Facebook's Australian News Ban Did Demonstrate The Evil Of Zero Rating

from the a-massive-problem dept

People have been very angry at me for pointing out that Facebook's decision to ban links to news down under actually made sense -- even though Facebook has now cut a deal to return the links. The move was in response to an incredibly poorly thought out law to force Facebook and Google to pay giant news organizations, just because those news organizations couldn't figure out how to innovate online. One key point: I said that even if Facebook is the worst representative of the "open web," this move is the right one for the open web. That's because the alternative is much worse. Since the Australian law would force Google and Facebook to pay for the crime of linking to news, it would set up the incredibly anti-open web concept that you could be forced to pay to link.

Again, as we've already explained, this is idiotic. The links give websites free web traffic. Most news organizations, including those down in Australia, employ SEO and social media managers to try to get more links and more traffic from these websites because the links themselves are valuable. And thus, this entire bill is bizarre. It's saying that not only do you have to give us valuable traffic for free... you also have to pay us. I still can't think of any reasonable analog, the situation is so insane.

But -- some people argue back -- Facebook is no champion of the open web. Indeed. I've never argued otherwise. It's not. But this move was important to protect the open internet (and it's now disappointing that the company has caved). But, of course, this move also has demonstrated why Facebook has, historically, been a danger to the open web as well. And that's because when it blocked access to news links in Australia, it also did the same for many Pacific islands. And while we've mocked Australians who don't seem to realize they can just go to the websites of news organizations, for some of these Pacific islands, that's not actually the case. Because of Facebook's other attacks on the open web.

For years, we've pointed out the evil that is Facebook's "Free Basics" program. This is a form of "zero rating," in which Facebook would subsidize (or even make free) access in remote parts of the world... but only to Facebook. Facebook, of course, framed this as a way of "connecting the poor" and helping to get affordable internet access to places that didn't have it. But that's not true. It only gave them access to Facebook. As many people have pointed out over the years, if Facebook really wanted to subsidize internet access in these parts of the world, it should have have subsidized real access to the wider internet, not just Facebook.

So, now, these two things have collided in the South Pacific. Facebook's anti-open internet policies with zero rating, and Facebook's pro-open internet decision to not link if it requires payment. And those who bought into the false prophet of Free Basics, are now suffering:

Across the Pacific, thousands of people are on pre-paid data phone plans which include cheap access to Facebook. Those on limited incomes can get news through the social network, but cannot go to original source websites without using more data, and spending more money.

The region’s largest telco provider, Digicel, with a presence in Fiji, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Tonga and Vanuatu, offers affordable mobile data plans with free or cheap access to Facebook.

In Australia, news from Pacific sites also appeared to be blocked, a significant impediment for diaspora communities and seasonal workers.

And this, in turn, is creating disinformation risks:

Articles reposted from Australian news sources are often used in the Pacific to rebut misinformation being spread on Facebook, Watson and Howarth said.

“One very popular page in PNG seems to attract more than its fair share of long-longs [an ill-informed person in pidgin] opposing vaccination as the Covid pandemic quietly spreads daily,” Howarth said.

It's not clear why Facebook cut off news to those Pacific islands in addition to Australia, but it might just be because they cut up the map by regions and lumped the south Pacific islands in with Australia. And, even if it wasn't that, since Facebook is blocking all links to news sources from Australia to the rest of the world, the Australian news sources that many of the small islands rely on are cut off for users on Facebook's zero rated plan.

So, yes, of course Facebook itself is no great friend of the open internet. And these two moves have combined to mess up news in the South Pacific. If Facebook actually wanted to support the open internet, it should keep banning news links where governments demand payments, but it should drop the silly "Facebook only" limitation of its zero rating program.

Filed Under: free basics, islands, link tax, news tax, south pacific, zero rating
Companies: facebook

Facebook Quietly Backs Away From Its Net Neutrality Killing 'Free Basics' Program Overseas

from the the-AOLification-of-the-internet dept

While Facebook professes to be a net neutrality advocate here in the States, their silence as Comcast, Verizon and AT&T have dismantled the open internet has long proven otherwise.

