211–220 of 243 posts
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https://github.com/matiasinsaurralde/facebook-tunnel I heard about some more, but didn't bookmark them :<
Sadly this doesn’t work with http://0.facebook.com/ , the version of Free Basics available in Germany.
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Personally, I believe Zuckerberg is sincere in wanting to connect everyone in the world with each other. Agreed. Given what we know about his history, he also seems to think that most people just aren't nearly as smart as he is... and so it's best not to confuse them, with you know, choices . And that the fact that everything they say and do within his realm is relentlessly indexed, analyzed (with literally the most…
Umm... free internet/basics/walled garden is an additional choice... Not sure how free basics reduces choice.
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I'm from India and the conditions of many farmers is pathetic here, poverty isn't a word enough to describe their condition. They are illiterate, exploited by higher-ups in the society and struggle to get even basic necessities in life. Conditions are so gloomy that on average, one farmer commits suicide every thirty minutes in this country! And these are the people whom Zuckerberg is targeting for the FreeBasics fre…
> farmers...illiterate, exploited by higher-ups... millions ...would have been much better spent by actually donating that money to the farmers One of the things you might hope for connecting them is they could educate themselves, organise and fight back against being exploited. Maybe their kids can go online if they are illiterate themselves. That kind of thing is more likely to improve conditions than a modest amou…
Basically, the recipient is the best positioned to identify what will help them improve, not some well meaning remote do-gooder.
Ref: 1. http://www.givewell.org/international/technical/programs/cas... 2. http://www.who.int/alliance-hpsr/alliancehpsr_dfidevidencepa...
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If those opposing the FreeBasics are trying to decide on behalf of poor, isn't FreeBasics itself not doing the same thing? In fact the word play now is just ridiculous. When questioned about the above, they point out that this is an open platform now where any service can come in. When questioned on why not simply give free capped bandwidth then, the answer is that "basic internet services" like education, health are…
I'm not exactly sure what the problem is. Ultimately the target user can choose from whatever options are available to them (apparently freebasics or nothing right now). For a free service there certainly is a limited amount of bandwidth available. It makes sense to ensure that the maximum amount of users get the maximum utility from it, which means preventing the bandwidth sink that porn will be.
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It does seem that people in India are speaking up against this. Now you will quip that these activists must already have internet access, otherwise they would not even know to speak up. But the activists are at least from the same communities as the target market for this program. They are fighting for their families and friends. This seems very genuine and selfless in comparison to the motivations of the company and…
>They are fighting for their families and friends. The less charitable explanation is that they're fighting to keep their leg up on the less fortunate population. The gap between those with Internet access and without is absolutely enormous. If everyone has Internet access, this untaps incredible amount of people resources, which would drive down the demand for those who currently have Internet access. These "activis…
Personally, I believe Zuckerberg is sincere in wanting to connect everyone in the world with each other. However, I believe he is also sincere in thinking that Facebook is the best and perhaps only platform by which this is possible. In this he is sincerely mistaken. I feel sure he doesn't think of it as a land grab, even privately. But he is looking from the inside out. If he wants to be seen as the Great Connector,…
Zuckerberg is the new Bill Gates. In the 90s, Gates was notorious in his ruthlessness to define personal computing as a 100% Microsoft-only experience. Today, as you pointed out, Zuckerberg is pushing equally hard at defining the internet and Facebook to be one and the same. In both cases, it doesn't really matter whether or not the efforts are sincere. The outcome is just as undesirable for the general public either…
Time to detach.
Data infrastructure should be controlled by the government only. Why? Well, imagine that every transport company had to support their own road network... Alternatively, imagine that one company controlled the roads, creating effectively a controlled market nested inside a free market.
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I think there's another motive at play, he's using 3rd-world countries as a proving ground for tiered Internet access. Facebook has already come out against net neutrality, and has billions of dollars to play with. Wouldn't it make sense for them to want to test their theories that have been shot down in their own country? Zuckerberg might be ostensibly altruistic about his lofty goal of bringing Internet access to e…
Even if there were only one package of internet available globally there would still be tiered internet, you can pay for that one package, or you can not pay for it. The only way we'd have universal untiered internet is if there was some sort of government fee / tax that you just had to pay to get internet and that was your only option. Everyone has vastly different (tiered) internet experiences, for example the inte…
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>They are fighting for their families and friends. The less charitable explanation is that they're fighting to keep their leg up on the less fortunate population. The gap between those with Internet access and without is absolutely enormous. If everyone has Internet access, this untaps incredible amount of people resources, which would drive down the demand for those who currently have Internet access. These "activis…
I really don't think the activists have any such motive.
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> with "Free Basics" they're taking steps to ensure that dominance stays intact. It is not just that. The worrying thing is that they are violating net neutrality by making sure that "FB and friends" is the only thing accessible on this free internet. If Mr. Zuckerberg is that altruistic, why not provide proper full internet? Even a limited (say 500MB per person/month) internet for free is better than nothing. But no…
I thought that Facebook claimed that anyone can make apps available in Free Basics: https://developers.facebook.com/docs/internet-org > Free Basics by Facebook provides free access to basic internet services to a billion people all over the world. Your service can be part of it. > In order to make your website display properly within the Free Basics Platform and be accessible to people on all types of phones and data…