I'd have much less of a problem with this if it wasn't being branded as "Internet". The whole premise of the Internet is that it's, well, the Internet. As in, a singular global network of connected machines.
If they want to launch FacebookNet or MiniNet or FooNet or whatever, more power to them, but this isn't the Internet and shouldn't be branded as such.
Why are people so insistent that Facebook's Internet.org is a bad thing?
Is no internet really better than limited internet? These people have almost no internet right now. A lot of these countries can now use Google and Wikipedia. It's either total freedom for free, or no freedom at all?
In my opinion, no internet is better than a limited internet. With no internet, people WANT the internet very badly. With no internet, ambitious entrepreneurs see a market willing to pay for their services.
No internet births wireless ISP's and Co-op internet and mobile providers.
If there is a free, but limited, internet then customers might not be willing to pay money for internet service anymore and there won't be enough demand for a business to try to bring real internet to those areas.
> In my opinion, no internet is better than a limited internet.
All of the proposed charitable objectives(as opposed to Facebook's own interests) would be served by just providing free internet with a limited data cap.
Customers would want more data badly, local entrepreneurs would be free to make any kind of app to serve the poor, rather than being restricted by Facebook's guidelines, and can even be not disallowed to compete with Facebook.
The problem with internet connectivity in India is that rural areas do not have good coverage or fiber or even copper. Internet.org doesn't address any of this, so this is NOT aimed at the poor.
It is instead aimed at teenagers, who can't pay for their own data packs yet, but still have access to smartphones. Facebook is trying to ensure that no startup ever takes mindshare away from Facebook.
This is a good point that both supporters and opponents of this initiative should gather more information about: who actually accesses services using this Facebook program? Is it in fact the previously unconnected?
And vice-versa: when you talk to the unconnected, what is preventing them from getting online? Are data costs the main barrier? Anecdotally (and admittedly my personal conversations aren’t an exhaustive survey) in India even from lower-income people I hear people talk a lot more about needing money to buy/repair a phone compared to anyone saying they can’t afford a data plan.
Most of the "previously unconnected" are people who know the value of the Internet (It's used pervasively enough that people who don't use it still have an idea of what it is), have the capability of using it, but don't want to. Very few of them are ones who can't afford it. I mean, they exist, sure, but for them the cost of a phone that can handle the internet well is probably the deciding factor, not the data plan prices. These phones cost Rs. 5k+ (cheapest I can think of) and last maybe two years without repair. Basic data plans can come at Rs 100 a month, prepaid data is generally even cheaper. No, the data plan is not the deciding factor here.
Internet.org is probably more likely to move existing Internet users onto the walled garden, because everyone loves free things.
I don't know if this is practically true for a lot of these countries. In a lot of these countries, a vast majority of the population doesn't have easy education, and are often poor.
Countries like India have a much better percentage (but still small) of the population that can afford the internet, that ISPs are incentivized to grow and expand. Countries like Zambia -- not so much (I don't actually know if internet.org is in Zambia). I don't know that a small business in Zambia has the capital to expand considering how many people can afford it.
> All of the proposed charitable objectives(as opposed to Facebook's own interests) would be served by just providing free internet with a limited data cap. Customers would want more data badly, local entrepreneurs would be free to make any kind of app to serve the poor...
Great point. "Small data payloads" would become a factor in competition, too.
I don't see how the people who don't have internet, are making choices in any way at all?
They have no way to make an informed choice, or even to make a choice, and there is no media who speaks out for them. There is no wallet for them to vote from, and no competition to choose from.
Instead the whole move is designed to prevent them from making choices, in the future, choices that are contrary to Facebook's market domination.
> It's so easy to make choices for others when you already have what they don't.
I see your point, but most safety regulation could be criticized the same way. We as a society won't allow you to buy or sell a house that doesn't meet building codes, meat that doesn't pass inspection, etc.
This is a restriction on your freedom and could be viewed as paternalistic, but it also prevents poor, desperate people from getting sick living in asbestos houses.
Is Facebook-controlled internet like an asbestos house? Arguably.
> With no internet, people WANT the internet very badly.
