SubTopic based on (Re: Edubuntu: some observations..)

[Dan McGarry]

Mauricio Hernandez Z. wrote:
> It is just unacceptable from my humble point of view that internet
> access is not 'sold' as a reasonable and accessible price for everyone!
> 
> I just cant believe people get charged so much for an internet
> connection.

It's a very common practice, unfortunately. Some nations have been 
successful in liberalising their markets and therefore lowering costs, 
but many many nations are still captive, if you will, to the local monopoly.

We in Vanuatu have been working quite a bit to ensure that this 
important resource is managed responsibly, and (believe it or not) the 
current situation is a significant improvement on what existed not so 
long ago. All indications are that things will continue to improve, 
although as you can see there are still some fairly significant 
obstacles to access to communications at the grassroots level.

> The way I see it, Internet is a service in the same category as
> electricity and water, and therefore we have to do something, complain,
> demand, etc.

Doing so is a bit of a bootstrapping problem, though. How do we get 
togther, raise awareness and organise ourselves if communications are 
poor to begin with?

In our particular case, we're a nation composed of 86 inhabited islands 
spread over almost 1000 miles of ocean. On most of those islands, 
there's no power, the roads are poor and there might or might not be 
telephone available via obsolete microwave transmission equipment.

It would not be terribly difficult to establish workable wireless data 
communications using 802.11 or 5 GHz equipment, but the telco here faces 
a problem: They're bound by conditions of service that require that they 
use carrier-grade equipment, and the cost of this equipment (and 
maintenance) is too high for the island communities to bear. If they 
allow others to install their own equipment, they effectively give up 
their monopoly, and they feel they can't afford to do that.

We're doing our best to navigate this maze, and progress has been steady 
but slow. In a few months I'll be setting up the first of several rural 
computer centres in locations that have no power, no water and where the 
telephone is about half a kilometre away. I'll be using wireless to link 
up to the phone, and I'll do it with an antenna that, coincidentally(!) 
manages to cover two other islands within its range. With a little luck 
and some good will, nobody will object.

> I would really appreciate if someone already knows about organizations
> already 'fighting' for this issues, please share the info with me (at
> least) or anyone else feeling this is something unfair in today's world.

Believe it or not, our biggest allies to date have been the World Bank 
and the national government. The World Bank is quite interested in 
market liberalisation (though for different reasons than ours), and the 
government is acutely aware how poor communications is slowing 
development here. The result is that Telecom Vanuatu is much more 
attentive to the voice of the Vanuatu IT Users Society when we ask them 
for improved services or lower fees. 8^)

For an example of how a grassroots movement managed to break a telecom 
monopoly, I'd recommend you look at what happened in the last 6 years or 
so in Jamaica, where Cable and Wireless used to have a vry firm grasp on 
the communications infrastructure.

Best,

-- 
Dan McGarry	it.psl at fsp.org.vu

IT Consultant
Community Communications Project