10 Things Facebook doesn’t want you to know about Free Basics

Facebook has been aggressively pushing its Free basics campaign in order to convince users to send mails to TRAI in support of the Free Basics by Facebook program. In the process, it has spent crores of rupees to drive its point using terms like ‘digital equality’  and receive the support it expects in order for TRAI to formally recognise zero-rating services.

However, there is one element missing from all of Facebook’ campaigns (including a 4-5 full page ad marketing Facebook’s in the leading newspapers across the country) and that is the actual details and the agenda of the Facebook’s campaign. It seems Facebook is using its rich coffers to mislead the general public into believing that Free Basics is indeed a genuine initiative to connect people online and this is a ‘humanitarian’ initiative. (Spending millions in marketing on a ‘noble’ initiative from a company that is listed and has shareholders to answer to, seriously?). This is a clear example of Facebook abusing its market dominance and power to drive its vested interests and blinding all possible criticism for its activities. Why else would Facebook invest so heavily in a campaign using shareholder money. On the surface, it clearly appears that Facebook has vested financial and monopolistic interests in positioning ‘Free Basics’ as a wonder attempt to connect billions of Indians online who can’t afford it. It amounts to exploitation not just of the untapped market but also of the users who are heavily dependant on Facebook for their daily dose of communication and networking.

There are key things that you should attend to before blindly clicking on that notification on the FB wall that asks you to send a mail to TRAI wth language that is misleading and camouflages the real intentions.

1. Facebook has rented hundreds of hoardings and taken up a majority of newspaper space to silence any criticism that speaks the truth about Free Basics. It has also ‘accidentally’ asked US users to support the cause. Is anyone of us ready to believe that this was ‘accidental’ ?
2. The language of the campaign makes you believe as if TRAI and the government is the villain and your vote will ensure that the poor have access to ‘basic internet’. in fact, it is the TRAI that has floated a consultation paper to engage all stakeholders before taking any decision on net neutrality.
3. The communication itself masks the truth about the zero-rating system and the invite to send a mail to TRAI itself does not contain the terms and conditions that one must be aware of.
4. No disclaimer has been declared in any advertisement that asks users to assess the pros and cons carefully before offering any kind of support.
5. ‘Free Basics by Facebook ultimately uses the brand name Facebook in all forms of marketing communication. Facebook ultimately has a profit motive that leads us to question the integrity of this campaign. Why didn’t Zuckerberg choose to remove Facebook from the entire equation if ‘access to internet by all humans’ was the sole objective.

There are 10 things you should know about ‘Free Basics’ before making an informed choice.

1)One corporation controlling a large part of the internet

It is ultimately Facebook who is acting as a gatekeeper to these services. It amounts to virtual monopoly of a market where customers, unfortunately will not be in a position to speak for their own rights. These customers will be solely defendant on Facebook for access to the internet. Even if Facebook had very benevolent intentions, would you want to risk a disadvantaged market’s freedom being restricted by someone like Facebook?

2)Facebook gets to decide who is in and who’s out

Mark Zuckerberg and his trusted team gets to decide who gets in or who walks out on the basis of some very arbitrary and vague guidelines. No stakeholders, independent experts or even government agencies will be involved in the entire process.

3)VOIP, video, photo, etc not allowed – essentially limiting competition in critical growth areas

This clearly amounts to stifling innovation and competition from small or emerging players. We have to remember that Facebook is a social networking site and limiting photo size, videos or even VOIP access means that a number of competitors or rivals will stand to lose. Facebook also owns WhatsApp that has recently enabled a voice calling feature.  Millions of new users on the ‘Free Basics’ platform will want to connect with their loved ones and this clause ensures restrictions for a service that so many of us rely on for our ‘social’ needs. It essentially means that Facebook will have full rights in ascertaining as to what kind of services are needed by the masses leading to many innovators being rejected who are unable to meet their criterion. Surely, Facebook wouldn’t like another Facebook to thrive in it’s own ‘homegrown backyard’.

