Facebook Launches Its internet.org App in Colombia, Brings eBooks With It
Internet.org, Facebook’s quixotic effort to solve a hardware issue with software, launched today in South America. Customers of Tigo telecom can now join Ghana in accessing free services via the Android app.
The app offers access to internet staples like Facebook and Accuweather as well as Colombian government services (health, education, finance, jobs,
etc), and it will also include access to the ebook subscription service 24Symbols.
This Madrid-based startup has a catalog of over 200,000 titles and supports 650,000 users around the world, and 24Symbols founder Justo Hidalgo is thrilled to report that it will now be making its service available for free via Internet.org. "We are excited about this challenge, and it allows us to fulfill a vocation that was at the same origin of our project: to increase the access to reading, and help create new generations of readers worldwide."
Internet.org seeks to bring the web to the billions globally who still lack access, and while I applaud the effort I think the real credit should go to whoever is funding the infrastructure and connectivity cost.
This strikes me as more of a hardware than software problem, after all.
image by laloking97
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[…] is styled as bringing the internet to the third world, as we saw when it launched in Columbia last month what this program really does is bring access to Facebook and a handful of other sites and services […]