And overseas, Facebook has routinely undermined net neutrality -- at times under the banner of altruism. Thinking it could corner the ad market in developing nations, Facebook has been pushing for years something known as "Free Basics" under its Internet.org initiative. Under Free Basics, Facebook delivers users a free, AOL-esque walled garden version of the internet featuring content from Facebook-approved partners. But the program quickly came under fire by content partners who didn't like Facebook being the curator of what gets viewed. Others criticized the program for at one point banning encrypted content.

Countries like India ultimately wound up banning Free Basics as a violation of net neutrality, viewing the program as little more than glorified collusion -- since a cornerstone of the project involved Facebook determining which services users will be able to access. Users in these nations, meanwhile, began conflating "the internet" with Facebook itself, which is what Facebook obviously wanted, but which presented a whole host of new problems.

As Facebook saw heated opposition from Indian net neutrality activists, its response to the PR kerfuffle was pretty terrible. While it was abundantly clear the program held cornering developing ad markets as its primary agenda, Mark Zuckerberg proclaimed that net neutrality supporters worried about Facebook's plans were simply extremists who were hurting the poor. And at one point, the company launched a campaign that attempted to trick Indian citizens into rooting against their own best interests on this subject by spamming the government in opposition to real net neutrality.

Opposition to Facebook's version of the future has since spread to additional countries, and reports indicate that Facebook is slowly walking away from its Free Basics in a number of developing nations:

"Myanmar is not the only place where Free Basics has quietly ended. The program has been abruptly called off in more than half a dozen nations and territories in the recent months, according to an analysis by The Outline. People in Bolivia, Papua New Guinea, Trinidad and Tobago, Republic of Congo, Anguilla, El Salvador, and Saint Lucia have also lost access to Facebook’s free internet program. Additionally, Facebook was testing Free Basics service in Zimbabwe in mid-2016 in partnership with local telecom operator Telecel. The test program has yet to materialize into a wider roll-out."

The company continues to expand the program in some areas, but more and more frequently countries aren't appreciating that Facebook's effort to "help the poor" involves dramatically reshaping what the "internet" looks like, while putting Facebook in the unappreciated position of gatekeeper of acceptable internet content:

"The most concerning issue with Internet.org has been its unpreparedness to serve and protect the people it is helping come online for the first time. Nikhil Pahwa, a New Delhi-based activist who revolted against the Free Basics program in India, says part of the problem with Internet.org is that it is increasingly becoming a substitute for internet for people in countries such as Myanmar."

Effectively, Facebook’s Free Basics is shaping the internet experience of users — i.e., the services they can access, the services they cannot access,” Pahwa told The Outline, adding that this creates a filter bubble for users that influences their worldview. “You can see problems crop up in nations where Free Basics is operational and Facebook is dominant."

None of this is to say that Facebook's broader Internet.org initiative hasn't done some good work around the world. But as groups like Mozilla have long argued, if Facebook is so damn concerned about connecting poor people to the internet, it can always simply fund efforts to connect poor people to the actual internet.

Filed Under: free basics, net neutrality, walled gardens, zero rating
Companies: facebook

Facebook Wants To Bring Controversial Zero Rated 'Free Basics' Service To The States

from the we're-helping! dept

Last year the Indian government forged new net neutrality rules that shut down Facebook's "Free Basics" service, which provided a Facebook-curated "light" version of the internet -- for free. And while Facebook consistently claimed its program was simply altruistic, critics (including Facebook content partners) consistently claimed that Facebook's concept gave the company too much power, potentially harmed free speech, undermined the open nature of the Internet, and provided a new, centralized repository of user data for hackers, governments and intelligence agencies.

In short, India joined Japan, The Netherlands, Chile, Norway, and Slovenia in banning zero rating entirely, based on the idea that cap exemption gives some companies and content a leg up, and unfairly distorts the inherently level internet playing field. It doesn't really matter if you're actually altruistic or just pretending to be altruistic (to oh, say, lay a branding foundation to corner the content market in developing countries in 30 years); the practice dramatically shifts access to the internet in a potentially devastating fashion that provides preferential treatment to the biggest carriers and companies.

