Few months back, our COO Helani Galpaya was out in the field in Indonesia, doing qualitative interviews with BOP teleusers. She picked up an odd response pattern: negative answers to questions about Internet use that would lead us to conclude the respondent was not an Internet user but claims that they were using Facebook on the mobile. So it seemed that in their minds, the Internet did not exist; only Facebook. This is the gist of the argument in Wired:
Today, after just eight years in existence, Facebook now has more than 750 million users all by itself. At that astonishing rate of growth, the company is on track to accomplish much more than just a multibillion-dollar IPO. Facebook is on the cusp of becoming a medium unto itself—more akin to television as a whole than a single network, and more like the entire web than just one online destination. The evidence for that transformation goes well beyond the sheer number of users. Many businesses now bypass the traditional web altogether, limiting their online presence to Facebook. Already the platform has spawned one billion-dollar company (the social gaming giant Zynga) and swallowed another (the photo network Instagram). The average time people spend on the site has increased from four and a half hours per month in 2009 to nearly seven hours—more than twice that of any major web competitor.
2 Comments
Lakshaman Bandaranayake
I am not surprised if you find similar responses from youngsters for lower middle class families. They use second hand 3G handsets to watch Youtube videos and visit FB. Given there is limited local language content it is surprising their internet usage is restricted to YT and FB.
Nirmali
That’s quite interesting. This finding is an example of how important it is that survey questions are formulated and structured in such a way to best aids respondents’ understanding of it. E.g. questions about specific uses of services that require Internet connectivity (such as Facebook, etc) may be a more accurate gauge of internet use (although the finding that respondents are not aware of the term “Internet” is useful in itself as well).
Government of Sri Lanka’s new Bill on ‘Online safety’ – comparison with Singapore
A new Draft Bill on ‘Online safety’ was recently published in the Gazette of 15th September (issued on 19th September). As stated, the objectives of the Bill are to ‘to establish an online Safety Commission; to make provisions to prohibit online communication of certain statements of fact in Sri Lanka; prevent the use of online accounts and inauthentic online accounts for prohibited purposes; make provisions to identify and declare online locations used for prohibited purposes in Sri Lanka; and to suppress the financing and other support of communication of false statements of fact.
How to effectively address problems posed by harmful user-generated content (and why Sri Lanka’s Online Safety Bill must be withdrawn)
"Safeguarding freedom of speech and expression is so important that it is constitutionally protected in most civilised countries, as it is in Sri Lanka. Legislators seeking to address the new problems posed by rapid and articulated dissemination of user generated content must first decide what the priority is.
LIRNEasia-South Centre Expert forum: Policy Options for Digital Taxation in South and Southeast Asia
LIRNEasia together with the South Centre hosted an expert forum on Policy Options for Digital Taxation in South and Southeast Asia on 19 September 2023. The event was a closed-door event, attended by over 110 tax officials, with participants registered from Global South 40 countries.
Links
User Login
Themes
Social
Twitter
Facebook
RSS Feed
Contact
12, Balcombe Place, Colombo 08
Sri Lanka
+94 (0)11 267 1160
+94 (0)11 267 5212
info [at] lirneasia [dot] net
Copyright © 2023 LIRNEasia
a regional ICT policy and regulation think tank active across the Asia Pacific