4)Tagging in with a network operator means signing up for that service

Free Basics can only be accessed through network operators who have tied up with Facebook to offer this service. So, essentially you will be compelled to join that particular network (Reliance Infocom for now) to enable access. This amounts to giving an ultimatum to all operators : fall in line or you will lose out on your customer base. The participating operators, already reeling under heavy competition , would then look to milk profits from the millions who have signed up under the promise of a free internet.

5)No definition about the scope of Facebook’s feature availability on free basics

Facebook has spoken very little about the extent of Facebook’s own availability on the platform. If the initiative was aligned with a non profit motive, why would a profit oriented service be included and raise serious conflicts of interest?

6)Against the very concept of net neutrality

The fundamental principles of net neutrality states that all data should be treated equally without any discrimination. This zero-rating service aims to provide a channel of access to a select group of developers leaving the majority of services out in the cold. For example, if CNN tomorrow signs up for this Free Basics program and others don’t, users  on ‘Free Basics’  will be unable to access BBC or even NY Times. Internet, even according to Tim Berners Lee, the internet’s founder should be open and have unrestricted access.  If it is restricted, it is not full internet.

7)All data will be available with Facebook which is a dangerous thing

One should remember that this program has serious privacy implications. Facebook, because of ‘proxying’ all sites through the internet.org platform, will have full access to all your behaviour and usage. The terms explicitly states that “When people use the Free Basics mobile website, information is temporarily decrypted on our secure servers to ensure proper functionality of the services and to avoid unexpected charges to people”

Facebook shall obviously claim that this data will not be misused but how many of us are ready to believe it considering Facebook is solely dependant on data for its success as a business model.

8)A listed MNC will ultimately be about vested financial interests in the long run

Let’s not forget that Facebook is worth approx. $297B and has to look for new avenues for growth and profits. It cannot be deemed naive enough to let go of it’s profits in order to serve the world without any benefit in return. This untapped market will have the potential to open new sources of revenue and advertisements as these users will eventually rely on Facebook and may be some day, upgrade to a full fledged internet service ultimately benefiting Facebook as a group (WhatsApp, Facebook, FB messenger, Instagram amongst others)

9)No clarity on the future role of free basics – it could be monetised just with a short notice

Facebook’s own guidelines offer no clarity on the purpose and role of Free Basics in the near future raising doubts on the ‘actual’ mission of the platform. To enable trust, it could have categorically stated the guiding principles and scope of Free Basics. Instead the terms state the following:

“We may update these terms from time to time as the Free Basics Platform evolves. Unless we make a change to the above terms for legal or administrative reasons, or to correct an inaccurate statement, we will provide you with seven (7) days advance notice (for example, by posting the change here) of the updated terms. Your continued participation as a developer on the Free Basics Platform following changes to the terms constitutes your acceptance of our amended terms.”

Essentially, once it reaches a critical base, there is a potential for the terms to be modified to suit certain interests. It could be monetised through revenue sources like advertisements, royalties on traffic to sites etc.

10)Independent innovators will be stifled by the might of Facebook’s influence and domination

New age entrepreneurs and innovators are still looking for creative ways to access a majority of the human population who still don’t have access to the internet. It is estimated that only 40% of the world is connected to the internet with India having a low penetration rate of around 20%. (It is also growing at the highest rate). This offers a plethora of opportunities as well as challenges to the  to tech entrepreneurs looking to reach out to the next billion. Such platforms will ensure that anyone who doesn’t adhere to Facebook’s policies or is seen as direct threat to Facebook or its group companies shall be kept out using some nuances in the agreement or the other. This will have the tendency to stifle free and fair competition and will ensure that those with deep pockets ultimately win the game. This is against the very basic rules of capitalism and shall gave an unfair advantage to Facebook and its partners.