Fast forward a year and Facebook is now considering bringing the controversial service to the United States. The company has apparently been in talks with the White House about getting the idea rolling in the U.S., without setting off the same kind of regulatory alarm bells it faced in India:

"The effort to offer a U.S.-based version of Free Basics is moving forward in fits and starts, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the effort has not been publicly revealed. In particular, the company wants to ensure that Free Basics will be viewed favorably by the U.S. government before it launches, thus avoiding a costly repeat of its experience in India."

Again, India reacted poorly not because Facebook was giving away "free stuff," but because Facebook was trying to install itself as the 90's AOL of the modern internet. Content partners dropped out because they didn't like Facebook dictating which websites and services get to be "zero rated." Companies like Mozilla suggested that if Facebook really wants to help the world's poor, it can start by funding access to the actual Internet. Facebook, annoyed by those who don't believe it's being purely altruistic, responded by calling such critics "extremists" who are hurting the poor.

The fight comes to US shores as the country is already facing a growing array of problems thanks to zero rating. Whereas India banned the practice, the FCC passed net neutrality rules that don't ban it outright, opening the door to companies trampling net neutrality if they're just creative enough. As a result, Comcast, Verizon and AT&T all now exempt their own streaming content from caps while still penalizing Netflix. Similarly T-Mobile and Sprint have now started throttling video, music and games unless customers pay a steep monthly premium.

So while the FCC twiddles its thumbs to what's quickly becoming a growing problem (unless you're an ISP or a deep-pocketed content company), Facebook is looking to get in on the ground floor of a concept that professes to be "helping" while dramatically changing the way access to the internet works. Amusingly, the social media giant appears to be treading so carefully, it's refusing to strike deals with big carriers out of an obvious fear of anti-competitive criticism:

"Facebook has not attempted to strike a deal with national wireless carriers such as T-Mobile or AT&T, said the people familiar with the matter, over concerns that regulators may perceive the move as anti-competitive. Instead, it has pursued relationships with lesser-known carriers."

Again, if you want to help low-income global citizens access to the internet -- doesn't it just make more sense to help fund connections to the actual internet?

Filed Under: blocking, fcc, free basics, limits, net neutrality, throttling, us, zero rating
Companies: facebook

India Bans Zero Rating As The U.S. Pays The Price For Embracing It

from the unlevel-playing-field dept

As expected, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has passed new net neutrality rules (pdf) that specifically ban the practice of zero rating. The rules are relatively clear in that they prevent either content companies or ISPs from striking deals that exempt select content from usage caps. The ruling acknowledges that such models create an unlevel playing field for smaller companies who may not be able to pay to play:

"...differential tariffs result in classification of subscribers based on the content they want to access (those who want to access non-participating content will be charged at a higher rate than those who want to access participating content). This may potentially go against the principle of non-discriminatory tariff. Secondly, differential tariffs arguably disadvantage small content providers who may not be able to participate in such schemes. This may thus, create entry barriers and non-level playing field for these players stifling innovation. In addition, TSPs may start promoting their own websites/apps/service platforms by giving lower rates for accessing them.

The ruling effectively bans Facebook's "Free Basics" program, despite an immense amount of often misleading lobbying and marketing by the social networking company. Net neutrality advocates in India had argued that Free Basics -- which exempts Facebook "curated" content from wireless usage caps -- gave too much walled-garden power to the company, allowing it to corner India's ad and content markets for years to come. Facebook, in contrast, argued it was being entirely altruistic, solely worried about India's poor farmers.

In a statement on TRAI's decision, Facebook reiterated that it was only trying to help:

"Our goal with Free Basics is to bring more people online with an open, non-exclusive and free platform. While disappointed with the outcome, we will continue our efforts to eliminate barriers and give the unconnected an easier path to the internet and the opportunities it brings."

