Facebook ‘colonialism' row stokes distrust in Zuckerberg; BBC News, 2/11/16

Dave Lee, BBC News; Facebook ‘colonialism' row stokes distrust in Zuckerberg:

"The suggestion by Andreessen that India, with its history, should somehow be pro-colonialism was treated by many as absurd.

In centuries gone by, colonialism was about exploitation of resources. In the modern world, it's digital - moving in, setting up companies and building insurmountable user bases before any other company can.

That's arguably an extreme interpretation of the purpose of Free Basics - but it's the argument made by local businesses to India's telecoms regulator. An Indian social network wouldn't stand a chance against free Facebook, they said, and websites that are not part of the Free Basics scheme would lose out. The regulator agreed when it ruled in favour of net neutrality.

As did many Western onlookers. The Electronic Frontier Foundation, which campaigns for an open internet, said Facebook was doing what it could to open up the Free Basics scheme to local companies, the inherent flaw of the program was that Facebook remained the sole gatekeeper."