John, This seems like a tremendous amount of money to spend on connectivity, particularly when grandmas on Nigeria survive on a less than a dollar a day. So in other words on a very practical level you are dealing with the issues discussed here about ROI. But we are not talking about profitability in the purest sense here we are talking about the fact that you can employ, feed, clothe and nurse a lot of AIDS infected people back to health with that 1800 dollars you spend on the Internet (you said it was v-sat right?) every month.
The reality of these extremely high ICT costs causes many to think twice about the ICT sensation among aid and development gurus and to look critically at these programs. I am encouraged by discussions here and plan to look more deeply and carefully at the economic logic beyond ICT augmented development programs. I think this is particularly important because the potential of ICT to transform lives, if properly and effectively applied, is extremely high. I was wondering what other experiences there are in this group with relation to satellite in terms of costs, reliability and how they compare with the other forms of Internet connectivity. In an off list discussion with Lee Thorn and several others, we have begun to explore some of the issues associated with ICT and particularly in relation to the high cost of satellite. This led me to do research to actually explore the costs. One of the concepts that my org OVF is exploring is the idea of developing a satellite system that would share the cost of the satellite with surrounding communities through a wireless system using similar technology as developed by Tim Pozar for the BARWN project <http://www.barwn.org/>. The WISP concept is still not fully clear in my mind. Is it something like this? A BARWN like system would partially reduce the high cost of ICT in developing countries by reducing ISP distribution costs. To do this, a central hub community would be the location for a wholesale satellite connection. The wholesale connection, while expensive, would ensure a discount price for bandwidth, which would enable a sharing of the savings for surrounding communities through low cost, disruptive wireless systems such as BARWN. This would in turn lead to reduced ISP costs (thus this strategy scaled properly could be a major factor in reducing the digital divide). Rather than relying on a v-sat subcontractor on the ground that might engage in price gouging abuses, a group of communities could themselves maintain that control by developing a social enterprise to contract to provide those services to the member communities through one central satellite rather than a series of them, as is the case with v-sat (based on my very limited understanding). The service would operate from a centrally located community, which would function as a hub distributing reasonably priced ISP/ICT services to the surrounding communities. I was wondering what specifically you get from all that cost? - Possibly you have a high bandwidth capacity. - Remote location in Nigeria could account for the high fees. - V-sat packages may be more expensive than direct satellite and this may explain the cost differential. A brief and arbitrary online search of the satellite services lead to about a 200-500 dollar a month range (I assumed those quotes applied for Africa/west Africa region as they were listed in the coverage area). I assume that Satellite rates are significantly cheaper in affluent regions (hence a major reason for the digital divide) but to a lesser degree than the disparity between landline based services. In the US, Earthlink offers satellite ISP services for 80 dollars a month. SkyCrossing appears to be a direct satellite system. Basic packages start at speeds up to 512 kbps downstream and 128kbps upstream with an allotment of 2GB per month for $299 per month <www.skycrossing.net>, which actually seems pretty affordable. I however saw a quote for as low as $250 a month, and up front costs that total approx 6000 dollars. Residential service is based on a hybrid model integrating satellite broadband as a backbone and fixed wireless as the final mile. SkyCrossing residential service is priced at $49.99 per month with speeds up to 512 kbps downstream/144 kbps upstream http://www.alphastar.com/press_releases/press_rel_07_06_01.htm Jeff Buderer | [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sustainable Design/Project Development oneVillage Foundation USA | http://www.onevillagefoundation.org oneVillage.biz | www.onevillage.biz 102 Ballatore Ct. San Jose CA 95134 Cell 408.813.5135 Yahoo IM: jefbuder http://www.ryze.com/go/Jefbuder On 12/24/04, John Dada <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I think there are subsidies, and then there are 'subsidies'. There is no > way we can, as yet, sustain our monthly bandwidth subscription cost of > $1,800 without recourse to a subsidy from our own micro-finance service. > We have other pressing demands for this colossal (by our standards) > subscription fee, but we are yet to implement a technology that makes it > possible, for example, for me to partake in this discussion, from my > rural location in Nigeria. The bandwidth suppliers operate a cartel and > you cannot get much choice from them. We are exploring a WISP > alternative, and this is where we totally agree with Ken DiPietro's > observations. ------------ ***GKD is solely supported by EDC, a Non-Profit Organization*** To post a message, send it to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd Archives of previous GKD messages can be found at: <http://www.edc.org/GLG/gkd/>