As it stands, companies that violate the rules need to pay 50,000 rupees per day ($740), up to a maximum of 5 million rupees (an inconsequential sum to carriers and Facebook alike). The rules will be in place for two years and could be open for review at that time. As such, Facebook could still lobby to have the restriction on zero rating weakened, or could modify its Free Basics program so that it better adheres to the rules. Or, better yet, as Mozilla had suggested if Facebook really wants to help it could take all of the marketing, PR, lobbying, and design money being spent on Free Basics, and actually spend it on improving India's lagging telecom infrastructure.

India now joins The Netherlands, Japan, Chile and Slovenia in passing net neutrality rules that clearly prohibit zero rating. Contrast that to the rules here in the States, which don't specifically forbid the practice, instead ambiguously stating that services will only be examined on a "case by case" basis. But the mere act of opening the door to the precedent of zero rating already has already resulted in companies like Comcast and Verizon abusing it, both of them now exempting their own services from usage caps, while still penalizing competing services like Netflix.

Filed Under: free basics, india, net neutrality, trai, zero rating
Companies: facebook

Facebook Busted Trying To Fake Support For Its Net Neutrality Positions In India

from the we-see-what-you-did-there dept

For much of the last year now, Facebook has been under fire in India for its "Free Basics" zero rating campaign, which exempts Facebook-approved content from carrier usage caps, purportedly to the benefit of the nation's poor. Critics however have argued that Facebook's just trying to corner developing ad markets under the banner of altruism, and giving one company so much control over what's effectively a walled garden sets a horrible precedent for a truly open Internet. Indian regulator TRAI has agreed so far, arguing that what Facebook is doing is effectively glorified collusion, and it's demanding that Facebook shut the program down until a public conversation about net neutrality can be had.

Like any good giant international company, Facebook's response to this call for open and honest dialogue has been to launch a mammoth media and lobbying blitz across India. The campaign has included buying entire newspaper spreads in which Mark Zuckerberg professes to be super worried about the country's farmers, to some subtle, local advertising:But as we noted a few weeks ago, Facebook also engaged in some pretty shifty behavior to try and trick people into spamming Indian regulators in favor of Facebook's Free Basics plan. Numerous people complained that the Facebook app tricked them into signing and sending a complaint to TRAI, after the regulator issued a call for public feedback on the country's nascent net neutrality rules:

Got conned into signing the #FreeBasics petition on FB. DON'T "SCROLL DOWN TO LEARN MORE"! Signs you up immediately! pic.twitter.com/XqpyQSdUlN

— Accidenteshwari (@accidenteshwari) December 18, 2015

Facebook subsequently admitted it also "accidentally" sent the message to U.S and UK users as well, resulting in a flood of "feedback" from people who don't live in India and may not even know what Free Basics is. Amusingly, TRAI appears to have noticed the spam attempt and called Facebook's bluff. In a public notice (pdf), TRAI notes that it received 2.4 million responses in total, with about 1.9 million of them associated with Facebook's media campaign domains.

Being Facebook-generated form letters, TRAI points out that none of these responses appear to answer any of the questions the regulators put forth in its original call for feedback. Facebook's response, attached to the filing, is to claim that the company actually helped generate 11 million supporters of Free Basics, yet it mysteriously has no idea where these missing 9.1 million responses disappeared to. In other words, Facebook not only tried to trick its users into spamming the government, but it appears it may have lied about the overall volume of support Free Basics had.

Combined with Zuckerberg's claims that opponents of Free Basics are extremists that hate the poor, Facebook's making an excellent case for its critics who say that creating a walled garden version of the Internet in which Facebook is king is a very bad idea. A better idea? As numerous folks have suggested, how about putting all of this money being spent on Free basics, lobbying, spamming and marketing into actually updating India's lagging broadband infrastructure?

Filed Under: free basics, india, net neutrality, trai, zero rating
Companies: facebook

Facebook's Zuckerberg: If You Oppose Our International Power Grab, You're An Enemy Of The Poor

from the shining-beacon-of-hope dept

Last week we noted that India had shut down Facebook's Free Basics program, arguing the company's plan for zero rating Facebook-approved content and services is effectively glorified collusion; an attempt to eventually corner global ad markets under the banner of altruism. The country has been trying to craft net neutrality rules, and has slowly realized that whatever neutrality looks like, Facebook deciding what content Indians get access to isn't it.

