Only One Quarter of the Planet To Be Online By 2012 206
Stony Stevenson writes "Researchers are predicting that one quarter of the world's population will be connected to the internet within the next four years. According to the report by Jupiter Research, the total number of people online will climb to 1.8 billion by 2012, encompassing roughly 25 percent of the planet. The company sees the highest growth rates in areas such as China, Russia, India and Brazil. Overall, the number of users online is predicted to grow by 44 percent in the time period between 2007 and 2012." Is it just me or does that seem incredibly small?
It may be small... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:It may be small... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:It may be small... (Score:5, Interesting)
OK, I'm going to go completely outside the box for a moment and risk getting mocked for this, but what the hell...
What if we did get people without food and clean water online?
There is enough clean water for everyone. There is enough food for everyone. It isn't getting to the people that need it for various reasons; corruption, war, market failures. The common thread in these is a lack of correct information; corruption involves people deliberately misrepresenting information, war makes it dangerous to collect information, and market failures are normally trigged by bad information.
Areas where people starve are normally pretty opaque to information and that makes it harder to help people. If we were to give people in these areas better means of communication might it help allocate resources to solving the problems of food, water etc? It would be similar to how mobile phones were used to let the world know what was happening in Burma not long ago. Better information means better action.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:It may be small... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:It may be small... (Score:4, Insightful)
How do you keep the lines of communications open against the opposition of either the local warlord or whoever represents legitimate - centralized - authority? It can shorten your life to be in possession of a radio. The mesh network has the potential to expose everyone who is part of the mesh.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Or the local religious leaders come out with a statement that the food is either prepared with forbidden products(like pig), or contain stuff like birth control - which is why we STILL have polio around in the wild. The local religious leaders came out that the shots were really birth control, so nobody got them, so the disease is still around.
Re: (Score:2)
"Or people being afraid of food shipments (especially from the US) because they would use packaging designed to look exactly like unexploded bomblets."
Hold on, what? Are you asserting that the United States packages food aid to look like bomblets? I may be ignorant, but that seems far-fetched.
Re: (Score:2)
The US had some yellow bomblets that looked an awful lot like the yellow food packages being airdroped. I believe the food packages are now pink to differentiate them from the bombs.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
How do you propose we get Internet access to these people? We can't even get food or water to them. You listed corruption, war, and market failures as reasons for that but then you ignore them when you start talking about the Internet. Food and water don't need much infrastructure for transport, just people. Unfortunately, the Internet doesn't work like that.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not talking about laying down fibre optic broadband. I am talking about anything which can provide a means to get information out. In Burma, it was mobile phones.
I don't have an exact technical solution in mind, but it isn't outside the realms of possibility. The military set up very advanced communication networks swiftly in hostile situations. Why can't the same techniques be used in peacetime?
Yes, deploying such things would hit the same problems as deploying food and water - but the advantage be
Re:It may be small... (Score:4, Insightful)
You are right about the military being able to set up advanced communications in a war zone but I doubt those systems are meant to stay for very long. It is a noble goal, but there are goals that should be reached first. The Internet is a luxury, not a basic necessity. Once the basic necessities are taken care of in a place, only then can we consider helping them acquire luxuries.
Re: (Score:2)
You want to know how to help out the shitholes of the world? Drop in a few special ops teams and blow off a few skulls. Seriously. Because these places WILL NOT CHANGE without cutting out the cancer that is the thugocracy running the place. Current ruler dies? Nothing changes - a crony steps in. And on and on. You want to change and better the lives of the people? It'll take a few 12.7mm sniper rounds, not dollars and flour (or flowers).
Great theory. Too bad that such a policy has never really worked in reality. Time and again, when the US has intervened (either to prop up or take down) in another country's affairs, it has backfired and resulted in even worse outcomes.
Re: (Score:2)
You want to know how to help out the shitholes of the world? Drop in a few special ops teams and blow off a few skulls. Seriously. Because these places WILL NOT CHANGE without cutting out the cancer that is the thugocracy running the place.
Not that I necessarily disagree with the sentiment, but how does assassinating the top few tyrants really help? Someone a little lower will just step in, only with better protection.
Of course, we could step in and replace the "thugocracy" (great term, BTW) with our own puppet government. That's worked really well in Iraq so far, hasn't it?
I wish I had an answer that works, but really the only way that I can see that things actually change long-term is an all-out elimination of the bunch in power, coupled
Re: (Score:2)
How do you propose we get Internet access to these people? We can't even get food or water to them. You listed corruption, war, and market failures as reasons for that but then you ignore them when you start talking about the Internet. Food and water don't need much infrastructure for transport, just people. Unfortunately, the Internet doesn't work like that.