Actually, the opposite is true. When people have no internet, they don't know about the internet, and therefore don't want it. When people have a little internet, they realize how great the internet it is, and want more of it. It's like offering a free sample; no different than any other marketing tactic. If the thing being marketed is a good thing, then surely the marketing tactic is good? ( as long as it isn't exploitative or anti-competitive or anything)
> With no internet, ambitious entrepreneurs see a market willing to pay for their services.
It appears Facebook is one of those entrepreneurs. There was no internet; now there is internet.org and whatever those other ambitious entrepreneurs have offered.
Just because it doesn't throttle services doesn't change the fact that internet.org gets to decide what services get on the platform in the first place.
"Developer participation on the Internet.org 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 Internet.org, and any terms of use for your service will not apply to Facebook.
Submission does not guarantee that your site(s) will be made available through Internet.org."
If you can't open any other website other than the 50 or so provided by Facebook, then it is in effect a limited internet.
Arguments that "saying it did not block or throttle services", tries to imply that "This is not the Internet, so we are not blocking anything on the Internet". That's just hogwash.
It is. Free lane is fundamentally similar to fast lane.
Also, if you use Internet.org, you cannot use other websites unless you stop using Internet.org, you get a "fuck off" message for any other website you want to visit, even if you want to pay for it with usual pay as you go data charges.
I think the main issue is the name not the product. If it was honest about what it was then fine it's just modern AOL, but the name internet.org is at minimum misleading.
Because the spread of a network made and paid for by advertisers will hinder the spread of the network most of us have now, which is mostly paid for by the users.
Internet.org is not mis-named, it's an intentional hijacking of the "internet" brand to refer to a different network with different people and institutions in control.
> Question: Is being a slave really worse than being poor?
Good question. I'd rather let people decide that for themselves than have wealthy people half way around the globe decide it for them by removing one option.
In some cases or instances, conditions of one might be better than the other. However, universally, I'd say almost everyone would agree that being a slave is bad/wrong/immoral.
From a purely survivalist approach slavery is without a doubt a better proposition because it is nigh impossible to break away from poverty.
But lack of free and targeted internet is not poverty. Internet is already extremely cheap in India - cheaper than USA for example - and is easily available via mobile phones that are more ubiquitous than toilets!
To say that Internet.org is an alternative to no internet is not only disingenuous it is basically a mockery of 'them 3rd worlders...' as if they will never get internet without Internet.org. And that too for India? A country that has achieved more feats in technology domain than many of the first world countries (and before solving the problem of toilet)? It is hard to sell product to a level-headed person.
Not to say that Indian government is squarely going to reject Internet.org - Indian government - specially judiciary - is mind bogglingly corrupt - but it should be rejected.
I am not the poster, but I abhor how people get offended over reductio ad absurdem. The argument says "you think X is ok? well, here's something horrendous that we all would agree is horrendous that is based on the same justification you used, therefore your justification is no good." A variation of this says, "Your same logic would support this horrendous example, so what is the distinction in your reasoning that would support your assertion but reject this extreme case?" This form of discourse DOES NOT say that the original claim is to be equated to the horrendous extreme, it only says that the two use the same logic for their support and therefore the logic is invalid.
In these types of arguments, person one says badly-supported claim, person two shows the problem with the logic via a reductio ad absurdem example, and you are the only one here who is making hyperbolic claims, namely that a reductio ad absurdem reasonable point is equatable to actually asserting that the original view is the same as the absurd statement, which is a claim nobody was making.
In this case, "Internet.org is okay because a limited, restricted network is better than no network" is the original claim, and it's implicit support reason is: "even if your freedoms and possibilities are limited, it's better than just lacking resources", and so "is it better to be a slave (and get fed and have shelter etc) than to be poor?" is a reasonable question to clarify the scope of the premise. It's not saying they are equitable. One of many possible logical responses could be: "limiting your freedoms for access online is okay because I think as long as you have basic physical freedom over your own body, other sorts of freedoms don't matter as much". An illogical and simply invalid response is: "You're equating restricted internet access with slavery!"
Except voluntarily purchasing an inexpensive product nohow "limits your freedoms." I purchase a lousy cup of coffee from a vending machine; am I a slave if it's inferior to Starbucks? Reductio ad absurdum.
