[splintercell]

> "What Facebook wants is our less fortunate brothers and sisters should be able to poke each other and play Candy Crush, but not be able to look up a fact on Google, or learn something on Khan Academy or sell their produce on a commodity market or even search for a job," he said.<

Indians use connectivity very differently than the rest of the world(or at least different from the developed countries). To Indians, phone/internet is a mode of communication first. It was the thing which has been missing from their lives the most. This is especially true for the demographics Facebook was targeting.

The reason is the language barrier. A lot more Indians can read and write English needed for directions, news headlines, legal documents, store names etc, than those who can truly express themselves in English. My mom is a great example of this, she can read and write English, but will have trouble understanding a conversation going on purely in English.

This is the reason her smartphone usage is almost all reliant upon content created and generated by others. WhatsApp and Facebook are the two most used apps on her phone. It isn't that she wouldn't like to read up facts about politicians and world events from Wikipedia, it's just that Hindi Wikipedia and Google suck. However, if someone were to forward her a news article, a recipe or just make posts on their facebook, she's a lot more comfortable doing that.

It's been less than 5 years since she got WhatsApp and Facebook, but the social network she has created around the two facilitates her family in ways it was not imaginable 10 years ago.

BTW "It's East India Company all over again" is a cliche at this point and should be considered racist in India (because it's almost exclusively used against any non-Indian entrepreneurship in India).

[unprepare]

>it's just that Hindi Wikipedia and Google suck

And you think enabling tens of millions of people to access these resources will make them....worse?

Wikipedia is a community encyclopedia, by its very nature it gets better the more people access and use it, the more editors there are translating articles from other languages, etc.

You have not listed a single thing that would make it a net positive for a corporation to decide which sites millions of people should and should not be able to visit.

This is to say nothing of the next whatsapp or facebook - this plan is obviously about preventing competition.

You say they use the internet for communication first, is it any wonder Facebook/WhatsApp wants to ensure they control what mediums of communication are accessible throughout India?

What do you say to the Indian coder who today is working on his WhatsApp competitor? tough shit, facebook already bought the internet in this country?

[splintercell]

> And you think enabling tens of millions of people to access these resources will make them....worse?

Nope, just saying that non-English Indian language internet sucks. Yes it gets better when more and more people are using it, but that still doesn't change the fact that millions of people currently don't have internet in a form which they can use to make their lives better.

> What do you say to the Indian coder who today is working on his WhatsApp competitor? tough shit, facebook already bought the internet in this country?

Same thing you're going to say to that 18 year old kid in the year 2030 whose life could have been different had he lived in a more connected India.

[unprepare]

So you are working under the assumption that without the aid of Facebook et al, India will cease developing internet connectivity?

Frankly, I dont see a scenario where the third world remains unconnected through 2030, including India. There is much profit to be made connecting Billions (with a b) of people to the world economy; far too much profit that something as insignificant as running cable will forever keep them unconnected.

14 years of technological advancement. What radios do you think the iPhone 14s will have built in? Are you willing to bet an entire country's access to the (actual) internet that it will be the same radios we have available today?

[splintercell]

> So you are working under the assumption that without the aid of Facebook et al, India will cease developing internet connectivity? <

Nope, not at all. If I took half of all your wealth, does that mean you'd now be completely poor? No, you'd be poorer and it will harm you.

Even though the poor in India will eventually get Internet (let's hope so) now they will get Internet a lot later and a lot fewer of them would it.

I was lucky enough to get Internet access during the 1990s in India, but there are so many people I wish had Internet. I don't expect them all to become techies like me, but I definitely think it will make their lives a LOT better rather than waiting for the government to do something.

This is what government's services gets you (it's a link to a Hindi comedy show from 1990s which satirizes how many years you had to wait to get a telephone line).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i132W_iOKu0

[Golf_Hotel_Mike]

>This is what government's services gets you

Why are you assuming that the only alternative to walled garden internet connectivity is government services?