Right on. Considered the list of obstacles, the only solution can only be satellite-based. Not the kind with parabolas and POTS lines but more the satellite-telephone type. I'm not too aware of technologies in that domain but if you can transmit voice using a handset via satellite, then you can use that to dial some computer in the world and communicate like dial-up modems do. The cool thing about information is that you can use satellites (or even blimps, but these may be easier to gun down) to transmit i
Re: (Score:2)
The company I work for currently uses the geostationary satellite (with a paribolic dish) for data and get speeds of 128k/500k (but > 500ms latency). We sometimes have problems getting that dish alined properly, and as a result, the connection drops. We were looking into a backup system for when tha
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
It would be hard to keep the airdrop a secret from the corrupt government? There was a story recently about warlords intercepting the laptops and using them for their own purposes. How do you keep them from searching the villages for the laptops?
Re: (Score:2)
Simply put, you can't. Look, this sort of scheme isn't for places like Burma, or North Korea, or Zimbabwe. Yes, in those places people don't have basic rights of speech, assembly, or privacy, and so any sort of communication mechanism is only likely to put its possessor in greater danger. However, there are places where this might work. Countries that are nominally democracies, but still have significant problems with corruption because the villagers are completely cut off from the outside world could b
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
>> What if we did get people without food and clean water online?
C134n H20 4 ch34p!!! G3+ h3r w3t and h341thy!!! Fa5+ 5h1ppi4g, 10w pr1c3z!!!
Re: (Score:2)
Except... if you lack clean drinking water and basic necessities... you typically can't read or write. Though as far as connecting people in developing countries with those who can help them... try looking into various microfinance type website like kiva.org. They are already doing something like this.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
In much of the third world though, people ARE uneducated. Education often needs stability to happen, there is no real point in reading Shakespeare, or learning differential equations if your worried about genocide happening to you, or more worried about finding water.
Also malnutrition does lead to stupider people, especially when it hits children. Your brain needs nutrients to grow, take away those nutrients and it hinders development, which, for all intents and purposes, leads to stupidity.
Re: (Score:2)
There is enough clean water for everyone. There is enough food for everyone....
Re: (Score:2)
Every single person on the face of the earth could live on the land (not water) of Texas, and have less population density than New York Metro area.
The outflow of the Columbia River (between Oregon and Washington) would provide each person with 23 gallons of fresh water EACH day.
The farmland in the rest of the US and Canada - not including Texas (where we live), and not including any forests, parks, roads, cities, etc - would allow for 0.6 acres per person, enough to grow fo
Re: (Score:2)
Are you using the same internet I'm using?
More information != better information, especially as the traditional sources of propaganda are getting much better at using the internet.
This post started as a joke, but I think there's an essence of truth in it... Reminds me of a recent article regarding the fact that news reporting has become more homogenous as the internet becomes a larger channel for distribution of news.
But you're right that greater visibility of injus
Re: (Score:2)
A scholar using Wikipedia has great access to information, because they can get the overview from the wiki page then check out the sources. Having an abundance of information is only problematic for people who don't know how to process it, and we are talking about experts using the information gathered on the ground to plan efficient responses to humanitarian crises.
It isn't a perfect solution. Sure, someone will get a bullet through the head for owning a mobile phone - but I think overall that it will im
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I kind of like people... Being one and all.
I'm as misanthropic as the next basement dweller, but I have some issues with forced sterilization, and mass murder. I can understand (if not fully agree) with people who think that other species/ecosystems have as much right to exist as we do, but when we even even further decided that they have MORE rights, then I get a little confused. Aren't we just another species, and our cities/town/ghettos just another ecosystem?
The way I see it, the best way to improve
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I don't have the statistics, but you need to also consider what % of the population has access to reliable electricity. It's a little annoying to me that people are focused on getting people online when other, more basic services should be addressed first. Being online actually costs money.
Also, what % of the world's population WANTS to be online. Living in the US and having access to non-dialup since 1998 and dialup since 1994, I find it weird that my better half's brother in Germany (non city, not Wyoming
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Chances are there are already people who are living where the food and water are, and they will shoot you (or confine you to a refugee camp) if you try to move there and compete for those resources.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Further, those Palastinians who did stay behind, Israeli Palastinians, are forced to carry permission papers to even leave their homes, and must bear different license plates on their cars indicating them as a "danger to the state." There
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It may be small... (Score:5, Insightful)
Try moving to a more abundant farming area, whose inhabitants look upon you as an outsider who is muscling in on their scarce resources.