I urge you to read both sides of the argument to make an informed choice before a word with the TRAI. Facebook has been creatively designing its campaigns and abusing its user base to manipulate a majority of us, but lets hope that truth and wisdom will prevail, and the internet will be free from restrictions and open to all, irrespective of the income group you belong to. Internet access to all is a challenge but we shouldn’t let one corporation take advantage of our ignorance and benefit stealthily out of it.

Facebook developer agreement (the devil is in the details) : https://developers.facebook.com/docs/internet-org/participation-guidelines

Opposing joint action group :http://www.savetheinternet.in.

This should further convince you about the perils of the ‘Free Basics’ program. I sincerely urge you to support this action group and have your voice heard too, so that the power of democracy can defeat the vested interests of a few.

From one net neutrality supporter to the other.

Saurav Dugar

Update: Even IIT and IISc faculty members have signed a petition against Free Basics. More details in the link below:

http://www.ibnlive.com/news/tech/iit-iisc-faculty-members-call-facebooks-free-basics-a-lethal-combination-highlight-major-flaws-1183131.html

Maximum government, Minimum governance. The Government’s Hindutva agenda

The BJP Government must live upto its promises of providing a secular government without any ideological baggage of the past

In 2014, when BJP was entrusted by the electorate to lead the nation for the next 5 years, the promises and the commitment expressed by Modi and his entire team had ample clarity : to ensure maximum governance and minimum government interference. Their idea was to undo all the interferences by earlier governments for political gains and let them function independently. Increasingly, a lot of our public institutions were are stress at large and showed signs of fatigue and dependancy on the political class for their actions and considerations. The government vowed to change this status quo and let our instituions run on merit and capabilities, instead on the whims and fancies of their political superiors or their ideologies.

In just over a year since these concerns were intermittently put to rest, the government seems to have backed away from its promises in pursuing its ideologies that go well beyond the scope of the constitution and the principles that we pride ourselves on. The government that entered power with the hope that it would usher an era of governance that is seen as impartial and free of bias is now engaging in practices that lead us to believe that there is a systematic agenda to further there Hindutva ideologies in a discreet yet, organised manner. This is dangerous for the society at large as it has the power to influence large sections of the population in an undemocratic and uninformed manner.

Gajendra Chouhan’s appointment as the chairman of Film and Television Institute of India (‘FTII’) was one such instance. He is seen as a man who has Hindutva inclinations and is perceived as one who is very close to the BJP and the Sangh parivar. In a prestigious institute like the FTII that deals with freedom of speech and creative expression and which involves a medium that has a wider reach than most information mediums, this move has the evil power of suppressing speech and ideas that go against personal and political ideologies. Such a move has not only been vehemently opposed by prominent individuals in the film industry like Anupam Kher and Rishi Kapoor but also by students who feel an impartial and capable chairman is the need of the day and men like Chouhan have the capacity to dismiss voices that go against a particular mindset and ideology.

The FTII appointment would have been ignored if it was an isolated example of selection based on considerations other than merit and experience alone. In November the government appointed a Padma Bhushan awardee, Lokesh Chandra, aged 87 as the head of the Indian council of Cultural Relations (‘ICCR’). If the age wasn’t baffling enough, his comments reaffirmed fears that his loyalties towards Narendra Modi was a compelling enough reason for this selection. Post appointment, he referred to Modi as virtually an ‘incarnation of God’. Further, he was quoted wanting to organise Ramayana and Mahabharata-based programmes with the south-east Asian countries like Indonesia, Cambodia, Laos as they have living traditions drawn from these epics. If this was one of his many agendas as the head of ICCR, it would have been a non-issue but the fact that every statement from him speaks of a grand plan to implement an ‘unfinished’ ideology is a worrisome affair as this body routinely engages with the outside world and has the power to shape opinions about how the outside world thinks of India and its traditions.