[splintercell]

Look at the post I am responding to, it specifically talked about government providing services to the poor people.

[kamaal]

>>Same thing you're going to say to that 18 year old kid in the year 2030 whose life could have been different had he lived in a more connected India.

There is a patient suffering from a heart disease, medicine arrives in a few days.

You seem to be suggesting that another drug, which can relieve the patient of some of the pains for the next hour, but is sure to kill the patient in the next few months be administered to the patient immediately.

[notahacker]

I don't think it's going to kill the patient having a choice of only Facebook and WhatsApp to talk to each other without paying for minutes or SMS. Or indeed enhance their freedom of choice when they decide to stick to SMS because it's good enough and cheaper than the internet.

I started using AOL when its walled garden tried (not unconvincingly at the time) to pass itself off as the entire internet. 15 years later I can't even remember the last time I visited a core AOL property.

[splintercell]

> There is a patient suffering from a heart disease, medicine arrives in a few days.<

We fundamentally disagree upon the nature of net neutrality. I do not believe net neutrality is a good thing, and getting rid of it would be a good thing.

The fundamental fact is that all bits aren't created equal. Facebook wants to pay for some bits by attaching the economic value of future customer, and that is fundamentally a justified thing.

In America T-mobile recently launched Binge On program under which Netflix and Youtube won't count against a monthly data plan. People on HN are hell bent on claiming that somehow this is a bad thing, but the fact is, for most people this makes their lives better.

I'm surprised that TRAI (an organization which should be gotten rid of completely according to me) caved in to Net Neutrality proponents. In future you'll see when in America Net Neutrality will be removed and how much benefit it brings to the people.

[kamaal]

>>Facebook wants to pay for some bits by attaching the economic value of future customer, and that is fundamentally a justified thing.

Facebook realizes there is very little value they can add to whatever they have done so far. So now the only way to be safe from competition is to create a monopoly and prevent others from even getting a chance from competing with them.

>>People on HN are hell bent on claiming that somehow this is a bad thing

It is.

>>for most people this makes their lives better.

Its the first step these companies take before they start charging for VoIP calls.

>>I'm surprised that TRAI (an organization which should be gotten rid of completely according to me) caved in to Net Neutrality proponents.

I'm only surprised it took them this late, after this much activism.

[tzs]

> What do you say to the Indian coder who today is working on his WhatsApp competitor? tough shit, facebook already bought the internet in this country?

How about saying to him that he should make his WhatsApp competitor work well on feature phones and low bandwidth connections, and then submit it for inclusion with Free Basics?

Free Basics is open to almost any site that can meet a few technical requirements, which are basically that it works well on feature phones and in low bandwidth scenarios and when going through a proxy. There are also some non-technical requirements, such as giving permission to use their logos in Free Basics marketing. [1]

[1] https://developers.facebook.com/docs/internet-org/platform-t...

[rohmish]

Yeah Facebook says so. How many times have companies (even Facebook) said something and something entirely different. Facebook still reserves right to not allow you on their service. In addition they want ability to see and even modify content going between you and the customer.Facebook can actually say that they can't accept you because of reason X while they actually want no competition to Whatsapp or Facebook

[throwaway2048]

and if facebook says no? or decides to drop you because you compete with them?

[senthil_rajasek]

"... is a cliche at this point and should be considered racist in India... "

How is that racist?

Expressing nationalism is not racist unless in specific other circumstances. In the U.S, Japanese and Korean auto makers were accused of stealing jobs and Latino Americans still are... I see it as a form of nationalism.

[edited: to remove Europe and fix punctuation]

[sremani]

Nationalism ? No Sir, this is protectionism and dare I say, Xenophobia.

[guelo]

Whatever you call it it works really well and India is stupid to play by the colonialist's rules. Look at China, they banned or restricted all the western web companies now they're home to thriving new web giants. With all of India's world class programmers where is India's Baidu or Wechat or Weibo or Alibaba?

