Philippines to Roll Out Nationwide Free Wi-Fi Service by 2016

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-09-07/philippines-to-roll-out-nationwide-free-wi-fi-service-by-2016

by prostoalex • 11 years ago

70 53 11 years ago

droithomme• 11 years ago

Peru announced that all its poorest residents would be hooked up to full solar power. In the end, a huge amount of money was spent and a couple hundred houses were hooked up to very low wattage systems shared by entire villages.

India announced they were going to produce a $15 computer for the masses of poor. Well we now have $15 computers, but not from this program, and India still is lacking stable electricity, clean water, and other basics throughout much of the nation.

"The Philippines is planning free Wi-Fi services to half of its towns and cities this year and nationwide coverage by end-2016"

So the claim being made is half the towns and cities by this year, 2015, within a few months. And total coverage by next year.

Most of the land area of the Philippines is remote and rural. Much is mountainous. It would be a remarkable engineering project to have total wifi coverage through the entire country by 2016. Accomplishing it with $32 million in funding would be especially amazing.

The chance that this will happen I estimate at 0%. The chance of a modest amount of coverage in certain neighborhoods of larger cities is good. Total coverage by next year isn't going to happen, isn't going to ever happen for the cited price, and the data point that it is being claimed it will happen by next year shows that those in charge of this program don't understand the problem, which means that the actually doable claims (coverage for 50% of all towns and cities by December 2015) are questionable as well.

herbig• 11 years ago

Not only would it be a remarkable engineering feat, but just getting this through the institutionalized government corruption with enough money left over to finish the project would be the largest hurdle.

I'm also incredibly skeptical of this.

funkyy2• 11 years ago

To be honest I would propose even simpler approach: offer free high speed Wi-Fi in every library. Connect every library in the country to high speed fiber and make libraries relevant in digital world again. Since libraries are usually spread evenly around the country I believe this would serve better purpose than setting unrealistic targets.

witty_username3• 11 years ago

Well, at least in India there aren't tons of public libraries, so I don't think it should be only libraries.

jackjeff• 11 years ago

You don't have a network of free public libraries in the Philippines...

elcct• 11 years ago

How about high speed WiFi in the jungles? Animals could carry WiFi transmitters that could also be powered from the animals movement...

strictnein• 11 years ago

Another little issue: the country is made up of over 7100 islands.

nbevans• 11 years ago

So 7,100 wifi APs then? Simples ;)

elwell• 11 years ago

Is Facebook paying for this behind-the-scenes? (There might be some precedent for that.)

patkai• 11 years ago

Maybe. But my first thought was the opposite, i.e. does the government _not_ want Facebook to provide free Internet for some reason?

JulienSchmidt3• 11 years ago

You can already use Facebook for free on mobile. I don't think FB has big interest in providing free internet for everyone.

FilterSweep2• 11 years ago

This is my fear. A "walled garden" internet is certainly an improvement, but I'm not sure its worth it at the cost of massive corporate surveillance and ubiquitous marketing.

On a higher level, this free Internet is a severe violation of net neutrality.

See India companies withdrawing from their Internet.org idea: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9382933

cpeterso• 11 years ago

Free ubiquitous Wi-Fi would be an effective tool for tracking citizens' internet habits and physical locations.

witty_username3• 11 years ago

And that's why the world needs to switch to HTTPS.

chrisfosterelli• 11 years ago

HTTPS wouldn't necessarily help with this. You can track on the station's MAC address, rather than the content of their HTTP connections.

jauer• 11 years ago

HTTPS has no bearing on the ability to track traffic volume, sites visited (DNS), and device location (mac address).

draugadrotten• 11 years ago

There are Swedish cities tracking citizens using mac tracking technology already. Vasteras comes to mind.

https://translate.google.se/translate?sl=sv&tl=en&js=y&prev=... http://www.idg.se/2.1085/1.606293/svenska-tekniken-som-spara...

kwhitefoot• 11 years ago

The company makes the usual claim that because they hash your MAC address that your privacy is assured.

