As a citizen of a developing nation to me this entire thing is just too many lobbyists on both sides spewing complete rubbish and this is the proverbial storm in a teacup.
Firstly Facebook is full of it because the market this will target is the internet on mobile networks which are pretty much everywhere it's even slightly feasible already. No matter what they claim Facebook are not going to magically cause a cell tower to be installed in some obscure remote village with no power or other infrastructure. (Old joke: The market penetration of the internet exceeds the "market penetration" of safe drinking water.)
Everywhere else it will be like the free Whatsapp services that some cell companies already offer as a way to steal market share from their competitors. The consumer likes it because it seems cheaper but otherwise NOTHING actually changes. The "Free Facebook" advert is only attractive if you are already on Facebook. The market we are talking about here is not sophisticated enough to understand which internet address is free and which one isn't but they are VERY capable of protesting loudly and very publicly if Facebook ever block access to other sites (Google, twitter etc.). In any case the carriers would want any extra revenue they might get. So while this will probably help Facebook somewhat they are dreaming if they think it will get them some monopoly on the Internet.
Aol and Blackberry have both tried similar schemes in the past and it didn't work then. Why would it now?
Finally I kind of doubt that any Governments will block this anyway, there is just too much chance of their opponents spinning it. But of course the lobbyists on both sides are busy trying really hard to scare their customers to fork out large amounts of money to make sure the other side doesn't win.
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Too many lobyists.
Firstly Facebook is full of it because the market this will target is the internet on mobile networks which are pretty much everywhere it's even slightly feasible already. No matter what they claim Facebook are not going to magically cause a cell tower to be installed in some obscure remote village with no power or other infrastructure. (Old joke: The market penetration of the internet exceeds the "market penetration" of safe drinking water.)
Everywhere else it will be like the free Whatsapp services that some cell companies already offer as a way to steal market share from their competitors. The consumer likes it because it seems cheaper but otherwise NOTHING actually changes. The "Free Facebook" advert is only attractive if you are already on Facebook. The market we are talking about here is not sophisticated enough to understand which internet address is free and which one isn't but they are VERY capable of protesting loudly and very publicly if Facebook ever block access to other sites (Google, twitter etc.). In any case the carriers would want any extra revenue they might get. So while this will probably help Facebook somewhat they are dreaming if they think it will get them some monopoly on the Internet.
Aol and Blackberry have both tried similar schemes in the past and it didn't work then. Why would it now?
Finally I kind of doubt that any Governments will block this anyway, there is just too much chance of their opponents spinning it. But of course the lobbyists on both sides are busy trying really hard to scare their customers to fork out large amounts of money to make sure the other side doesn't win.
Techdirt has not posted any stories submitted by elp.
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