[splintercell]

Same place where France's Google, Germany's Amazon is at, they don't need it. China is wasting effort by creating things because they don't wanna use the things rest of the world uses, and the rest of the world doesn't wanna use their things because it would be giving power to a non-liberal democracy.

[kamaal]

>>Same place where France's Google, Germany's Amazon is at, they don't need it.

Germany doesn't have their Amazon. They have their BMW's and Volkswagen's. That's their Amazon.

>>China is wasting effort by creating things because they don't wanna use the things rest of the world uses

So why did Ford have to create his company when Volkswagen existed?

>>rest of the world doesn't wanna use their things because it would be giving power to a non-liberal democracy.

Democracy doesn't mean two hoots in a world where economy dictates everything from domestic policy to international policy.

Absolutely nothing wrong in being self sufficient. Being self sufficient has helped Asian economies more than we know. India and China both have nuclear programs, our own capabilities to run our space programs, and launch our satellite and take of ourselves and our economies.

If anything we should be building our capabilities than depending on other nations.

[coldtea]

>Same place where France's Google, Germany's Amazon is at, they don't need it.

Germany and France are 1/10 the population of India or smaller. India is 2x+ USA populations.

>China is wasting effort by creating things because they don't wanna use the things rest of the world uses, and the rest of the world doesn't wanna use their things because it would be giving power to a non-liberal democracy.

Then of course US citizens can have their cake and eat it too, both using what "the whole world uses" AND having control over them because its their services.

[sremani]

You need to read the glorious days of protectionism and economy of India from 1950-1990. 4% growth has its own nick-name, "Hindu rate of growth".

[splintercell]

> Germany and France are 1/10 the population of India or smaller. India is 2x+ USA populations. <

All I am saying is that there is no need of creating the same piece of software by a different team of people just because of NIH Syndrome (Not Invented Here). India should spend time in creating other things.

China created its own search engine because they want a feature i.e. censorship, which Google doesn't offer them. France and Germany don't need their own search engines because there is nothing in Google which they want but latter doesn't offer.

All I am saying is that India should focus on making unique things specific to Indian population only. For instance create a Horoscope matching service similar to OkCupid, now that makes sense. Housing.com makes sense. Indian Facebook doesn't make sense.

[thaumasiotes]

> the rest of the world doesn't wanna use their things because it would be giving power to a non-liberal democracy

Let's not get carried away. The rest of the world doesn't want to use their things due to a combination of (a) not knowing about the things; and (b) the things being in Chinese.

[kamaal]

Not sure what you are talking about. Indians have been more than welcoming to other people. We have been screwed over thousands of years now.

Refusing to be screwed and looking after your interests isn't racism or xenophobia.

[splintercell]

In India Nationalism is a good word, whereas in the rest of the world it's an awful word because the rest of the world saw what Nationalism eventually takes you to (WW2, Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan).

Nobody in US who opposes foreign labor in US would ever wanna be called a 'Nationalist', it is the same thing as being called a racist(actually, it might even be worse).

[rohmish]

Nationalism could be considered good thing if you are in early to mid 20th century. But today when we are this global, being this nationalist makes no sense. Yes I understand nationalism here is grounded in our freedom history but in todays world it makes no sense.

[ignoramous]

The closed nature of the internet is dangerous for reasons far beyond "mom and pop can't use the rest of the internet anyway" argument:

1. Content Quality reduces due to lack of choice, and lack of exposure: Closed-groups are places where spam, false information, propaganda breed to a high degree. Other parts of internet help verify claims/suspicions/hypothesis.

2. Sets up a monopoly, vendor-lock-in, changes habits: Facebook would hold immeasurable power, once they've got people hooked onto thinking that there's nothing beyond their apps. The content they censor, never appears on their networks; the content they don't like die a bad death, the apps they don't interface with die a rather quick death, the business they don't bless die a death by the guillotine, the businesses they do business with die a death by a thousand paper cuts.