Obviously this has annoyed Facebook, which, under the international lobbying leadership of former FCC boss Kevin Martin (historically tone deaf to the nuances of net neutrality here in the States), has consistently tried to shame critics of the program as extremists and enemies of the poor. That narrative continued this week, with Facebook running ads in Indian newspapers claiming that Facebook's walled garden had miraculously helped the nation's farmers improve their crop yield:

Facebook indulging in some serious hogwash now. Free Basics doubles this farmer's yield? https://t.co/k5V8XQUrFH pic.twitter.com/TEVzJETI9B

— Nitin Borwankar (@nitin) December 28, 2015

This was accompanied by an editorial in Indian newspapers by Mark Zuckerberg, also promoting the amazing strides made by "Ganesh the farmer":

"A few months ago I learned about a farmer in Maharashtra called Ganesh. Last year Ganesh started using Free Basics. He found weather information to prepare for monsoon season. He looked up commodity prices to get better deals. Now Ganesh is investing in new crops and livestock. Critics of free basic internet services should remember that everything we’re doing is about serving people like Ganesh. This isn’t about Facebook’s commercial interests – there aren’t even any ads in the version of Facebook in Free Basics.

It's the aggressive pretense that Facebook's engaged in pure altruism that has made the company's efforts so obnoxious to many, including a growing legion of Internet activists in India. Many are smart enough to realize that once Facebook is entrenched as the gatekeeper to content, it will be entrenched as the cornerstone of developing nation ad markets. So yes, while there's no ads embedded now in Free Basics, it's obvious that there eventually will be. And as companies like Mozilla have argued, if Facebook is so in love with the helping Indian farmers like Ganesh, why not help fund access to the actual Internet?

Facebook's no stranger to net neutrality, having had a front row (albeit largely apathetic) seat to similar debates in countless countries, including the States. Yet Zuckerberg pretends to be shocked that anybody could possibly oppose a plan that doesn't provide access to the full power of the Internet:

"Who could possibly be against this? Surprisingly, over the last year there’s been a big debate about this in India. Instead of wanting to give people access to some basic internet services for free, critics of the program continue to spread false claims – even if that means leaving behind a billion people. Instead of recognizing the fact that Free Basics is opening up the whole internet, they continue to claim – falsely – that this will make the internet more like a walled garden.

Except a walled garden is exactly what Facebook is building. And pretending the entire country's poor will somehow be left behind if one doesn't support Facebook's vision of the future isn't just misleading, it's obnoxious. Facebook's zero rated ambitions don't operate in a vacuum; countless citizens, companies and organizations have spent years working to bring real Internet access to India's poor every day. Projects like the open source Freedombox, which manages to encourage connection to the actual Internet while simultaneously supporting concepts like encryption:

#Freedombox developers setting up free services centre using it as an alternative. @fsmi_in @fsmk_org @FSFTamilnadu pic.twitter.com/xOacc62nuZ

— kiranchandra (@kiranychandra) December 27, 2015

Offering a restrictive, curated version of the Internet over last-generation, lagging telecom infrastructure isn't a revolution, it's a stage play. About the only thing Facebook's supplying here that could be of use to India's poor farmers is Zuckerberg's seemingly inexhaustible supply of manure.

Filed Under: free basics, india, internet.org, mark zuckerberg, net neutrality, zero rating
Companies: facebook

India Tells Facebook To Shut Down Controversial Zero Rating Program 'Free Basics'

from the for-the-love-of-the-poor dept

The Indian government has spent much of the last year trying to craft net neutrality rules, and had recently been fielding public comment on whether or not Facebook's zero rating effort, Free Basics, violates net neutrality. As we've covered at length, Facebook's been trying to corner the developing nation ad market with a zero rated program that offers free access to curated, Facebook approved content. Critics and Free Basic content partners alike haven't been comfortable with giving Facebook that much control.