It is not voluntary when it is the only thing left in the market. We are already living in an age where some places on this planet consider basic internet connection a human rights issues so no, internet is a necessity.
Internet connection, a "human right?" That's merely an empty slogan. The notion of positive liberties breaks down under the slightest scrutiny.
What you're really saying is that somebody has a positive obligation to provide every human on earth a particular product, presumably at a price that each can "afford." This claim presents several unsolvable problems.
First, there's no objective way to determine what this price might be for each person.
Second, if we could establish a price for each individual person to get "full internet," you must admit that any person might prefer Zuck's "partial internet" at, some lower price. If this person's preference runs counter to my sensibilities, that's my problem to get over.
Third, on whom does this obligation fall? Are you personally the one obligated to provide every human this product? If not you personally then whom? Zuck? Santa Clause?
Fourth, on what basis shall we draw the list of products that I will demand be affordably provided me? And who shall draw the list and ratify it? Self appointed SJWs fresh out of POLI-SCI 101 no doubt, except professor never assigned Locke or Hobbes.
Internet access seems rather high up the hierarchy of needs especially in countries where starvation remains known. What shall they demand next, Ferraris? Reductio ad absurdum.
> While blocking and filtering measures deny users access to specific content on the Internet, states have also taken measures to cut off access to the Internet entirely. The Special Rapporteur considers cutting off users from internet access, regardless of the justification provided, including on the grounds of violating intellectual property rights law, to be disproportionate and thus a violation of article 19, paragraph 3, of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
> The Special Rapporteur calls upon all states to ensure that Internet access is maintained at all times, including during times of political unrest. In particular, the Special Rapporteur urges States to repeal or amend existing intellectual copyright laws which permit users to be disconnected from Internet access, and to refrain from adopting such laws.
It's also written into some constitutions or case law. See eg Costa Rica, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, and Spain.
Sorry, yes HN apparently has a limit to nesting of replies, so I cannot reply directly. I'm sure that replying a level up is bad etiquette, so this is the last time I will do it.
I will leave it at this. My position is that there is no sound philosophical basis for positive rights (the claim that one person is entitled to receive something that must be produced by another person). On other words, my rights are only to be left alone to satisfy my desired ends by my chosen means without force or coercion by another party.
This speaks nothing of what "society" or one's fellow man "ought" to do. Rights to no involve "ought."
Sure, but let's understand we've changed the subject. If the claim is that a state should not, by threat of violence, block a private firm from serving a voluntary customer, I could not agree more. That's entirely different from saying that someone has a positive obligation to provide a certain product.
Except now it's a right I can expect someone to provide minimum viable Internet for no or low cost.
In England you can get internet access via their computers for out-of-work benefits in JobCentres; there's other Internet access in public libraries; some hospitals and gp surgeries provide wifi.
That Internet is not great - slow, with quite a lot of limits, but it is provided.
Because something is in fact provided, be it by the government or the market, does not in the least confer to me a right. If it does, then I have no idea what you mean by "right."
The fact that I can rely on the existence of high-quality open source software to use in my projects does not mean that I may demand that you or anyone else write it and offer it for free. If I go hiking on the trail near my house, I know that I can expect "free" plastic bags in the city dispenser to clean up after my dog. Their existence does not make it my "right" to receive them for free.
I pointed out where the UN says it's a right. You say that it's not about being cut off, it's about provision, so I point to it being provided, and now you say that's not what you mean either.
I dunno what to tell you. Access to the Internet is seen as a right in some regions, and you shouldn't be kicked off the Internet for IP violations, and someone should be providing access to the Internet, and in England that someone is national government (Department of Work and Pensions) and local government (public libraries).
That's because better alternatives exist that provide access to the whole Internet free of cost. For example, Mozilla is trying out a couple of variants of free Internet in Africa and Bangladesh:
Facebook is a parasite of the real internet. Videos from other sites are embedded in your Facebook feed. You watch them on Facebook, comment on Facebook.
That's not parasitism, embedding content is the way the "real internet" is supposed to work. And all of that embedded content on Facebook links back to the original site, anyway. People add meta tags and social graph tags to their sites for a reason.
And anyway, that seems an odd criticism to make on a forum built around the same basic principle - people link content here, and discuss it here as well.