3. MBAs ride the wave with their business plans, corrupt official enact new laws, freedom is lost: Similar schemes by multiple powerful corporations crop-up everywhere. Internet gets fragment, and everyone is left to rue the freedom they gave up. 'Cause its a long battle up the hill, once the rules and laws are in place, they're very difficult to change because of the inherent momentum it affords to all those "rent-seekers" and "opportunistic" businesses that crop up around it. For a case study, refer how the Airline industry squeezed out every ounce of leg-room, and comfort, for more seats, and in hope to turn more profits...

There's a lot of other things that might happen, or not happen at all... but, remember, when something's free, the product is usually the user.

[splintercell]

> Sets up a monopoly, vendor-lock-in, changes habits: Facebook would hold immeasurable power, once they've got people hooked onto thinking that there's nothing beyond their apps. <

I wanna deal with this monopoly argument I keep hearing everywhere in this thread.

Can there be a monopoly of a web service? Facebook dethrowned MySpace, did myspace have a monopoly? MySpace dethrowned Friendster.

If Google has a monopoly in Search and email then what use is it when it can't push Google Plus? Even with Youtube integration FORCED upon people, nobody used Google plus.

Pretty much every single product other than social networks which Facebook has launched, has been a failure. It couldn't replace Gmail, Snapchat, Instagram.

Microsoft couldn't compete with iPod, Apple couldn't compete on Maps.

It just doesn't matter how much is your market share in a certain existing technology, people judge things based on the products (considering there is no 'price' to lure people away with).

[ignoramous]

You answered your own question, sir. Democratalized Internet is one way those behemoths are taken down.

At Google they say that the compitetor is just a click away. With the "FreeNarcotics" version of the iternet, that may not be true anymore, and a true one omni-monopoly may emerge.

[ecobiker]

But, if you look people out there is no way they'd even know if something is better...

[meanduck]

But there is already a monopoly. By TRAI over 1.25 billions.

If this discision was taken at state or city level, would be much better. Otherwise citizens/customers lose either way.

[tmerr]

Interesting point but I'm not sure how it applies to the argument. If websites are low quality, is that justification for an ISP to block them?

[splintercell]

Never said that. Also Net Neutrality regulation isn't the only thing preventing ISPs from blocking all the websites they want willy-nilly.

What ISPs want is ability to charge more for priority services (which includes but not limited to 'express lanes').

What NN supporters think this would mean is that ISPs will block websites.

Anyone has a right to block any content on their private property. Newspapers can censor articles. TV can only air what they wanna air. You can chose to listen to whichever radio station you wanna listen to. Until the ISPs promise you to not block any website, they have a right to block any website or deprioritize it for that matter.

When ISPs sell you an internet package, a 'feature' in non-NN world they would wanna provide you is: 'No blocked sites' in addition to Fiber, fast speeds, low prices, etc.

Any internet package which has blocked content on it, and blocking wouldn't be done proactively or blacklist-based, but rather like Free Basics was. Only a certain whitelisted sites were allowed. Any such package would be priced lower than a no-blocked sites package. Why? Because fewer people would want it. Discrimination of data also allows investment into the internet infrastructure. It's like Facebook ads are paying for the internet for the poor people.

Imagine this, you find out that people in New York love Mangoes, but there is nobody supplying them with Mangoes(and only super rich people are able to afford Mangoes). You find out that the city of Chicago has a LOT of Mangoes and available for very cheap. So you take your savings, buy a truck, drive to Chicago and bring a truck full of Mangoes to NYC. The question arises, since everybody from rich to the poor want Mangoes, at what price do you sell them?

If you auction the Mangoes to the highest bidder, then only the super rich will be able to afford it, if you sell it at a minimal profit(since lets say you're not in it for making profit) then while everybody will be able to afford it, only a few people will be able to acquire them until you bring back the next batch.