The story doesn’t end here. The government appointed mr. Sudarshan Rao, an ex-RSS member as Bthe head of the the Indian Council of Historical Research (‘ICHR’). Mr. Rao has recommended 3 RSS historians as part of the committee. To make matters worse, the ICHR in January disbanded the advisory committee of its prestigious and well acclaimed journal that included eminent historians like Romila Thapar and Irfan Habib. Even its’ chief editor, Historian Sabyasachi Bhattacharya quit over his ‘un-approval’ of the direction in which the ICHR was heading.  In June, Gopinath Ravindran, member secretary of Indian Council of Historical Research resigned over his differences with Mr. Rao. As informed human beings, we can sense that something is systematically wrong if a string of reputed voices are raising the alarm bells in the same direction.

India’s educational institutions like the IIM have also been vocal about government interference. Their autonomy is what makes them exceptional as an institution and any attempt to take away this asset will only hamper the quality of the global renowned institutions.

The latest attempt to further Hindutva ambitions was visible in the recent story surrounding IIT Delhi. In an event organised by the professors to discuss Unnat Bharat Yojna, a project to provide technology designed especially for the rural areas, Baba Ramdev and a number of RSS members were invited as part of a well planned guest list. It would be silly to even comprehend that they would have any expertise to comment on areas like technology in rural areas. Even if rural expertise as a subject is involved, inviting right wing members and further, intending to collaborate with right wing agencies like Swami Sampoornanand and Swami Muktanand speaks of an underlining Hindutva ideology. We cannot afford to meddle with such institutions and corrupt them with over-reaching ideologies that go against the basic principles of democracy. These campuses are designed to foster creativity and unabashed flow of ideas without any hindrances and such attempts by the government are intended to stifle the thought process and encourage their line of thinking and action.

Amartya Sen, India’s noted economist and a Nobel Laureate brought the interference in Nalanda University by the government to the public domain. He was amongst the first to flag concerns about the government aggressively pursuing its Hindutva agenda. When informed and rational individuals like Sen speak up with facts and patterns, citizens should take note of this.

If we would like to believe that such actions are not reflective of the government’s ambitions to pursue Hindutva ideologies, the patterns and trends will state otherwise. Such appointments and interferences are not trivial issues by any means ; they have the power to influence and dictate the thought process of many around us. They shall look to encourage sections that support this ideology and will by all means, coercively or politically, look to suppress and stifle voices that have an opposing view. For a democracy, a healthy debate within the boundaries of democracy and the constitution is a healthy trend and such interferences and systematic intrusions  – both in our minds and our public bodies, is a serious threat to the fundamental principles of speech and expression. The ideology itself is not at the heart of our debate but its systematic installation in our institutions is a mater of serious concern and we should all rise up and flag these issues to ensure the ideals of our democracy are restored. At this rate, the thought process of our public bodies and the minds of those exposed to them shall be dictated by our political leadership. The institutions are at the heart of what we stand for, and compromising on its’ integrity is something that will have damaging consequences. We certainly don’t want that as an informed and educated nation. Hindutva ideologists will think otherwise.

Everything that is wrong with the #ALSIceBucketChallenge

Celebrities leading the wave

There has been a recent trend of celebrities all across the world jumping in to take the now extremely popular Ice bucket challenge and nominate others to take up the same.

The Ice bucket challenge was primarily done to spread awareness about the ALS disease and at the same time, raise charity to help the ones in need. As part of the challenge, one is either required to drench themselves in a bucket that is filled with ice  water or donate $100 towards the ALS cause and then go on to nominate 3 people to take up the challenge. This process of nomination creates a Domino effect and awareness was intended to spread like wildfire.

Awareness was the agenda

Also, the challenge had a simple objective : spreading awareness. It did all except spread awareness on the disease itself. Awareness doesn’t just amount to knowing the world ‘ALS’ and flaunting to the world that you have been a witness to one of the most viral #hashtags on the internet. If you are reading this post now, chances are that you have tumbled on this twitter or the youtube bandwagon some time or the other and seen Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerburg and the likes take this challenge up with all the courage. If I were to ask you the following questions would you be in a position to answer that?

