Google joins Facebook in support of Zero Rating in India • Hacker News Board

Re: Google joins Facebook in support of Zero Rating in India

#31

Post by crdoconnor » Thu, Aug 20, 2015, 4:51 PM UTC

oneJob wrote: post #8

Sven7 wrote: post #6

The Indian Telecom landscape has no resemblance to the US or Europe. There is no AT&T/Comcast monopoly. Why? Because the regulator has done a pretty decent job ensuring access to voice and data stays cheap through competition. As far as I know, in all the big cities you can choose between 7-8 major provider's. No contract. Dirt cheap access. Also worth mentioning is the existence of a reasonably large public sector I…

monopoly-regulation and net-neutrality are two unconnected issues. you can have a monopoly that does/does-not respect net-neutrality; you can also have a competitive market place where all members respect/do-not-respect net-neutrality. net-neutrality is not about ensuring broad access or low pricing, whether accomplished by regulation or the free market. net-neutrality is about ensuring equality of access and equalit…

>monopoly-regulation and net-neutrality are two unconnected issues.

Not really. Competition can be relied upon to maintain net neutrality. It's what consumers will opt for when given a choice.

Only in monopolies and oligopolies can really get away with violating it (which is why the legislation is necessary in America).

Re: Google joins Facebook in support of Zero Rating in India

#32

Post by jjoonathan » Thu, Aug 20, 2015, 4:52 PM UTC

Cakez0r wrote: post #27

johansch wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Suggest some better terms?

"toll free" would be clearer than "zero rated". Net neutrality is trickier though...

If you're on the Net Neutrality side then "toll free" obscures the downside even more thoroughly than "zero rated". So it's clearer... if you're facebook :)

Re: Google joins Facebook in support of Zero Rating in India

#33

Post by nitrogen » Thu, Aug 20, 2015, 4:56 PM UTC

crdoconnor wrote: post #31

oneJob wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

monopoly-regulation and net-neutrality are two unconnected issues. you can have a monopoly that does/does-not respect net-neutrality; you can also have a competitive market place where all members respect/do-not-respect net-neutrality. net-neutrality is not about ensuring broad access or low pricing, whether accomplished by regulation or the free market. net-neutrality is about ensuring equality of access and equalit…

>monopoly-regulation and net-neutrality are two unconnected issues. Not really. Competition can be relied upon to maintain net neutrality. It's what consumers will opt for when given a choice. Only in monopolies and oligopolies can really get away with violating it (which is why the legislation is necessary in America).

Not really. Competition can be relied upon to maintain net neutrality. It's what consumers will opt for when given a choice.

Not in the face of anticompetitive schemes like "zero-rating" promoted web sites.

Re: Google joins Facebook in support of Zero Rating in India

#34

Post by avdempsey » Thu, Aug 20, 2015, 4:57 PM UTC

smhenderson wrote: post #2

Having skimmed the first paragraph of a Wikipedia article on Zero Rating[1] I immediately knew what it was about but I'd never heard it called that before. Think T-Mobile's free music[2] service if you live in the US. Once again I think this is going to be a hard one. If you understand the devilish details under the surface and it's effects on Net Neutrality you can make an informed decision to oppose this. But it's…

Are the music streaming companies paying T-Mobile to take part in the program? If not, is the barriers to entry objection sufficiently mollified? That is, the carrier is making an entire class of content zero-rated, not picking favorites.

Re: Google joins Facebook in support of Zero Rating in India

#35

Post by nitrogen » Thu, Aug 20, 2015, 4:58 PM UTC

JoshTriplett wrote: post #22

nphyte wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every market is different and so are their rules. You are right that India has more players than the US or Europe markets but it also has more diversity and population density. Imagine paying all these multiple service providers to make your content free as a small company , non-profit , or startup to reach a billion people.

With multiple service providers available, why would you bother paying one? If they decide to make your service slow, their customers will notice, and if they care about your service, they'll switch. An ISP can only pull that kind of extortion when they're the only game in town.

The point of net neutrality is that without it, your new service will never have a chance to make any inroads at all, so customers won't know they can't access it. A competitive non-neutral market won't fix that.

