’ But with only 2.7 billion people having access to the internet, countries such as Africa and Russia were missing out on their basic human right. That combined with the issue of internet censorship. With the intent of making the internet universal, organisations around the world launched the endeavour to bring online services to those yet unconnected.
Facebook’s Internet.org and A Human Right have been working for years to bridge the internet gap. Since 2009, A Human Right, headed by Kosta Grammatis, has managed successfully to bring the internet to many. With the ‘Move This Cable, Connect St. Helena’ project, the planned 10,000 km undersea cable meant to connect Africa to South America was modified to expand its reach. Launched in 2012, in a few
months the campaign convinced eFive to reroute the cable it was laying by 500 km. That detour has brought 4,200 people on the island
of St. Helena into high speed Internet.
Using the documentary, Web, the group also managed to persuade the Peruvian government to bring connectivity to poor children in a remote village. Grammatis’ latest initiative, Oluvus, focuses on “wiring the entire planet and bring free internet to the five billion people who do not have access.” He initially planned to buy a satellite from a company that had filed for bankruptcy, park it over the area of Africa and beam connectivity to places that were lacking in internet.
However the group found it difficult to
get to the satellite with their
project “Buy This Satellite”.
They are now focused on
using less expensive orbital
technology and have approached
established communications
and financial institutions.
Facebook’s Mark Zukerberg
began an initiative of his own.
Internet.org in contrast to Grammatis’ project
brings together big names like communication
giants Ericsson, Nokia, Qualcomm, Mediatek,
Samsung and Opera.
Zukerberg was reported as saying, “The goal
of Internet.org is to make internet access available
to the two thirds of the world who are
not yet connected and to bring the same opportunities
to everyone that the connected
third of the world has today.”
The Internet.org Innovation Lab, an Ericsson-
Facebook collaboration, is giving developers
a platform to test their apps under network
conditions found in growing markets, giving
them the actual environment to test and optimize
their apps.
A result of this has been the Internet.org app
that was recently launched in Zambia. The app
allows mobile phone users to avail online services
like education, health and basic communications
using their devices.
Users logged to this will be able to enjoy free
access to services like Google search, Facebook,
Wikipedia, AccuWeather. The app has also
opened up new avenues for job hunts through
GoZambia Jobs.
In India, Internet.org has partnered with
Unilever to expand connectivity, currently at
13 per cent. The plan is to evaluate infrastructure,
costs, barriers to connectivity as well as
educational and cultural factors that limit internet
use.