1)The full form of ALS.

2) What causes this disease and how it can be cured?

3) How much of the population it actually affects and so on…

In a humble attempt to spread awareness on the disease, this is what Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis actually is :

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), often referred to as “Lou Gehrig’s Disease,” is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord. Motor neurons reach from the brain to the spinal cord and from the spinal cord to the muscles throughout the body. The progressive degeneration of the motor neurons in ALS eventually leads to their death. When the motor neurons die, the ability of the brain to initiate and control muscle movement is lost. With voluntary muscle action progressively affected, patients in the later stages of the disease may become totally paralyzed.

Also, it is important to note that:

While there is not a cure or treatment today that halts or reverses ALS, there is one FDA approved drug, riluzole, that modestly slows the progression of ALS as well as several other drugs in clinical trials that hold promise.

Source: ALS.Org

What was intriguing was also the realization that a majority of them could have refused to take up the challenge and pay up $100 towards the cause. This would have raised awareness as well as make a meaningful contribution towards the cause, instead of wasting a precious resource like water. Celebrities could have spoken a word or two on the subject itself and they would end up attracting the same amount of audience that had seen them taking up the challenge.

Don’t get me wrong. I myself had no clue until Wikipedia and the organization behind the cause, ALS.org came to my rescue. That information, by itself has helped me be more aware about ALS than the scores of videos circling the Internet.

It is disheartening to know that the main objective in the #ALSIceBucketChallenge has been unattended to. In the end, all of us will know that there was a #hashtag that was amongst the most popular in 2014 and that there were hundreds of celebrities who voluntarily roped in to spread the message. People like us took this challenge and nominated our set of friends and this resulted in a lot of ‘fun’. This cause has been reduced to a ‘challenge’ and a game of ‘fame’ and nothing else. This is all that we will remember and this shouldn’t make us proud by any means.

This also speaks about the society’s tendency to hog the limelight whenever given the opportunity. People across the world are happy to spend 5 minutes of their time to creating a video and nominating others but few would be willing to donate some amount of money to this cause. Individuals would rather be more inclined towards ‘refreshing’ their web pages to check the ‘views’ and the ‘likes’ that they would have received instead of actually spending all this time on researching on ALS disease. Stephen Hawking, for instance, suffers from ALS and a few minutes of research and debate would have revealed this. Few would even know this as a matter of fact.

ALS affects two in every 100,000 people. In comparison, 345 million people have no access to fresh drinking water in Africa only and 3.4 million people around the world annually die because of water related illnesses. 

Nearly 1.3 million people die annually in road accidents and the global loss to GDP is around $518b annually. Every second, the world loses 2 people to road accidents. By the time you are done reading this, more than 600 people across the world would have lost their lives. These numbers are equally ‘terrifying’ and deserve the same attention. Are we now in a state that we will ignore ’causes’ if they are not packaged or marketed like this one? Will causes be all about publicity and ‘self styled’ videos? Such mindsets will only undo all that the progress that we have made as a society. If we are Samaritans in the real sense, these numbers should inspire us to act with the same sense of ‘urgency’ that was seen in the recent Ice Bucket challenge.

For more awareness on ALS, please click on the links below. They will do a world of good to you and the people around and help you in understanding this disease better than what the ‘videos’ are currently capable of.

http://www.alsa.org/about-als/what-is-als.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amyotrophic_lateral_sclerosis

Facebook manipulating emotions is unacceptable

 

Facebook is facing a barrage of criticism over a recent disclosure that it secretly manipulated user feeds of nearly 700,000 people to study changes in their behavior. This study demonstrated that the content on news feeds directly affected their moods and emotions; positive information on their individual news feeds meant the users demonstrated positive emotions through updates,postings etc. and negative news feed data translated into users expressing negativity through their user accounts.

Please note that Facebook directly altered the feed of nearly 700,000 people. These users in turn, could have posted feeds as result of such manipulation which might have influenced the moods and emotions of many more people on their list. This domino effect means that a vast number of people were directly and indirectly manipulated to have their emotions altered.

