (both online and offline), we post different scholarship opportunities, fellowships, programs, etc.
We plan to provide tailor-made educational content separately to each student according to their interests and challenges. Also thinking to test different models.
At some point, I am not sure yet how can we maintain this educational part on a bigger scale. Hopefully through partners on the ground. But still, we believe that since we all take internet connection for granted and at the same time utilize it for the good of ourselves (not always of course), others have the same right to do it.
I know people like to hate on ISPs for pricing or availability, but I consider my case to be a fair deal. I live in a house in the US.
I'm not saying internet is bad or whatever, it's just that it's not going to change people's lives without a lot of groundwork first. Educating people so they have questions to ask, or things to produce, or knowledge to acquire. We both really thought having free internet access was going to be a paradigm shift for these kids, but unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be making much of a tangible difference at all. You could make the argument (I personally don't), that it has actually made things worse.
That's a pity. YouTube is a treasure of awesome educational videos, better than any school can be. If only I had YouTube when I was a schoolboy... Cool people explain math (and other subjects) I could never understand but grok instantly this way. I can also hardly imagine a better media spreading cultural progress. It also promotes artistic expression, incl in poor people - have you seen the post about african teens making short scifi movies? If I had to choose just one website to give everybody on Earth access to that would be YouTube.
Nevertheless narrow content kind focus can be a problem - if somebody watches nothing but stupid/weird stuff (it may be good to have this kind of fun occasionally but one should not focus on this too much) and is suggested more and more videos of the same kind this can hardly be beneficial. Perhaps Google should invent a solution to this problem. E.g. showing some educational videos among recommendations regardless to what kind of videos you watch.
the issue with that, is what counts as stupid/weird? Is watching vlogs stupid/weird? Is watching people like Logan Paul, weird or stupid? One could argue that you could actually learn alot from people like Logan Paul, about what to do and what not to do.
Also, people can learn things from the unlikeliest of sources.
First Students receive a link with a "welcome package"-list of most popular and relevant educational platforms which are available in the local language. We also partner with the local EdTech partners who provide their services for free for our students, so if anyone is interested in any platform we teach them how to use it and provide free access. We are also long term partners with Khan Academy and Code.org and actively promote these platforms to the students.
On a weekly basis, we post in an online group different educational content, free offers from our partners and education organizations who provide their courses for free (both online and offline), we post different scholarship opportunities, fellowships, programs, etc.
We plan to provide tailor-made educational content separately to each student according to their interests and challenges. Also thinking to test different models.
I recently saw some Sci-Fi shorts made by some Nigerian kids using some really interesting hacks to work around their economic and resource constraints. They were primarily inspired by watching other shorts, and learnt how to do video-editing etc from Youtube videos. I think banning anything that you consider "wasteful" isn't productive.
> Educating people so they have questions to ask, or things to produce, or knowledge to acquire.
Maybe you didn't mean to but this sounds rather patronising. Also, they were acquiring knowledge, just not knowledge that you wanted them to acquire.
- the internet makes people dumber (low attention spans, group think, advertising driven content, addictive behaviors promoted, etc)
- the internet makes us consumers instead of creators
- the internet makes people depressed and anxious
- the internet causes around 5% of global GHG emissions
- internet enhances ability for total monitoring and censoring of speech
- internet creates centralized global tech monopolies on information flow and data
- extensive global networks put society at increased risk of total collapse
What are the benefits and do they really outweigh the negatives? Can the benefits be accomplished through other means? Just make sure you're comfortable with possibly making people's lives worse.
The LGBTQ crowd is benefiting tremendously from online dating.
People with weird health issues are benefiting tremendously from the ability to do research and safely talk to others with their condition, something that would be difficult or impossible to arrange and potentially quite dangerous to do in person due to cross contamination issues.
I'm not going to sit here and try to point-by-point rebut your points, but, man, what a gloomy, glass-half-empty point of view. There is zero attempt at all to be even-handed about it.