Try moving from a rural existence, where your food comes from your labours, to the city, where you must buy your food with money. (Where unskilled labour is dirt cheap.
Try getting a passport without spending a large amount of money.
Try getting a visa to Europe or US if you come from Africa.
Before you judge a man, walk a mile in his shoes.
Re:It may be small... (Score:5, Funny)
Interesting saying. I'd guess most of those people don't even have shoes.
Re: (Score:2)
So, these people live where is no food, no water, no medical treatment, and they are incapable of moving somewhere else. In which case, why do they breed, and subject their children to the same misery?
Re: (Score:2)
There are people just outside your building living in tents? I will presume that since you have the luxury of posting on /. you regularly give them a few packages of TP and bottles of clean water. I mean, I really hope so. I know you can't simply raise them up to your standard of living, but at least some of them wouldn't have to live completely like animals.
Re:It may be small... (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously! Doesn't anyone read the news? Most of the world's population lives in abject poverty compared to western standards. All you need to is see that pic of the world at night from space - lights visible in the US, Europe, Japan and a few scattered major cities - everything else is dark.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
http://williamwnekowicz.com/pictureoftheday/?p=40 [williamwnekowicz.com]
Those tarps are where people live. It's monsoon season in India.. they don't hold up very well in the rain.
Re:Not small at all (Score:3, Informative)
"IPv4 uses 32-bit (four-byte) addresses, which limits the address space to 4,294,967,296 (232) possible unique addresses. "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPv4 [wikipedia.org]
Thats alot of people using a system that never really intended to accommodate such a massive volume of users.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:It may be small... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
(Additional investments: Box (60 sheets) o' Kleenex: $2, Bottle (2oz) o' Neutrogena hand lotion: $4.)
They don't need bread (Score:2)
Give a man a fish and he'll eat for day, teach him how surf and he'll get two medium pizzas, a bottle of pepsi and two free side dishes for just $9.99*.
And there's always enough left for breakfast.
*chicken dippers $1.00 supplement
Re: (Score:2)
To me, 25% seems almost incredibly much. I'd have
Re: (Score:2)
Anyone who thinks these figures are small should take a look at the reported rates of telephone "penetration" by country as reported by the International Telecommunications Union [un.org].
In general there were well under 10 telephones (including both wireline and cellular) per 100 people in most African countries as of 2004. For some countries the figure is between zero and five per 100. In developed countries this figure is usually over 100.
The data for Internet usage per 100 population follows a similar pattern
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
We must not let there be an information gap!
</Strangelove>
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Hookers!
But seriously...I don't need this stuff, and I don't need you. I don't need anything except this ashtray.
And that's it and that's the only thing I need, is this. I don't need this or this. Just this ashtray. And this paddle game, the ashtray and the paddle game and that's all I need. And this remote control. The ashtray, the paddle game, a
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
But seriously...I don't need this stuff, and I don't need you. I don't need anything except this ashtray.
1.8 Billion with a B (Score:4, Insightful)
Seriously, it's just you.
Is it just me... (Score:5, Insightful)
... or do you not realize how poor most of the planet is?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I don't think you realize the true definition of poor.
No one is going to by an Eee on $3/day. No matter what the price.
Re:Eee etc... (Score:4, Informative)
Most people in industrialized nations has access to TV today
There, fixed it for you.
It is small, but... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
There is no middle ground. You will not see a day laborer hitting up a cafe to check his email. Just no.
Is it just me or does that seem incredibly small? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Is it just me or does that seem incredibly smal (Score:2)
That's what your MOM said.
Oh... wait...
Not small at all (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not bad at all considering. (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
25% of the Planet? (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
No, 75% of the Earth is covered by almost 100% water.
Thanks, I will be here all day :)
yes, it's small (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Look up logistic curve [wikipedia.org]. It's a lot easier to grow fast when you're small.
Welcome to the new millenium (Score:2)
It might interest you to learn that it's no longer the 1990s.
Internet usage has increased 290% [internetworldstats.com] in the last 8 years, or an average of less than 20% per year. If growth slowed from 100%/yr in the 1990s to 20%/yr in the 2000s, it should be no surprise that the next few years will see growth that's slower yet.
(This is, incidentally, a nice example of the folly of blindly extrapolating exponential growth rates; if the 2000s had seen the 100% growth r
IPv4 (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Not a fair normalization... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
There's also a significant portion of older people who will never be on the net regardless of availability or price, because it's just an uncomfortable idea for them. Although it starts getting hard to measure, a more useful figure would be how many people who WANT internet access have it.
