Thanks, Papa for the feedback. Two things. First, was that I was pressed for time so I didn’t say as much as I wanted to in the article or find the links to the articles I read leading up to the event. You know how it goes in this media business. Second is that all I wrote, I wrote from my head, ergo from my point of view. I saw an article on Techpoint a few days ago that holds a similar position (though a lot less informed than you about Net Neutrality, or Free Basics, or anything for that matter), and I’ll say now (more or less) what I said then.
We know that people must get connected to the internet (recommended reading: Mark Zuckerberg’s Is Connectivity A Human Right? article). We know that the internet infrastructure/bandwidth they use once online must be paid for. We know that the demographic at the bottom of the pyramid either cannot afford internet connectivity or do not see it as important enough to pay for it (because they don’t know any better).
While I’m skeptical about having Facebook as a gatekeeper, I know that the criteria for being listed on the platform is publicly available, and if a potential competitor (lol) has met the criteria and still gets rejected, and they suspect Facebook is being nefarious, they can seek redress based on the publicly available criteria. That’d be a different case entirely. But as far as I know, Free Basics is open to anyone who offers a stipped down version of their site.
During the event, while Emeka Afigbo was speaking, here’s what I wrote down in my Notes app:
While it’s great to build castles in the air and talk about bringing the next billion people online, bandwidth will be consumed and resources will be expended to deliver this service. Who pays for all that? How do they recoup their investment? Do we expect carriers to bear the financial brunt because of a potential increase in their user base? Does Facebook subsidize bandwidth costs in any way? Or the entire thing funded by delivering ads in everyone’s sites?
After the Free Basics fireside chat, I spoke to Emeka Afigbo, and during our conversation I asked him the questions above and then some, and he said that Facebook does not serve ads to fund the project, or subsidize it. It’s the telcos who bear the cost of the bandwidth (and that may be why there haven’t been many takers around the world asides from Bharti Airtel who probably see it as a global customer acquisition ploy) and they are only doing so because of the access it gives them to users they can then sell other services to.
Of course, Facebook has direct economic interests in bringing more people online - increasing their already massive user base. I don’t think that’s a terrible motive to have, and Facebook is hardly the only party towing this line. Google Free Zone and Wikipedia Zero can be accused of the Net-Neutrality-violation crime, but I’m not sure how else companies that exist to make profit are incentivised to pay for internet access to people who can’t afford it. Net Neutrality will not pay for the bandwidth these people will consume while drinking the web through a straw.
Am I being naive? It’s entirely possible. But I haven’t seen anyone come up with any more reasonable ideas to get people connected to the internet than the model Facebook/Internet.org is proposing. The Nigerian government won’t do it. Nigerian companies won’t (or don’t have the scale to) do it. So who will? Any better ideas?