Neither has the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), which, in an initial set of net neutrality guidelines, argued that what Facebook has been up to is effectively collusion. And Facebook's recent attempt to stuff the comment box apparently didn't work very well. Now TRAI has taken things one step further and demanded that Facebook's partner, mobile phone operator Reliance Communications, shut down Free Basics immediately:

"We have asked them (Reliance Communications) to stop it and they have given us a compliance report that it has been stopped," a senior government official told TOI... "The question has arisen whether a telecom operator should be allowed to have differential pricing for different kinds of content. Unless that question is answered, it will not be appropriate for us to continue to make that happen," the source said, in reference to the Facebook-Reliance 'Free Basics' platform.

Critics have long argued that not only does Free Basics give Facebook too much power, it potentially harms free speech, undermines the open nature of the Internet, and provides a new, centralized repository of user data for hackers, governments and intelligence agencies. Others, like Mozilla, have suggested that if Facebook really wants to help the world's poor, it can start by funding access to the actual Internet. Facebook, annoyed by those who don't believe it's being purely altruistic, has responded by calling such critics "extremists" who are hurting the poor.

Granted it's important to note that TRAI has yet to finalize any rules yet, meaning that Facebook's lobbying team (run by former FCC boss and no friend to net neutrality Kevin Martin) still has plenty of time to convince Indian regulators that it's an altruistic angel with only the the welfare of the poor in mind. It's also entirely possible that while the final rules ban Facebook's power grab, telecom lobbyists still manage to water them down to the point of uselessness. In fact there already have been reports that Airtel has had lots of input into the proceedings, and as a result TRAI likely won't ban zero rating.

Avoiding the issue of usage caps and zero rating is the path taken by the FCC after pressure from AT&T, Verizon and friends -- and the result has been a bit of an ambiguous mess here in the States thus far, with broadband operators doing their best tap dance routines to wiggle over, under and around ambiguous consumer protections. So while keeping Facebook from becoming an entrenched gatekeeper in any market is a good idea, it won't mean all that much if traditional telecoms ensure the broader rules remain useless.

Filed Under: free basics, india, internet.org, net neutrality, trai, zero rating
Companies: facebook, reliance communications

Facebook Spam Tricks The Internet Into Supporting Company's AOL-ification Of Developing Nations

from the this-post-brought-to-you-by-Facebook dept

For much of the year Facebook has been under fire for trying to dress up its attempt to corner developing nation ad markets under the banner of selfless altruism. Facebook's plan is relatively simple: through a program dubbed Free Basics, Facebook plans to offer developing markets a Zuckerburg-curated, walled garden version of the Internet, for free. Under Facebook's vision of this program, Facebook becomes the axle around which online access (and therefore online advertising) spins for generations to come, with the tangential bonus of helping low-income communities get a taste of what online connectivity can offer.

But many critics have complained that such a model gives Facebook too much control. Partner companies quickly dropped out of the program, unhappy that Facebook got to decide which content was "zero rated" (exempted from wireless usage caps) and which wasn't. Companies like Mozilla similarly argued that if Facebook was so keen on helping the poor, it should finance access to the actual internet. Others worried that having one company as a powerful gatekeeper not only poses problems for competition, innovation and speech, but helps create a central repository for subscriber data that would prove an irresistible target for hackers, governments, and oppressive regimes.

Facebook's response to all of this criticism was to call these concerns extremist, and to imply that if you're questioning Facebook's motives, you're hurting the poor.

The problem (for Facebook) is that as India spent much of the year trying to craft net neutrality rules, government regulators agreed with this criticism, suggesting that what Facebook was attempting was glorified collusion. This week, in a desperate attempt to sway the government toward Facebook's AOL-esque vision, the company decided it would be a good idea to use Facebook users to automatically spam the Indian government. Users who logged in were greeted with a message that automatically sent a message to Indian regulators lamenting a "small group of vocal critics" trying to derail free Internet access:Of course that "small, vocal group of critics" is in reality quite large. And they're not looking to ban free Internet access from a billion people, they're just smart enough to realize that what developing nations need is real infrastructure connecting people to the actual Internet at lower prices, not a bastardized version of AOL. Facebook has consistently tried to argue that if you oppose its vision of a curated walled garden you're a villain preventing the poor from being connected. But that's nonsense, and it doesn't void the reality that Free Basics is a potentially harmful idea, dressed up to look like Mister Rogers.