It's parasitic because of its particular approach. For example, it could embed youtube videos... so that the real creators get their pay, but no, Facebook would rather that the videos be Facebook videos, thereby the original creator getting zero profit from his hard work.
It's not even just video. I often want to share an article link to another application starting from the FB app's internal web view, and I always have to use safari as an intermediary before being "allowed" (can't believe im Jain this word but his really is what it comes down to) to do so.
What bothered me most about some recent headlines was that they kept saying how Zuckerberg is trying to bring the "Internet" to Africa and whatnot, when in fact they were referring to "Internet.org", i.e. only about 50 websites of the whole World Wide Web - 50 websites that are completely "curated", per the local governments' wishes. Is that the kind of "Internet" we want the other 2-3 billion people to get?
If Zuckerberg actually felt as philanthropic as he pretends to be, he should try to bring the real Internet to everyone, with no other hidden agendas (he is trying to portray Internet.org as a philanthropic thing not as a Facebook global domination strategy, after all).
Perhaps it's an idealistic view where "content pays for infrastructure", which on the surface appears like a Comcast move and against the grain of net neutrality.
I agree with you, but also: right now Facebook is effectively the main web browser for millions and millions of people. Even without Internet.org, those 50 websites are all a lot of people see. How can we change this model in a realistic, attractive, non-techno-utopian way?
(Also, in light of Internet.org, Instant Articles seem like a pretty democratic thing to do - bringing external content that would otherwise be blocked into this context.)
Isn't Google's approach "realistic"? They're just pulling fiber in Africa, without walled gardens. They now have better networks in Uganda than we have in the Bay Area.
Despite a lot of fiber in Africa, connectivity is hampered by ISPs refusing to pay for bandwidth, ultimately resulting in super slow connection speeds and horrible latency.
I'm pretty sure that's exactly the problem. Internet.org sounds like an effort to create a monopoly by collaborating with governments, at the expense of real Internet access by the citizens those governments are supposed to represent, to ensure they're in charge of the Internet when these markets become robust. It sounds terribly corrupt, to me. If Facebook's corrupt efforts can help to define what "Internet" means for most of a continent, imagine the consequences.
Facebook might be monopolistic in some contexts because that’s what people want to use but the issue with internet.org is that communications networks are licensing public spectrum and then cutting deals for preferential access to certain websites. Regulators and the public have a direct interest in figuring out whether these sorts of schemes are acceptable.
Facebook is what people want to sue because many (maybe most) had no idea that you could hang out with friends online in a big broadcasty way until it came around. Will that be true when they realize they can make their own website or blog with their own style to share with friends and family, download torrents, edit Wikipedia, chat or IRC, or use Twitter and HN?
I don't really know, but I hope they would go for the bazar over the cathedral. I don't see why Facebook should get a first shot at hiding the reality of the system from them.
I remember reading something a while ago that many people tboguth Facebook and the internet were 2 seperate things. Stemming from so you use the internet much? Most said not that much. But when asked if they used Facebook much. They said all the time. And apparently even when asked. Thougt of them as distinct entities
main /= only. And I'd like to see a source for the assertion that it's the main browser for millions. Facebook is kinda out these days, most of my friends (predominantly not working in technology) don't post anything there except birthday greetings, use it as an event planning/invite tool, and send the occasional message.
The browsing experience offered by internet.org isn't just some walled-off version of the open internet, with network costs underwritten by Facebook. They also do a lot of work to make sites offering health information, commodity prices, local job searches etc not only viewable (layout wise) on mobile but able to work on extremely slow networks and on low-end devices.
> They also do a lot of work to make sites offering health information, commodity prices, local job searches etc not only viewable (layout wise) on mobile but able to work on extremely slow networks and on low-end devices.
None of this is made easier or possible by any technological framework provided by Internet.org.
You are free to optimise mobile websites for slow connections on the normal Internet. Governments should be moving towards full and complete Internet with a restricted data cap instead. The next best thing would be something ad-supported, rather than this.
So in China, Iran et al., you can get past censorship with VPNs. If I understand this correctly, China's GFW blocks about maybe 20% of the internet, while Facebook's proposed free ISP blocks perhaps 90%.
