Suddenly, all of those who were protesting against internet.org are now sending message to TRAI because Facebook's marketing team came up with the good adverb that all Indians love to hear and that is "Free". So first of all there is no difference between internet.org and free basics.When Facebook launched internet.org in India all citizens protested against and stopped it.Facebook was really shocked by this response.They knew Indians will never say no to anything which is free.Hence, they came up with new word "FREE BASICS".You know how Facebook is aggressively marketing its "FREE BASICS" by sending notification to all the Indian users to send a message to TRAI, sending notification to the user if someone from the user's friend list sent the message to TRAI, also they are advertising this via newspapers, hoardings on the road etc.
"Free Basics is neither free nor it is basic"
Let's understand this with an example, Lets assume you live in Mumbai and you want to travel Pune. A Company built the expressway(Mumbai-Pune) so it collects the toll from you whenever you travel from that expressway as a service charge.Now for travelling, you have to choose one travel agency from two, say XY travels and PQ travels.Both are offering same services i.e. transporting you from Mumbai to Pune.But the travel agency PQ have made a contract with the Company who built the road.So if you choose PQ you don't have to pay the toll charges.Now we know that road is public property.They can collect charges from the people but they can't collect the different charges from different people.
Now,applying this concept in our case - suppose you want to buy a product,you have two options Flipkart (XY) or Snapdeal (PQ) .But of course you need internet for accessing these sites.The internet is operated by Reliance(construction company) so you have to pay internet charges to Reliance.If Reliance has made contract with Snapdeal (PQ) you don't have to pay internet charges but you need to pay extra charges if you want to access Flipkart (XY).Just like you cannot charge different toll charges from different people travelling through the same road you cannot charge people for using same services on the same internet.This is against net neutrality.
What Is Free Basics?
Free Basic is a platform introduced by a Facebook by which certain basic sites for e.g. Facebook will be free of charge but you need to pay extra charges if you want to access other sites for e.g. Google.In India, Facebook has tied up with the Reliance for the free basics.You can see the list of sites that will be available for free in the following image.Also, we need to appreciate Facebook for their marketing strategy as Free Basics can be abbreviated as FB.
Case I: What Happens If TRAI Approves Free Basics
All of the sudden those who never had access to the internet in rural areas will have access to the some applications online.For those who never had such access to the internet it is a pure win.A lot of people can simply switch to free internet and free basics because of which paid subscribers can be hurt.If people switched to free basics and free internet then Facebook can control the internet and a can become a monopoly.
Case II: What Happens If TRAI Does Not Approves Free Basics
Nothing at all. Education, knowledge, commerce and government services are all moving online.So hundreds of millions of Indians will not have access to the internet.But this can be solved if the he government itself provide the solution like free basics or sponsor free internet.
So Say No To Free Basics.Even the WWW inventor Tim Berners-Lee Says the same.The main reason is it is against the rules of net neutrality.
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