This is a common practice, known as A/B testing that is increasingly used by corporations to conduct experiments that enable them to understand consumer behavior. Instead of rolling out an update for the entire set of users and risking a backlash, companies prefer to roll out an update to a controlled group of users to study their attitude towards the update. Such testing is common in the tech industry where slight mistakes could have disastrous consequences. Such form of analysis is primarily intended to understand human behavior which thus translates into better products and services for the end consumer.

But understanding consumer behavior and reactions is one thing, playing with emotions of ordinary people is sadistic by its very nature.

This Facebook experiment was different from a regular experiment. Emotions were manipulated and toyed around with. This is not just about understanding consumer behavior and our responses towards stuff around us. This experiment was designed to get deep into the human physche and alter the very core of our mood, for that day atleast. Some users could have been left completely dejected as a result of this information which therefore must have definitely played a role in all their activities during the course of the day. Others were led to artificially believe that the world was indeed a pleasant place when that shouldnt be the case if the news feeds merely reflected regular updates.

Such cases bring to the light the need of regulation regarding such hazardous experiments. The medical fraternity has rules for conducting experiments that respects privacy and is done only after obtaining prior consent. Some tech companies might have set up voluntary guidelines for such testing but I fear this is only the tip of the Iceberg and many companies continue to have veiled experiments like this. It is also not the first time that Facebook has been caught on the wrong foot. In 2010, Facebook was severely criticized for leaking out users’ identity when they ‘like’ a product or a service page even if they didnt intend to divulge all details in their personal profile. Privacy settings, when introduced, were deliberately designed to allow more sharing of personal information. If these things don’t unnerve you, Facebook’s policy once stated the following clause : “We may share your information with third parties, including responsible companies with which we have a relationship”. Although this has since been removed, this certainly cannot be a typo error!

The devil is in the design

Such systems cannot be counted out as mere flaws. These are systems designed to infringe one’s privacy, either by Facebook or by third parties or even users themselves. Take for instance the graph search feature that allows any outsider to view content relating to you. The privacy settings are just too complex to understand for a layman. (In fact, I doubt there is a way to effectively prevent your photos and other information from being viewed by outsiders using Graph Search) The emotional experiment was one of them and chances are Facebook has conducted tons of such experiments in the past which could be more disturbing than even this one.

Tip of the Iceberg

Practices like this set a bad precedent and are unacceptable in an era where there is a constant focus on the ideals of privacy. One simply cannot include users in experiments without their prior consent. They are grossly unethical and will only damage Facebook’s credibility in the long run. With such a massive user base, Facebook should avoid being in the limelight for the wrong users; such actions tend to trigger debates about abuse of market power and overreaches and they can take Facebook in the wrong direction.

Facebook also simply cannot run away by arguing that this is a part of the terms of service when users sign up. In fact, according to a recent Forbes report, the word ‘research’ was added four months after this experiment was conducted which leads us to believe that Facebook was in violation of their own ‘terms of service’ and continue to manipulate us with misleading information. Facebook’s acts demonstrate arrogance and its’ belief that they will walk away unharmed even with all the criticism around. Even an apology shouldn’t be enough. Users on facebook and critics understand that such studies further our understanding of human psychology but they cannot be at at the cost of privacy and manipulation. Facebook, in the interest of the users should clarify that no experiments will be henceforth conducted without consent. Further, to regain the lost image, it should make public all such cryptic experiments in the past. This way, people atleast know that Facebook has nothing to hide further. Facebook should be smart enough to know that people rarely read such terms of service in details before signing up with any service online as a matter of fact. If Facebook can hide behind its ‘updated’ terms of service, users will have no option but to be suspicious of Facebook at every step. This will only lead to reduced engagements with the brand or a possible withdrawal from such services. Either way, Facebook has tough questions to answer to all of us.