Curiously, several Indian Facebook users who've received this message claim that by simply scrolling down the notice, Facebook sends your message to the government without your tacit approval:

Got conned into signing the #FreeBasics petition on FB. DON'T "SCROLL DOWN TO LEARN MORE"! Signs you up immediately! pic.twitter.com/XqpyQSdUlN

— Accidenteshwari (@accidenteshwari) December 18, 2015

Facebook also claims it "accidentally" spammed many users in the United States and the UK with the message, likely resulting in a few extra million "accidental" messages to Indian regulator Trai, which is busy fielding input from the public. You almost get the sense that Facebook's getting a bit desperate when it comes to pitching its plan for global ad market domination unprecedented international love and caring.

Filed Under: free basics, india, internet.org, net neutrality, social media, spam, zero rating
Companies: facebook

Facebook Hopes Renaming Internet.org App Will Shut Net Neutrality Critics Up

from the it's-only-bad-when-other-people-do-it dept

Facebook is trying its best to defuse worries that the company is trying to impose a bizarre, walled-garden vision of the Internet upon the developing world. As we've been discussing, Facebook's Internet.org initiative has been under fire of late in India, where the government has been trying to not only define net neutrality, but craft useful rules. Early policy guidelines have declared Internet.org to be little more than glorified collusion, since while it does offer limited access to some free services, it involves Facebook determining which services users will be able to access (and encrypted content wasn't on the Facebook approval list).

Initially, Facebook's response to these concerns was tone deafness. Mark Zuckerberg proclaimed that net neutrality supporters worried about Facebook's plans were extremists who were hurting the poor. But in more recent weeks Facebook has been softening its stance, allowing a broader range of content on board the free service, and also renaming the Internet.org app in the hopes of blunting criticism:

"Today the company said it will change the name of its Internet.org app and mobile website, now available to mobile phone users in 18 countries, to Free Basics by Facebook. The change is intended to better distinguish the app and website from Internet.org, the larger initiative that spawned it and is incubating many technologies and business models to help get the web to new users faster."

And by "better distinguish," we mean help Facebook distance the app from criticism that the company is setting itself up as the gatekeeper to content in the developing world. To be fair, renaming it "free basics" and eliminating the "Internet.org" name does help clarify what Facebook's actually offering. And the company does appear to be opening the door to more content partners, and is working to ensure encrypted services will work "wherever possible." Still, many people still don't like the precedent set by letting Facebook be the gatekeeper for what's considered acceptable content, and argue that if Facebook really wanted to help the poor, it would offer subsidized real Internet access.

Other than changing the name and opening the Facebook gates slightly wider, the company is showing no sign that it plans to back off the core idea behind the Internet.org initiative. It also shows no sign that it actually understands why some critics are troubled by Facebook's vision. Former FCC Commissioner Kevin Martin (a huge friend to US telcos during his tenure) is now Facebook's vice-president for mobile and global access policy (read: global lobbyist), and recently declared that Facebook couldn't be a bigger friend to net neutrality:

"When users purchase internet access, they should be able to go where they want to, and that concept of net neutrality rules in context of operators who originally wanted to sell different tiers of speeds to consumers so that certain services can be accessed on a faster basis....He said that Facebook supports the concept of net neutrality and its program internet.org is to enable people to realize the importance of internet by providing access to basic web service free of data cost."

In short, that's a former FCC boss with no credibility on the subject basically implying that Facebook couldn't possibly be violating net neutrality, since that's something only a telecom operator can do. Facebook still apparently believes that nobody is bright enough to see past its shiny veneer of altruism to realize that the company is trying to corner developing nation advertising and content markets for the next thirty years. Hopefully more intelligent and nuanced thinking prevails, and those purportedly so desperate to help the poor will ultimately decide to do so by offering dirt-cheap Internet access, not a bastardized, AOL-esque vision of the Internet buried under layers of cheap public relations paint.

Filed Under: free basics, india, internet access, internet.org, net neutrality, zero rating
Companies: facebook, internet.org