August 20, 2013; PC World
Internet.org’s mission, announced yesterday, is to ensure that the whole globe has access to the Internet. This will require connecting about 5 billion additional people. Zuckerberg and Facebook will join with Ericsson, MediaTek, Nokia, Opera, Qualcomm and Samsung on the project, developing joint projects, sharing knowledge, and working with industry and governments.
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Internet adoption has been growing by under 9 percent each year, according to Facebook.
This is one of a number of projects aimed at greater connectivity. In February, Microsoft announced a collaboration with the Kenyan government and a local Internet service provider to provide broadband access using “TV white spaces”—the unused portions of wireless spectrum in television frequency bands.
This new effort is also planning to work with unallocated white space spectrum and on lowering the cost of access, also looking at localization of content and services through partnerships, and “sustainable business models for delivery of Internet at affordable prices, with incentives for operators, device makers, developers and other businesses.”
It sounds suspiciously like a plan for global domination but what do we know? We’d like to hear from people who do. Go check it out at the Internet.org website.—Ruth McCambridge