Of course if you have the database and someone's MAC all you have to do is hash it and look it up.

pkaler2• 11 years ago

The free Internet service will cost the government about 1.5 billion pesos ($32 million) a year and will be available in areas such as public schools, hospitals, airports and parks, said Monchito Ibrahim, deputy executive director of the Information and Communications Technology Office.

It's not free. It's subsidized.

This is the same debate I have with neighbors that want free wifi in the city. Sure. Do you want higher property taxes, too?

vacri2• 11 years ago

If it means better services for me and the people around me, yes, give me higher property taxes.

Being terrified of taxes is just peculiar - it's certainly not an argument-winning trump card.

afarrell• 11 years ago

It isn't being terrified of taxes. It is saying "things have a cost. Lets start talking about the cost and asking if we're really willing to pay it."

pkaler2• 11 years ago

I'm not afraid of taxes. I'm pointing out the cost.

And it's about focus. I live in Vancouver. The city should probably be focusing on the downtown eastside and on transit. In SF, the city should probably focus on Muni/BART and the Tenderloin. It's a matter of focus.

It's about competency. The city's website and mobile Apps are not very good. The coffee shops in my neighborhood can't get wifi right. I don't have confidence in the city being able to deliver wifi better than that.

Cost. Focus. Competence.

matthewmacleod• 11 years ago

It's not free. It's subsidized.

Nothing is free, if that's your point of view.

I think everybody understands that the term 'free' in contexts like this means 'free at the point of use'. Quibbling over it seems a little pedantic.

titfn• 11 years ago

the US government should do that too... to make it easier to do mass surveillance without having to go through hoops ...

balabaster3• 11 years ago

I think in light of the Snowden revelations, everyone in the U.S. would be right to be suspicious of such an offering. Except of course those that have nothing to hide. Of course, if you're not using the nation's free wifi, then you're clearly up to no good and deserve a warrant for suspicious behaviour ;)

DanBC2• 11 years ago

If your threat model includes a well funded government then it doesn't matter what wifi network you use.

hendry• 11 years ago

Yawn... go to Philippines... their international bandwidth sucks. Wifi will change nothing.

randomguy7788• 11 years ago

yep, exactly!

thawkins2• 11 years ago

I get 2-3 megabits into most international sites on my 10 megabit line, im in manila. Not amazing, but not that bad. They are just rolling out 20mb - 40mb fibre.

The only major issue i have is that PLDT's dns is shit, so i have to reroute everything to google dns.

reustle• 11 years ago

Hey, off topic but are you based in Manilla? I'm headed there soon, would love to chat! (no contact info in your hn profile)

jpmoral• 11 years ago

Sad, but true. The timing is curious, next year (2016) is an election year.

dexterbt1• 11 years ago

Just skimmed, TLDR, the article and IDC links is slim on the technical details. The DOST arm of the gov't has a little more detailed doc here: http://icto.dost.gov.ph/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Free-Wi-F...

The doc details that coverage is limited to public places (gov offices, schools, libraries, etc), and aimed towards underserved users. Data cap is measly 1GB per month per device ID, unless you have Gov't passport/ID (up to 3GB/mo); where a national-ID system required here means a decrease in privacy and increased surveillance possibility. One can also smell a strong possibility of this being backed a foreign-state.

jister• 11 years ago

"The new service is expected to push data charges lower in the Philippines. Access to the Internet costs about $18 a megabit per second in the country, more than three times the global average of $5, according to research firm International Data Corp. or IDC."

I don't think this will happen considering PLDT owns all the infrastructure:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Philippines/comments/2aurzq/how_pld...

balabaster3• 11 years ago

If you're not paying for the product, you are the product. I can't think of an easier way to monitor everything that's going on online than have every one of your citizens use your wifi access points...

lhopki01• 11 years ago

That's such a glib saying that has no relevance here. You're not paying to visit the park - you are the product. You're not paying to use the local library - you are the product. Oh wait you are. That's what taxes are used for.

Philippines to Roll Out Nationwide Free Wi-Fi Service by 2016

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