Re: Google joins Facebook in support of Zero Rating in India

#36

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Aug 20, 2015, 5:11 PM UTC

nileshtrivedi wrote: post #4

smhenderson wrote: post #2

Having skimmed the first paragraph of a Wikipedia article on Zero Rating[1] I immediately knew what it was about but I'd never heard it called that before. Think T-Mobile's free music[2] service if you live in the US. Once again I think this is going to be a hard one. If you understand the devilish details under the surface and it's effects on Net Neutrality you can make an informed decision to oppose this. But it's…

Imagine if Orkut was zero-rated, back when Facebook started. Or if Yahoo was zero-rated when Google started. Internet giants are turning their back on users, now that they have money.

[deleted]

Re: Google joins Facebook in support of Zero Rating in India

#37

Post by doki_pen » Thu, Aug 20, 2015, 5:19 PM UTC

johansch wrote: post #23

RodericDay wrote: post #21

I don't understand why we are using incomprehensible-without-supplemental-material terms like "Zero Rating" and "Net Neutrality" when discussing these matters. It's like they were crafted with the explicit purpose of confusing laymen, like someone challenged you to a game of chance, gave you loaded dice, and you just went with it.

Suggest some better terms?

Sponsored content. Sponsor-free internet.

Re: Google joins Facebook in support of Zero Rating in India

#38

Post by doki_pen » Thu, Aug 20, 2015, 5:21 PM UTC

mratzloff wrote: post #19

nileshtrivedi wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine if Orkut was zero-rated, back when Facebook started. Or if Yahoo was zero-rated when Google started. Internet giants are turning their back on users, now that they have money.

It's pretty standard practice for any company that becomes suffiently large to increase barriers to entry (after previously championing low barriers to entry when it suited them). Not saying it's good for users, but the incentives for corporations are clear.

Yes, the question is would you rather put people in office who support those barriers and benefit the few, or people who represent the majority? I'm not surprised that corporations behave this way, and it's very important that it's publicized so the populace can defend it's own interests. Just because it's not surprising doesn't mean we shouldn't publicize it.

Re: Google joins Facebook in support of Zero Rating in India

#39

Post by ChrisArchitect » Thu, Aug 20, 2015, 5:47 PM UTC

RodericDay wrote: post #21

I don't understand why we are using incomprehensible-without-supplemental-material terms like "Zero Rating" and "Net Neutrality" when discussing these matters. It's like they were crafted with the explicit purpose of confusing laymen, like someone challenged you to a game of chance, gave you loaded dice, and you just went with it.

true - I came on here just to see if anyone posted an explanation about what the hell zero rating was

Re: Google joins Facebook in support of Zero Rating in India

#40

Post by smhenderson » Thu, Aug 20, 2015, 7:16 PM UTC

avdempsey wrote: post #34

smhenderson wrote: post #2

Having skimmed the first paragraph of a Wikipedia article on Zero Rating[1] I immediately knew what it was about but I'd never heard it called that before. Think T-Mobile's free music[2] service if you live in the US. Once again I think this is going to be a hard one. If you understand the devilish details under the surface and it's effects on Net Neutrality you can make an informed decision to oppose this. But it's…

Are the music streaming companies paying T-Mobile to take part in the program? If not, is the barriers to entry objection sufficiently mollified? That is, the carrier is making an entire class of content zero-rated, not picking favorites.

That's a great question and since I brought up T-Mobile in the first place I went ahead and dug around a little via Google. It looks like no, they do not charge the providers so I guess this was a bad example on my part. They started the program with a few big names (Apple, Spotify, Pandora, more...) and then opened it up to others (Google Play, Rhapsody, more...). But it looks like the entry cost to providers is low/free and in this case T-Mobile is genuinely trying to add some value to the customer to compete against the giants in their space.

So IMHO opinion it's still Zero Rating but consumer friendly because it does not favor one music streaming service over another. I'm not trying to promote T-Mobile, just stating the facts as I see them. The cynical in me thinks that T-Mobile doing it without charging providers is to avoid any any competition legislation they are worried about running up against.

More here: http://www.eweek.com/networking/t-mobile-expands-free-music-...