Zuckerberg Plans to Connect the World
Mark Zuckerberg, one of the first 5 co-founders and current CEO of Facebook, is undoubtedly one of the most successful man of his generation thus far. Though he only takes a one-dollar salary, his current wealth is estimated to be $31.5 billion. The best part is that he is only 30 years old. This American computer programmer and successful Internet entrepreneur already has a pretty boss resume, but he is looking to make it even better. Zuckerberg believes that connectivity to the World Wide Web is a human right. With the help of Facebook and some other major sponsors, Zuckerberg wants to connect the other two-thirds of the world that does not have Internet. Every detail about the project can be found on internet.org. Many believe this is just a huge Facebook marketing gimmick, and in some ways it might be, but others also believe that this initiative could completely change the world.
In today' s society, there are about 2.7 billion people that actually have access to the Internet. That is a little more than one-third of the world's population. Facebook alone connects more than 1.15 billion people to one another each month. Even though about 5 billion people have mobile phones, not everyone can afford data, and not everyone has access to it. They major issues they will face are technical, social, and economic. Zuckerberg says, "There is no guarantee that most people will ever have access to the internet. It is not going to
happen by itself. But I believe connectivity is a human right, and that if we work together we
can make it a reality."
So what's the big deal? Why does this matter so much? Not only does the Internet connect us to our friends, families, and communities, but it is also important to the global knowledge economy. The amount of things we can learn and share on the Internet is endless. Technology also account for about 25% of the GDP, and that is growing rapidly. Connecting everyone in the world is going to completely enable the knowledge economy, but their are gonna be some major obstacles.
Four major obstacles:
"First, most people in the world don’t have much disposable income to spend on data access."
"Second, the global infrastructure required to deliver the internet is extremely expensive and
costs tens of billions of dollars every year."
"Third, even when they can afford it, many people who have never experienced the internet
don’t know what a data plan is or why they’d want one."
"Fourth, a lot of people don’t have phones. Many are either very young or old, but many just
cannot afford one."
Here is the plan and the major steps Zuckerberg plans to take:
Here is a pdf to all of Zuckerbergs ideas and steps he will take to make this project come to life.
I hope this video inspires you.
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