Item — HN Reader

This is so right. It's not that the rich countries can't do anything to help, but that they are so often clueless in their approach. Internet.org is one such example even if you assume it's well-meaning.

This reminds me of all the ridiculous cheap laptops for the Third World projects - all of which completely failed. Meanwhile the factories in China keep churning out ever-cheaper laptops and phones which are having a real impact without any of the grandiose talk about Helping The Poor.

Cheaper laptops work. Laptops with hand-cranks because The Poor Don't Have Electricity don't. Internet.org is at best the Internet with a hand-crank. It's not even a step towards solving the problem.

3 comments

And I wonder what the problem is exactly? Getting internet to the poor?

How about the mobile network providers first stop robbing them blind with numerous scams and offers with hidden costs and ambiguous claims?

"New offer! Reduce your call charge to .9 Rs per 60 seconds when when you charge[1] for 350 Rs".

--Charges with 350 Rs.--

"Congratulations. Now you just need to charge again to enjoy the offer you just paid 350 Rs for!!"

Yes, that is the kind of exploitation that can happen with things like this, and there is not one damn thing that the poor can do about it.

[1]. Around here in India, "Charging" refers to adding prepaid talk time to a mobile connection often by purchasing a coupon.

This is sort of veering off topic, but it does seem appropriate to mention in this context..

They have similar nonsense in Mexico, Carlos Slim (incidentally the majority shareholder of the NY Times) make billions off of the backs of the poor in Mexico. The cell phone costs in Mexico are more expensive than in the US. So when adjusted by purchasing power, cell phones represent a huge financial burden on those least able to afford it but most likely to need it (due to decayed or non-existent telecom infrastructure in many parts of the country.)

If you want to see the effects of limiting competition (especially on the poor), Mexico is a case study. Before the Downvote Brigade starts naming Telcel competitors, one must remember that Carlos had an over 5 year monopoly on telecoms in Mexico before other market entrants were allowed to join the market, so essentially Carlos Slim and Co. were able to own the market before they had to compete, however by the time competition happened, they had a massive head start. Slim also owns/controls Telmex giving him almost total control of the internet infrastructure (and land lines) as well as cellular infrastructure. Mexico is a place where your cell phone plan might include "5 SMS messages a month" as part of your plan. That's right, 5. There's a reason WhatsApp just went nuts down there.

Personally, I wouldn't jump to call them "clueless", at least in the case of Facebook. They seem to clearly know what they are doing is not in the spirit of net neutrality, yet defend it to no end.

Those ever-cheaper laptops started as copies and spin-offs from the "helping the poor" projects and related technologies. So while the projects themselves may have failed, I wouldn't say they had no impact.

> Those ever-cheaper laptops started as copies and spin-offs from the "helping the poor" projects and related technologies.

I doubt that's true: can you substantiate that? How was the EeePC a copy of OLPC? The only commonality was that they were cheap (for the time). I'd say the cheaper laptops are as a result of a confluence of things: Android, the battle between ARM vs. Intel Atom, a glut of TFTs the high- and mid-range won't accept,