Quick Follow-Up On Facebook, FreeBasics, And India

A few days ago, I wrote an opinion post on my blog, based on my point of view on what I’ve read and my experiences working in India, about the debate going on India currently between’s Facebook’s desire to push FreeBasics and the impassioned response (among many of the vocal majority) to oppose it. I knew when I was writing it and when I hit publish that many people wouldn’t like my POV, but my philosophy in writing publicly (for better or worse) is to think about my own POV and to share it without apologies, no matter the recourse.

The recourse in this case was a bit more than I had bargained for.

I received many Disqus comments and tweets lashing out at my POV. Some of them were too ad-hominem in nature to even entertain. Some of them had a strong but polite differing of opinion. I also received many private emails, which on one hand is great because I am grateful that people care to read what I write, but also a bit overwhelming as some of them were quite accusatory. That said, a few folks did write to me very thoughtfully and some engaged in conversation over email, which I greatly appreciate — I never write to prove that I’m right on a topic, I write to share the POV that’s inside my head, and I never claim for that POV to be correct.

In digesting all of the attacks and feedback, I wanted to clarify a bunch of things that are either related to me, to the original post, or to the issue in general — I realized in reading some of the comments that I likely didn’t do as careful a job in selecting or framing my language with disclaimers, and I underestimated (despite my local knowledge) how much of an emotional issue this is for many people.

So, in the spirit of continuous learning, of never assuming I’m always right, of being unafraid to clarify or admit an incorrect passage, and in the spirit of defending my own right to share a free POV (which folks can also choose not to read), I offer the following quick follow-up, in no particular order:

1/ I have spent real time working in India. With major universities. With the government. I have been all over the country. I may not be on the ground now or have been yesterday, but I got a lot of messages asserting I’ve never spent time there or know the country. I have also followed the issue at hand, despite people conflating their disagreement with me with evidence of my being misinformed.

2/ I do not work for Facebook. That was a comical assertion among a few. I am a Facebook fan, I own lots of Facebook stock (relative to my overall portfolio), I think it’s the best-run company in the world, and no matter how folks in India or other parts of the world get online, chances are good anyway a majority of them will end up on Facebook properties voluntarily.

3/ The focus of my argument was rural. I should’ve done a better job stating this upfront and multiple times. Yes, people will still disagree with that (which is fine). Naturally, city-dwellers in India of all socioeconomic levels will have access to new or used phones and be able to get online one way or another. I don’t have great confidence in the government’s ability to do the same for rural populations (which are over 600M+ in India), and cited some harsh historical facts to make the argument. Of course, people didn’t like those and saw them as patronizing — I love India and the people and would never say I am better than the country. No patronizing on my part or intent, and I used the term “License Raj” as a historical term applied to rural settings, but I think it was too hot-button to use at all. I should’ve stated the following, too: My preference, of course, would be for the country itself to bring these folks online, but I was just being honest in my POV that I don’t believe that will happen in a reasonable time frame.

4/ I did a poor job of not pointing out that I do personally believe that net neutrality is important. Of course, I do. Rather, I was making an argument out of being pragmatic, out of cutting a corner to accelerate access to wireless networks and the web. Of course, in a perfect world, people should be able to get online and not be restricted of where they surf or what apps they use (and pay for them in proper ways). I see the debate today as a way to kickstart (if even imperfectly) the onramp, and while the majority of responders (who disliked my post) disagreed, that was just my POV. Of course, in a perfect world, I would hope the Indian government and Indian telco’s got the rural folks online. That would be my hope, and again, for better or worse, my honest POV is one of deeper skepticism around that happening in a reasonable timeframe. Yes, I could be wrong, but that’s my POV. My hope wouldn’t be for Facebook or any other company to fill that void, but I do believe we will see more of this in other countries and, given Facebook’s execution prowess, I think they will succeed in cutting these types of deals in other places.

5/ Twitter isn’t a great Medium for conversation. It was much better to have emails sent to me calmly explaining what folks felt or read. I was able to digest and see where my language could’ve been misinterpreted. I appreciated the time those folks took to write to me privately. Thank you for that. On the flip, it was easy to just block and mute people who were attacking or conversing blindly on Twitter, but another lesson learned on the medium. I also got tons of messages of people I’ve never heard from in my life who said they were long-time readers of my blog, but only know felt compelled to reach out to me. I guess there’s no time like the current right now to introduce yourself.

Anyway, I learned a ton through the process, which is always my ultimate goal, and again, I am truly grateful for those few folks who wrote to me privately and shared their POV. Thank you.