Perhaps there's room within the remaining 10% to create a VPN and fudge access to the free internet? Perhaps using TCP-over-DNS, or even something ridiculous like TCP-over-Facebook-chat?
This thread is interesting, finally people have started to complain that they are only against the name instead of saying that internet.org will skew the market (which it might).
This shift of thinking is vividly interesting, it is quite possible that next time people won't object.
This line of thinking is dangerous too, since Facebook has already changed the name. It's now called Free Basics by Facebook.
However, it is still a limited internet because it runs on top of IP networks provided by existing ISPs, who are using public spectrum. This public spectrum was auctioned for telecom and Internet services, the public and regulators still need to look at how this will skew the market and competition.
It's still free, no one is forced to use this. Companies exists to make a profit, if Facebook offers something for free of course it's not driven by philanthropy. I believe internet.org is better than no internet at all. Hopefully people in developing countries will be offered alternative in the near future but to get normal internet they need to earn enough to pay for it - internet.org is free with means people using it are the product.
Then I would go for another ISP, that's the point I can choose because I live in Europe, but If I could choose between no internet and free internet from Facebook I would go for free from Facebook if noone else want to provide internet for people in Africa.
Internet.org runs on top of existing ISPs. Anywhere it's accessible, other ISPs are available in the same region too.
"No internet" vs "Internet.org" as the only two options, is not a choice anywhere at all.
Those ISPs have bought public spectrum to provide telecom and internet services. Public spectrum being used to make services of foreign companies free, while making other traffic expensive, is something a democratic population should be concerned about.
This is about not deceiving users and attempting to usurp the definition of the word "Internet". It'd be fine if they called it Facebook Net or whatever.
Edit: Disclosure: I work for Facebook, but not with Internet.org. I'm not aware of any master plan Zuckerberg has for it, other than spreading internet usage
I'm surprised that Berners-Lee is taking this stance. If anyone, he should understand the critical importance of access to basic information and communication. Connectivity is a cornerstone for developing nations and allowing young minds to prosper. I feel this is a basic human right, but over half of the world's population is not online. They cannot afford it or they do not see the value it provides.
It is grossly presumptuous to say that a small subset of the internet is worse than no internet access at all. The pure internet is obviously better than internet.org. Once people can see the vastness of the internet, nobody will want to be stuck behind a firewall.
Tim Berners-Lee would rather impoverished people have no access to connectivity rather than access to Facebook's watered-down version. He wants them to reject and deny one of the most important things they now have access to. Would he also tell starving children to turn away food donations that are not organic? I guess he would tell them to "Just say no"
Edited in that disclosure at the top. I am a stockholder, and I agree that colors the arguments. Honestly I didn't feel that it was very relevant because I don't work very closely with internet.org, and I don't think they have any secrets.
And if access to social networks such as those of your employer is a "basic human right," as you assert, then presumably Internet.org would provide free and unfettered access to all social networks, including those that would seek to unseat Facebook in the future?
I believe the basic human right is access to the unfettered internet. But we need to crawl before we can walk. People first need to see the value in having any internet at all. Once people are online a bit, they quickly want to see it all. The rampant use of VPNs in China is a good example.
Building out a cell network for the whole world isn't easy. It is much more feasible to partner with the existing providers who already reach the vast majority of the world's population. Although I agree it would be way better, I'm not sure how you'd convince them to make their entire service free.
I've been using the internet for 15 years, and I don't want to "see it all" and I never have. There's only about 15 websites I use regularly, and everything else I see comes through those. So you can't say, "we'll provide the big 15, you will learn to love the rest" when that could very well be a significant lie.
It's like saying "We'll build Wal-marts in every town, that way they'll learn to love shopping so much they'll start competing local businesses." It's transparently disingenuous, and completely unrealistic.
> People first need to see the value in having any internet at all.
Wow, this is horridly ignorant of the level of awareness in countries where Internet.org is trying to operate.
Let's take India.
People: homeless people, poor people, people in villages; all know what the Internet is. To some level. Not everyone uses it (esp. older people); not everyone is sure what it is -- but it's used in almost every social bubble by some people so people are aware of it and know its value. A lot of low-income families use Whatsapp, for example.
