While Mark Zuckerberg is virtually a household name across the world, relatively fewer people know about Tim Berners-Lee. Ironically, Zuckerberg’s creation–Facebook–and his billionaire status would not have been possible without Berners-Lee who created the World Wide Web in 1991.
Zuckerberg is now the icon of a business model where command-and-control methods enable Facebook to have a net worth of $190 billion. On the other hand, Berners-Lee’s work at the World Wide Web Consortium keeps the internet functioning smoothly. Berners-Lee is also a leader of the open source approach which favours cooperation and sharing rather than vast concentrations of money and power.
This contrast is what lies at the heart of the battle now raging in India over Facebook’s aggressive promotion of its Free Basics product.
The controversy in India highlights the key dilemma currently faced by policy makers and private entrepreneurs who wish to foster, not just ‘inclusion’, but business models which foster economic democracy. But, what is economic democracy? It means asking: Is it enough to give low income users free access to an essential public good like the internet? Or is it more important to look at the gift horse in the face and ask how the economic power might become more concentrated by the so-called ‘free service’?
Net Neutrality is about ensuring a truly open and unhindered internet. “India and Brazil are the last battle grounds for net neutrality,” says Sunil Abraham, Executive Director of the Bangalore based Centre for Internet and Society.
Facebook claims that Free Basics, which is offered through Reliance Communications—a dominant telecom service provider in India belonging to one of the largest business houses in the country, offers digital inclusion free of cost and, thus, any opposition to it is virtually seen as anti-poor. Free Basics is already running in 35 countries where it provides people access to “… a range of free basic services like news, maternal health, travel, local jobs, sports, communication, and local government information.” [i]
The fatal flaw in this approach has been best explained by the Berners-Lee himself. It is not the internet if full and open access to the entire internet isn’t provided to one and all. Thus, any claims of ‘inclusion’, are baseless. [ii]
Facebook counters this argument by stating that there is full disclosure to users that the free access is only to a few select websites with an option to pay and access full internet. To comply with its argument, Facebook even changed the name of the product from ‘Internet.org’ to ‘Free Basics’.
When viewed through the lens of economic democracy, this controversy has two key dimensions – firstly, how to protect commons and secondly, foster dispersed accumulation of assets.
Protection of ‘commons’ is important for a sustained and democratic growth, rather than concentrated growth of the private enterprise. Splitting of the internet into free and paid tiers violates the principle of net neutrality–all data on the internet should be treated equally.
Save The Internet, an Indian civil society campaign for net neutrality, has warned that if Facebook is allowed to split the internet between paid and ‘free’ services, it will become the norm. India’s leading telecom service provider, Bharti Airtel, launched a similar scheme, in April 2015, where customers could get free data access to limited mobile websites and applications. [iii]
This is why the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has temporarily suspended all such services, pending feedback from the industry and internet users on a consultation paper on Differential Pricing for Data Services, which is part of its exercise to frame a policy on net neutrality. [iv]
Also, it is vital to ensure that digital inclusion does not come at the cost of creating monopolistic tendencies in the marketplace. At present, the market share of India’s broadband providers is fairly well distributed – with Airtel having 22.19% and Reliance coming in fifth with 8.01% share. [v]
Policy makers must ensure that many players remain in the industry. Resistance to Free Basics is partly driven by concerns that if allowed it could eventually concentrate market share with just one provider, in this case Reliance.
Public-private partnerships to provide free wi-fi access in public spaces and educational institutions are also vital. For example, Indian Railways and Google have last week inaugurated such a service at Mumbai Central station. [vi]
Nandan Nilekani, former Chairman of the Unique Identity Authority of India and Viral Shah, who led the design of subsidy platforms using Aadhaar, have suggested that the government can offer Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) for internet data packs. The estimated cost of about Rs. 2,400 crores a year, which would benefit 800 million users, can be met by the Department of Telecom’s Universal Service Obligation Fund, which already has a corpus of Rs. 40,000 crores with contributions from all telecom operators over time. [vii]
Since digital inclusion is an underlying pre-requisite for meeting several Sustainable Development Goals, particularly goal number ten about reduced inequality, CSR and philanthropic spending on enabling internet access free of charge can also play a role.
Indian policy makers have a rich array of options to work with, provided all concerned ministries apply a simple litmus test – does a policy promote both inclusion and dispersal of asset accumulation.
Rajni Bakshi is Gandhi Peace Fellow, Gateway House.
This article was exclusively written for Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations. You can read more exclusive content here.
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References
[i] Facebook Developers, Free Basics Platform, <https://developers.facebook.com/docs/internet-org>
[ii] The Guardian, Tim Berners-Lee urges Britain to fight ‘snoopers charter, 27 May 2015, <http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/may/29/tim-berners-lee-urges-britain-to-fight-snoopers-charter>
[iii] Airtel Media Centre, Airtel launches ‘Airtel Zero’: A win-win platform for customers and marketers, 2016, < http://www.airtel.in/about-bharti/media-centre/bharti-airtel-news/corporate/airtel+launches+-+airtel+zero-+a+win-win+platform+for+customers+and+marketers>
[iv] Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, 18 January 2016,
[v] Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, Press Release, 12 May, 2015, <http://www.trai.gov.in/WriteReadData/WhatsNew/Documents/PR-34-TSD-Mar-12052015.pdf>
[vi] Business Standard, Mumbai Central Turns into Wi Fi Zone,23 January, 2016, < http://www.business-standard.com/article/current-affairs/mumbai-central-turns-into-wi-fi-zone-courtesy-google-power-116012300057_1.html>
[vii] Times of India, Free basics is a walled garden: Here’s a much better scheme — Direct Benefit Transfer for internet data packs, 1 January, 2016, <http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/toi-editorials/free-basics-is-a-walled-garden-heres-a-much-better-scheme-direct-benefit-transfer-for-internet-data-packs/>