My favorite definition of Internet is from Jim Cowie: “The Internet is a robust virtual infrastructure comprised of tens of thousands of communicating enterprises, each seeking to maximize profit according to local rules and business conditions.” And the Data Centers function as the factories-cum-warehouses of Internet. Thousands of servers and routers being stacked across the vast space emit enormous heat in the air. That’s why highly sophisticated air cooling systems are installed to maintain proper temperature and Internet. Any glitch in the power supply system results disastrous consequences.
We have isolated 3 stories which came out of our Myanmar teleuse baseline survey findings which we thought should be placed in the spotlight in the form of press releases. And they are as follows; Fewer women own phones compared to men. But due to shared use, the usage of phones is not very different between men and women. 99% of Ward/Village Leaders carry Mobile Phones. Only 89.
Last week I was told that the authorities/companies in Gujarat had succeeded in shutting down Internet without shutting down voice service. This was thought to be some kind of technical achievement. Now it’s on the other end of India. With the death of 1 more person, the death toll in Churachandpur district during the current violence has increased to 8. Curfew is still on with heavily armed state and central forces personnel patrolling the streets.
Two members of CPRsouth, Ibrahim Kholiul Rohman and Hasib Ahsan Nadeem, have collaborated on an evidence-based op-ed published in Indonesia’s leading English daily. I am very pleased about this. This kind of decentralized initiative is what we sought to foster through CPRsouth. But decentralized initiative also means that the policy recommendations may not be in line with what LIRNEasia would say, based on its research. Here is one such divergence.
Luckily, the unlimited/”all-you-can-eat” culture was not part of the Internet landscape in Asia. Even in its birthplace, it has been in decline, except in the imaginations of the passionate and uninformed. Here is a piece that illustrates the retreat from unlimited. T-Mobile also practices what is called network deprioritization. In areas where networks are congested, T-Mobile will look for the highest data consumers — those who have surpassed 21 gigabytes of data — and give priority in providing higher speeds to those who have consumed less data.
When the paper by Shazna Zuhyle and Grace Mirandilla was presented at CPRsouth 10 in Taipei a few days back the discussant, Reg Coutts from Australia, asked why the paper supported action by the regulatory agency as a remedy for the manifest problems of quality in the Philippines market. My answer, on behalf of Shazna and Grace, was that regulatory action was an interim solution until the international backhaul problems were resolved. It was incomplete. I am happy that Grace has filled he gap in my answer. Another underlying problem was the duopoly in the access market.