<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class="">There are some other aspects that prevent this from being an easily solvable problem<div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Smartphones are fairly cheap and affordable - ok</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Access is at extremely cheap prices - ok</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Education / literacy levels in India are rather low - problem #1</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Poverty levels are still high enough that many can’t afford even this - but these people have other, more serious basic needs (food, shelter <- and electricity that’ll charge a phone, clothing, healthcare ..) besides the literacy</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Even among quite ill paid people (earning less than $150 a month) - the younger people use cheap smartphones and use whatsapp / the internet etc, while older people stick to using old nokia and samsung handsets that just do voice and text, and maybe play music off an SD card.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">—srs</div><div class=""> </div><div class=""><div><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class="">On 02-Apr-2016, at 3:56 PM, Michael Gurstein <<a href="mailto:gurstein@gmail.com" class="">gurstein@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div class=""><div class="WordSection1" style="page: WordSection1; font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">I think that what you have presented rather proves my case.<o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">Most<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://www.internetlivestats.com/internet-users/india/" style="color: rgb(149, 79, 114); text-decoration: underline;" class="">recent stats from India</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>have only one-third of Indians as Internet users even at the rock bottom (and highly “affordable”) prices that you are indicating. <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">What this suggests to me is that an “affordability” program (a la the A4AI) in India for example would be concerned with increasing the numbers of those who are able (and willing) to take advantage of the competitive marketplace (thus of course, increasing the potential profits for existing suppliers) while not really tackling the problems of enabling service and use by the rural poor and the highly marginalized in urban areas.<o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">For ensuring service (and use) by the very poor and marginalized a different approach and set of programs would be necessary than those market focussed polices and regulations being proposed and promoted by the A4AI.<o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">M<o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><span lang="EN-US" class="">-----Original Message-----<br class="">From: Suresh Ramasubramanian [<a href="mailto:suresh@hserus.net" class="">mailto:suresh@hserus.net</a>]<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br class="">Sent: April 2, 2016 2:59 AM<br class="">To: <a href="mailto:governance@lists.igcaucus.org" class="">governance@lists.igcaucus.org</a>; Michael Gurstein <<a href="mailto:gurstein@gmail.com" class="">gurstein@gmail.com</a>><br class="">Subject: Re: [governance] FW: [1st-mile-nm] FCC Lifeline Program</span></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">You do have a local government owned telco stil providing internet access, along with landline and cellphone service (BSNL) but people hardly ever use them these days because of cheaper and faster service available from private players, not to mention BSNL’s proverbially lackadaisical and bureaucratic customer service.<o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">For example a 8 Mbos plan (3rd column in this list) from bsnl costs inr 1275 ($19.25 a month)<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://www.bsnl.in/opencms/bsnl/BSNL/services/broadband/BB_plans_high_speed.html" style="color: rgb(149, 79, 114); text-decoration: underline;" class=""><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;" class="">http://www.bsnl.in/opencms/bsnl/BSNL/services/broadband/BB_plans_high_speed.html</span></a><o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">And on at least one private player -<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://www.acttv.in/index.php/products/act-broadband" style="color: rgb(149, 79, 114); text-decoration: underline;" class=""><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;" class="">http://www.acttv.in/index.php/products/act-broadband</span></a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>(select “tariff” and choose say chennai or bangalore) - rates start at INR 999 for 40 Mbps ($15 a month).<o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">Panchayats (village councils) - to say nothing of city municipalities - are already overworked in providing other infrastructure - roads, water, public health and such. Even if there were budget there’s very little on the ground expertise in running an internet service provider so this would end up farmed out to a third party - with the typical governmen ttendering process.<o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">I am sure IT 4 Change is doing a great job in one - or possibly more small towns - but a high touch approach of that sort with an NGO practically adopting a village - is just not going to scale, especially given the population of India, and its fairly unique connectivity patterns (mostly on mobile devices, these days, and with data + voice plans among the cheapest in the world (I pay $35 a month for 7 GB of LTE data + voice and text), plus an extremely large number of cheap smartphones imported from chinese and korean manufacturers or OEM’d there by local phone vendors.<o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">> On 02-Apr-2016, at 3:17 PM, Michael Gurstein <<a href="mailto:gurstein@gmail.com" style="color: rgb(149, 79, 114); text-decoration: underline;" class=""><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none;" class="">gurstein@gmail.com</span></a>> wrote:<o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">> In India I've never understood why the Panchyats overall have not been<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">> used to develop local infrastructure, demand and capacity for Internet<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">> use (although I belief there are some recent developments in that<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class="">> direction coming from various states).<o:p class=""></o:p></div><div style="margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;" class=""><o:p class=""> </o:p></div></div><span style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 11px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; 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