If you want to be able to provide Mangoes to maximum number of people, the smartest strategy is to sell them to the highest bidder, and then use the extra money you're getting to buy more trucks and make frequent trips.

This is exactly what Net Neutrality prevents from happening. When discriminatory services are provided, it allows for more services to everyone. You think that Microsoft will be able to pay to block GMail, where as what will happen will be more like UPS's regular mail vs overnight delivery. Amazon will not pay UPS to ship things through regular mail if UPS started accepting money from Walmart to slow down or block Amazon's packages.

[skewart]

"Anyone has a right to block any content on their private property."

A lot of people would argue that broadband infrastructure shouldn't be considered plain old private property. It's an essential component of a well-functioning society, so it should be among the few things that are collectively managed and supported - like water, fire departments, and the criminal justice system.

I don't think anyone knows whether or not allowing telecom companies more freedom to set prices and provide services however they want would ultimately be better for society than the kind of compromise a lot of places have now. I think it could be worth some experiments.

That said, net neutrality is a known system that more or less works. It's reasonable to be very cautious about any massive change to the current internet ecosystem.

Fire departments in many cities in the US used to be private companies that offered subscription services. They maintained their own infrastructure and sought profits and growth. Eventually cities decided that the fire service market was special in a number of ways that made it better treated as a public good. People were pretty happy about municipal fire departments. [1]

[1] I read about this a while back in a book on the history of New York. I do t have time to look up the details now. Please correct me if I'm wrong about any of this.

[shubhamjain]

I read a book called "Economics in One Lesson" [1] which is quite in few ways similar to your arguments. The gist of the book is Government should avoid doing anything in capitalistic market, goes on to argue against Minimum wage Laws, Labour unions, Price control etc. and how a free market will solve every economic problem.

The problem with your arguments / analogies and of that book, is that they tell a simplistic chain of reasoning without considering hundreds of factors involved in the equation. You say that a 'no-blocked sites package' and 'whitelisted site package' could co-exist but fail to see that, the former one could be priced so high (once the latter gains a very large market share) that it becomes necessary for an ordinary person to limit his choices. The barrier to entry for a telecom network or a broadband service is really high and I can't see a better alternative just coming in quickly.

[1]: http://www.hacer.org/pdf/Hazlitt00.pdf

[splintercell]

> You say that a 'no-blocked sites package' and 'whitelisted site package' could co-exist but fail to see that, the former one could be priced so high (once the latter gains a very large market share) that it becomes necessary for an ordinary person to limit his choices.<

See this is where pretty much everywhere gets it wrong. Prices aren't set by one side. Prices are ALWAYS set by both sides coming to an agreement.

People believe that prices are set by seller or employers, because they are usually the buyer or the employee, and they feel that they don't have the power to set prices, when the truth is that the price they want isn't just being set (and this is a good thing).

General package(no blockage) will be priced based on the supply and demand. Same is with whitelisted site package. The fact is, for most people whitelisted package where a bunch of competition websites are blocked is not a big deal. This annoys people who want cheap 'open' package.

This is precisely the reason where most proponents of net neutrality fall. You want things a certain way, but since the market will not provide you the option you want, you want it to be enforced by the government. If nobody can block anything, then there won't be any non-general packages. So make it about freedom. But it's no different than when groups interfere in the lives of other people, like preventing gay people from having sex by criminalizing it because they themselves are disgusted by it.

At the end of the day, the argument is simple, when you allow people to do something freely, will they do something you don't like?

[mpnordland]

No. Net Neutrality protects what we already have. We already pay for access to the entire internet. Customers pay ISPs for this access. When ISPs throttle (and effectively block) websites that don't pay for "priority" or inclusion, then they are lying to their customers (consumers) about the service they provide.

[splintercell]

How is it different than saying "Defense of Marriage Act protects what we already have"?