I had a neighbor for example who died a little less than a year ago. He was 98 at the time he passed. Despite being a very interesting man to talk to, technology just wasn't his thing. He generally didn't even watch tel
And quite of a lot them... (Score:2)
Illiteracy (Score:4, Informative)
Not surprised. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
You have to wonder -- by the time the rest of the world catches up to where we are today, where will we be?
It's just you... (Score:5, Insightful)
Having lived in what is effectively a third world country, South African, for about 15 years, one thing is painfully obvious when compared with life in a first world country. The vast majority of people have little to no access to electricity, let alone the internet!
It's very hard to understand this unless you witness it first hand - it's all to easy to think "but surely everyone needs to be on the internet?"
The reality is for most of humanity, the struggle to put food on the plate and shelter themselves is the main driving force in their daily lives.
I'm therefore suprised at how many people are online, not how few - completely the opposite reaction to the parent.
Tool or toy. (Score:4, Informative)
Firstly you need to think of how many third world countries there are and also developed nations where there is a vast agricultural society where the internet is just an irrelevant "fancy" for city dwellers to keep themselves entertained. You and I might find the internet a necessary tool for our trades and daily lives but going back 20 or 30 years, could you see yourself becoming so dependent on such a device as a people? Instant information and communication have become woven into the very fabric of who we are but there are many more people out there that simply have no use for it. It steals idle time like heroin steals life. You only need to walk away from it for a few days, or hours in some cases, to feel its draw. Many that have fell into its grasp cannot free themselves, their very livelihood depends on it. For others, the majority it seems, it is simply a useless tool or senseless toy to occupy the minds of those who have access to it. To them it's as useful as a canoe is to a desert goat herder.
Perspective (Score:3, Funny)
It is just you. There are literally billions of people who have not heard of WoW, a MacBook, or your parents' basement. There IS a whole world out there, you know, in that room outside the server room, where the sky is sometimes blue and sometimes black with little white led lights, where the HVAC is on the blink half the time. You know that big room?
Legit users or just more spam ? (Score:2)
China, Russia, India and Brazil... is it a coincidence that those are the four main countries whose traffic I drop from my servers ? 99.44% of the traffic is spam, and the remainder is irrelevant to my business. If they love my snarky comments so much, they can use a proxy or VPN (yeah, right!)
Is Jupiter Research basically saying I need to unblock those folks ? Or are they really suggesting we'll have even more botnet slaves online by 2012 ?
Re: (Score:2)
"99.44% of the traffic is spam, and the remainder is irrelevant to my business."
then why do you even have an email address?
Re: (Score:2)
Let's just say that the US emits more spam total, and you don't know enough Indians to bring up the signal:noise ratio. If you're working somewhere like a university, you just cannot block email by country.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not sure I'd trust Spamhaus's spam statistics. They tend to be pretty hardcore about what they consider spam. They blocked Youtube, for example, simply because someone send out spam that advertised a video on Youtube.
Only 1.8 billion? (Score:3, Informative)
1.8 billion people online is fantastic. Sure we want more, but let's not forget that a whole lot of people!
1.8 billion people communicating outside there immediate sphere of influence. The lower the bar to knowledge, the better the global society will be.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
"We" is anyone who wants fewer wars, less poverty, and people to ahve a chance at improving their lives.
Yeah, there is some crap that comes along with it, but that's true of many great things.
I believe in freedom of speech, even if that does mean horrible things like the "Wheel of time" series will be created.
Zing!
It is a lot harder to get the people to rise up and be in your army if they related to people in other countries. Overall, the information provided to these people will help improve things.
Re: (Score:2)
So wait a minute - the US "invented" the internet. That doesn't seem to have reduced our propensity for war-mongering.
Re: (Score:2)
The Internet also allows you to operate places that concentrate a certain mindset and excludes others. It's easier to bring people together, certainly, but it's also just as easy to set up a completely polarized environment there.
Re: (Score:2)
I predict... (Score:4, Informative)
that in 2008 only 50% of the planet will have a telephone.
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/med_tel_sub-media-telephone-subscribers [nationmaster.com]
Incredible (Score:2)
Perspective (Score:2)
Considering the percentage that don't have access to clean drinking water..? Yeah, it's just you.
small? (Score:2)
> is it just me or does that seem incredibly small?
Possibly; you do seem incredibly small...
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Do you know what portion of the planet doesnt have clean running water? Or a reliable electricity supply? Any idea what portion of the planet exists on less than a dollar per day?
AC
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
You MUST live in poverty, to not be able to afford a "Y" or "O" key, or a comma key. Sucks to be you, perhaps we can get the UN to airdrop some keys to Anonymous Cowardisitan.
Re: (Score:2)