Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg at the company's Townhall Q&A at IIT
Delhi on Wednesday answered questions that were posted on his Facebook
profile ahead of the event, as well as pre-screened questions taken from
the students of the educational institution.
Zuckerberg's visit to
India comes at a time when the debate about net neutrality is already at
a high-point here, and Facebook has also been strongly advocating the
service in India, with print and television advertisements, and ads on
Facebook as well.
At the IIT Delhi Townhall Q&A, Zuckerberg
discussed several topics, from Internet.org (now rebranded as Free
Basics) and net neutrality, to why India is such an important market
for Facebook. He even discussed how Oculus Rift will be incorporated into social media.
"Internet.org is live in 24 countries around the
world, there are 15 million people who have access to the Internet now,
who wouldn't have had it otherwise... Internet growth rate is twice as
much with Internet.org. This is a program that's working around the
world, it works and it will connect more people."
Zuckerberg added
that Internet.org or Free Basics is aimed at "breaking down barriers to
availability, affordability, and awareness." Speaking further on
availability, he said Internet.org will be made more widely
available with solar-powered planes to beam down connectivity. Facebook
also plans to put satellites in space to provide Internet connectivity.
As
for affordability, he said Facebook has been working to make its apps
use less data, and now use one tenth the data they used to. Getting to
awareness, Zuckerberg added Free Basics allows people to access basic
utilities like education, job listings, basic communications, Wikipedia,
and tools. "We've found that half of the users who use Free Basics
become full paying customers," he said, detailing the benefits for
operators.
Answering a question on whether Internet.org supports net
neutrality without any filters, Zuckerberg said the company was looking
to build an open platform that any developer can build something for.
"One of the illusions of Internet.org is that it's a small set of
Internet services that people can use, that couldn't be further from the
truth. We can provide this Free Basics program, any developer that fits
that definition that is text or low bandwidth, or not cannibalising the
operator business."
"We are not being a filter to any of the
content there. This is an important topic, and we think that it's
important that we have regulations to prevent hurt people. If you're a
person trying to watch some videos on YouTube or Netflix, and an
operator wants to charge for that, that's bad. That's the type of thing
we should have regulations against."
Getting to why India is such
an important market for Facebook, Zuckerberg said, "If you have a
mission to connect every person in the world, you cannot do that without
connecting India. It is the largest communities we have across the
world. We take responsibility to serve our users in India."
"A
billion people do not have access to the Internet yet. It's really a
tool that provides vital infrastructure to our life. Health, education,
jobs. For every 10 people who get access to the Internet, one person
gets lifted out of poverty, and one gets a job... Connecting things in
India is one of the most important things we can do for the world.
Second biggest community in the world, we really want to get the next
billion people online," he said.
Speaking about Oculus Rift's social media implications, Zuckerberg said, "Dev kits are being shipped around the world, over 200,000 dev kits have been shipped... As time goes on, people get richer and richer communication mediums. We're really entering this golden age of internet video. The primary way where we'll share our experience and ideas online is through video. I don't think videos are end of the line. People want an ever richer medium, which is what virtual reality and augmented reality can do. [I'm] Expecting a daughter soon. Sharing that experience so that my family and friends can experience her first baby steps, is going to be really magical."
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