> When ISPs throttle (and effectively block) websites that don't pay for "priority" or inclusion, then they are lying to their customers (consumers) about the service they provide. <

Every country has consumer protection clause. IF ISPs promise you full internet, but they don't offer you that, then they can be sued under most jurisdictions.

The fact is, you know that this is not what it is about. There is no fraud involved. ISPs want to offer a certain kind of service and you're afraid that most people would take it and you'd be at the losing end, so you want to use the government to force the market to move in a certain direction.

[curt15]

>See this is where pretty much everywhere gets it wrong. Prices aren't set by one side. Prices are ALWAYS set by both sides coming to an agreement.

The price will only be efficient in the face of robust competition. The price will not be optimal when there is a monopoly. If the telco/ISP market were actually competitive, a plan that imposed artificial scarcities (like limiting packets based on their content instead of the actual cost to transport them) would never see the light of day as competitors would offer an uncrippled product for essentially the same cost.

[udibai]

Your argument about mangoes has a very big assumption involved and that is the supplier wants everyone to have mangoes and isn't in the market just for the profit. This is similar to what Reagan tried to argue with the Trickle-Down economics, he said if you tax the rich less they'll create more jobs and hence it'll benefit everyone. This didn't happen, 'cuz the rich found other better ways (investment funds etc) to use that extra money than create jobs. So, NEVER assume intrinsic goodness. If discriminatory policies are allowed people will misuse them.

[splintercell]

> Your argument about mangoes has a very big assumption involved and that is the supplier wants everyone to have mangoes and isn't in the market just for the profit <

I thought someone would raise this point. If the seller is in the market for making the maximum amount of profit, then he would sell his mangoes to the highest bidder at maximum profit, then use that money to expand his business to sell more Mangoes to make every last bit of profit from Mango sales. Correct?

I assumed that everybody understood that selling goods to the highest bidder is what a person motivated by profit does. So all I did was assumed that the seller wants to benefit maximum number of people. By performing that thought experiment, I showed that even THEN he would do the same thing as the person motivated by highest amount of greed would do.

[jsudhams]

The good thing is mangoes are available already cheap. So 200 rupees for 1GB .. and with competition it will go down further

[sremani]

I love the Ghosts of East India Company are always invoked when a foreign company enters India with heft, this was said of Coke, Pepsi and now when referring to Facebook Basics and Amazon. Of course, the stone walling of Foreign Retailers like Walmart. Anybody who talks about EIC is a protectionist trying to play on Colonial insecurities.

Having grown up in Socialist India, the demagogue who summons East India Company talk scares me more than East India Company itself.

[kamaal]

People who opposed coke were a minority, who weren't taken seriously by their own political representatives.

Slow adoption of technology had more to do with fear of automation and job losses, than anything.

[splintercell]

> People who opposed coke were a minority, who weren't taken seriously by their own political representatives. <

Well then why Coca Cola and IBM were forced to leave the country? George Fernandes was Union minister when he ordered them to leave India. I don't think you can get any more high profile than that.

[kamaal]

I don't know where you are getting your information from. I can still buy Pepsi and Coca Cola in India. And I have friends who work for IBM.

Coca Cola has been in bad news for other reasons. If you sell a pesticide poisoned drink, you must expect to be held accountable by the law someday.

[splintercell]

For someone who is a License Raj apologist, you clearly don't know enough the History.

In 1977 Janata Party under the leadership of Morarji Desai kicked out Coca Cola and IBM (as the high profile companies). Both the companies came back in 1990s. Go do some research before you start defending economic policies.

[singham]

Your is a very specific example. My mom can't do that. But father can.

[Perixoog]

Does she use email?

[splintercell]

I don't think she does. Never really thought of that. She's on WhatsApp like all the time, posting at least 20-200 messages a day. That's not just her, a lot of people in my family do the same thing with WhatsApp. And my mom is the smart one in the family (of her generation). She made everyone learn things like the app.