Internet.org isn't targeted towards the people who don't use the Internet at all. It's targeted towards the people who do use the Internet, but not much. Free stuff is nice, so more and more people will move on to the free Internet.org. There's no altruism here. It's a plain and simple business tactic.
> Building out a cell network for the whole world isn't easy.
Nobody's saying they should. But for the same amount of investment they could provide services like free Internet with a data cap. Make a landing page with a prominent link to Facebook or something. Meh.
> The rampant use of VPNs in China is a good example.
No it's not. That has nothing to do with this whatsoever. That's censorship.
> But we need to crawl before we can walk. Once people are online a bit, they quickly want to see it all.
At any point do you see Facebook committing to bringing the whole Internet to these people? I wouldn't really mind if it said that internet.org would be replaced with a full internet in 5 years or so.
>"once people see the vastness of the internet..."
Exactly. How will they get this glimpse from within a corporately delineated sandbox? Or one could see the vastness from afar, yearn for it, and make it happen. Give a man a fish and he becomes full and dependent upon the fish-monger. Tell a man that he can learn to fish and when he does he will never be hungry.
>Connectivity is a cornerstone for developing nations and allowing young minds to prosper.
So why not give full connectivity? Facebook Net is some next level BS. Facebook is treating poor people as secondary citizens who are only interesting from a consumption perspective while the rest of us have access to the full power of the internet and all the benefits it brings. The gap between the haves and have-nots only continues to expand.
Or Pepsi's campaign in India where you get codes on buying a soda, where each code gets you some data.
If Mark was indeed altruistic, he could get people 50MB of free data, which wouldn't have costed more than what it's costing him now(assuming that people would use more than 50 MB of fb on internet.org).
But that wouldn't have allowed him to create a sustainable monopoly, even if people would have used facebook on a free neutral network, which would still have fetched him money.
The only value of this deal to Mark is that Facebook gets to create a monopoly. This is something that should worry you.
Net neutrality is more important than whatever financial or profit motives the worlds billionaires may have. Facebook could easily connect India completely if it felt like it.
The question being asked here is if Internet.org’s curated content negates access itself. Given the recent, unprecedented restructuring in mobile ads, maybe there’s a better question: Does Facebook really believe the internet can be restricted to 50 sites?
Internet.org brings no new infrastructure. It is not easier to bring to the poor by alternative infrastructure.
Free neutral Internet with a small data cap is much better than this, if you want to give 'some' Internet to the poor. "No internet" vs "subset of Internet" is a glaring false dichotomy if I ever saw one.
I hope this gives some pause for people who advocate the XKCD line on free speech[0]. While not every platform should be required to host every kind of content, when a platform becomes sufficiently dominant, its ability to censor content becomes a free speech issue.
While you bring up a valid issue (per e.g. [1]), it's not clear to me what you're trying to say about it. Even less clear to me is how any sort of coherent legal regime would be imposed on something like Internet.org, which presumably has access to sufficient resources to carve up its legal entities into the tastiest possible slices (such that e.g. the local entities only run the base stations while content approval decisions are ostensibly made by a mailbox in Panama or whatever).
I wasn't saying that Facebook should be regulated like shopping malls. I was saying that people who say that private censorship is not problematic, do not have an answer for things like internet.org. Facebook are legally free to set up programs like this, but people are also right to criticize Facebook for setting up a system that takes away from the freedom of the open internet. The shallow analysis of the XKCD comic ignores these issues, yet I often see that comic posted when people complain about left wing censorship online.
A daily comic isn't the medium that one usually chooses for subtlety or depth. A lot of people complaining about "left-wing censorship" (or "right-wing censorship", for that matter) are in serious need of a clue-by-four and wouldn't bother reading a deep analysis if it were given to them.
But people complaining about "corporate censorship" are smart well informed people? How is internet.org controlling what website people get to see different from, for example, YouTube controlling which videos people get to see? And how are the whims of whoever will control or influence internet.org different from the (mostly left wing) groups that (sometimes successfully) pressure companies to remove material from their websites.
If they want to launch FacebookNet or MiniNet or FooNet or whatever, more power to them, but this isn't the Internet and shouldn't be branded as such.