Subject: [gaia] Internet and Development: A Reality-Check

From: Arjuna Sathiaseelan <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 14 Oct 2016 23:41:10 +0100

"It is generally assumed that the Internet boosts development, especially
in countries like China, India or Brazil, and it is estimated that ICT
capital is already contributing on average 15% to the GDP growth in the
developing world. However, although evidence of the Internet’s inherent
power is growing, the assumption of the Internet being an engine for
development does not apply automatically. "

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/constance-bommelaer-de-leusse/internet-and-development-_1_b_12468308.html
-- 
Arjuna Sathiaseelan
Personal: http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~as2330/
N4D Lab: http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~as2330/n4d

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From: "El Khatib, Yehia (elkhatib)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 15 Oct 2016 08:56:13 +0000

Exactly our argument in this position piece: http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?doid=2793013.2793018

--
Dr. Yehia Elkhatib
School of Computing & Communications
Lancaster University, LA1 4WA, UK
y.elkhatib/then/add/lancaster.ac.uk
http://www.comp.lancs.ac.uk/~elkhatib

From: gaia <[email-masked]<mailto:[email-masked]>> on behalf of Arjuna Sathiaseelan <[email-masked]<mailto:[email-masked]>>
Date: Friday, 14 October 2016 23:41
To: gaia <[email-masked]<mailto:[email-masked]>>
Subject: [gaia] Internet and Development: A Reality-Check

"It is generally assumed that the Internet boosts development, especially in countries like China, India or Brazil, and it is estimated that ICT capital is already contributing on average 15% to the GDP growth in the developing world. However, although evidence of the Internet’s inherent power is growing, the assumption of the Internet being an engine for development does not apply automatically. "

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From: Leonardo Maccari <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 27 Oct 2016 17:29:48 +0200

On Fri, 2016-10-14 at 23:41 +0100, Arjuna Sathiaseelan wrote:
> "It is generally assumed that the Internet boosts development, especially in countries like China, India or Brazil, and it is estimated that ICT capital is already contributing on average 15% to the
> GDP growth in the developing world. However, although evidence of the Internet’s inherent power is growing, the assumption of the Internet being an engine for development does not apply
> automatically. "

Hi Arjuna,

thanks for this link. On this line of reasoning, I wonder if anyone
can point me to some evidence showing that upgrading a broadband connection 
from ADSL-like to fiber produces some socio-economic effects. 

One quote from a 2012 ITU study that attracted my attention is [1]:

"So far, research has proven that the move from dial-up to broadband 
(be it DSL or cable modem) has a positive impact on productivity. However, 
it is yet unclear whether there is a linear relationship between speeds and
economic impact. The question is: at what speed should broadband be offered
 in order to maximize economic impact? [...] There is no point in investing 
in 100 Mbit/s services if they don’t offer any socio-economic gains relative
to 10 Mbit/s services."

I wonder if from 2012 we had gathered enough data to show that a broadband
policy that pushes on 100Mbit/s (like the European one) is really useful.  

leonardo.

[1] https://www.itu.int/ITU-D/treg/broadband/ITU-BB-Reports_Impact-of-Broadband-on-the-Economy.pdf
> _______________________________________________
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> https://www.irtf.org/mailman/listinfo/gaia
-- 
Leonardo Maccari, Assistant Professor @DISI, University of Trento
Tel: +39 0461 285323, www.disi.unitn.it/~maccari, gpg ID: AABE2BD7

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From: Arjuna Sathiaseelan <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 27 Oct 2016 17:38:54 +0200

Hello Leonardo,
I am on the road doing some deployments in Cape Town so not able to check
properly but you might want to see a paper written by Elizabeth Belding,
David Johnson on their Zambia village network where they show some benefits
when their backhaul capacity got upgraded.

Regards

On 27 Oct 2016 16:29, "Leonardo Maccari" <[email-masked]> wrote:

> > "It is generally assumed that the Internet boosts development,
> especially in countries like China, India or Brazil, and it is estimated
> that ICT capital is already contributing on average 15% to the
> > GDP growth in the developing world. However, although evidence of the
> Internet’s inherent power is growing, the assumption of the Internet being
> an engine for development does not apply
> > automatically. "
>
> Hi Arjuna,
>
> > http://www.huffingtonpost.com/constance-bommelaer-de-leusse/
> internet-and-development-_1_b_12468308.html
> > --
> > Arjuna Sathiaseelan

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From: Arjuna Sathiaseelan <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 27 Oct 2016 18:29:03 +0200

This is the paper I was talking about: Mariya Zheleva, Paul Schmitt, Morgan
Vigil and Elizabeth M. Belding, "Internet Bandwidth Upgrade: Implications
on Performance and Usage in Rural Zambia
<http://people.cs.ucsb.edu/ebelding/sites/people/ebelding/files/publications/itid15.pdf>",
Information Technologies and International Development (ITID) Journal,
11(2), Summer 2015.

---

From: Leonardo Maccari <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 28 Oct 2016 11:22:47 +0200

On Thu, 2016-10-27 at 18:29 +0200, Arjuna Sathiaseelan wrote:
> This is the paper I was talking about: Mariya Zheleva, Paul Schmitt, Morgan Vigil and Elizabeth M. Belding, "Internet Bandwidth Upgrade: Implications on Performance and Usage in Rural Zambia",
> Information Technologies and International Development (ITID) Journal, 11(2), Summer 2015.
> 

Thanks Arjuna,

I checked the paper, it analyses upgrade up to 2Mbp/s from 256Kbp/s.
Their finding confirm that that step enables new applications (like
video) with various consequences. 

What I was wondering is what justifies the efforts to go from 
10Mbp/s to 100Mbp/s, as the digital agenda for Europe is trying
to do. 

l.

> On 27 October 2016 at 17:38, Arjuna Sathiaseelan <[email-masked]> wrote:
> > Hello Leonardo, 
> > I am on the road doing some deployments in Cape Town so not able to check properly but you might want to see a paper written by Elizabeth Belding, David Johnson on their Zambia village network
> > where they show some benefits when their backhaul capacity got upgraded.
> > Regards
> >