[Pyxl101]

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 plans, your mobile website(s) must meet certain technical conditions created by the Free Basics proxy. [...]

Granted, I don't know how difficult it is to get a service included, but I've seen them mention a number of times that they intend enrollment to be open to anyone. The participation page seems focused primarily on technical issues like how easy the site is to proxy and cache, in order to serve a bandwidth-light version.

[ucaetano]

The content of your app is also subject to Facebook's Terms of Use:

> Developer participation on the Free Basics Platform, including the information submitted with your application, is otherwise governed by our standard legal terms. Collectively, our standard legal terms and these supplemental terms are the entire agreement between you and Facebook relating to Free Basics, and any terms of use for your service will not apply to Facebook.

Which essentially makes FB the gatekeeper of the internet.

[nileshtrivedi]

Facebook competitors like Google, Twitter, Telegram are all conspicuously absent from such a good opportunity. Could it be because the terms and conditions are actually prohibitive?

[madaxe_again]

It's irrelevant - they're selling it as "the internet", but this is actually a regulated walled garden over which they have complete control. You may want to have a read about Net Neutrality and what it means - if your ISP can choose which sites you can and can't visit, can choose which content you can and can't read - that's not "free" or "open". It's "closed" and "closed".