As the Quartz article from Jens's email discusses, the decision in Chile is
very unfortunate.[1] It's an example of when net neutrality — which is an
important principle for the free and open internet — is poorly implemented
to prevent free dissemination of knowledge. Although Wikipedia Zero is not
yet available in Chile, it is a country of interest for the program, so we
are thinking about what options are available in light of this decision.
That said, I would like to clarify a couple of points about the
implementation of Wikipedia Zero that were raised in this thread:
1. The newer Wikipedia Zero partnerships have provided the full Wikipedia
sites (m.wikipedia) free of data charges for some time now and we are
phasing out the reduced version (zero.wikipedia) from the older
partnerships.
2. While earlier Wikipedia Zero partnerships only zero-rated Wikipedia, we
are working on getting carriers to zero-rate all the Wikimedia projects.
3. We are also working on getting editing functions zero-rated, though
there are some technical hurdles for that right now. But, eventually,
Wikipedia Zero will not only make knowledge more accessible, but also
empower more people in the Global South to contribute to the projects.
4. Finally, WMF does *not* pay carriers to zero-rate Wikipedia under
Wikipedia Zero. Carriers zero-rate the sites because they want to make a
commitment to access to knowledge as a corporate social responsibility.[2]
I believe this question has already been answered in this thread since
Scott raised it earlier, but I just wanted to confirm that Wikipedia Zero
does not involve payments.
Hope this is helpful!
Best,
Yana
[1]
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Yana Welinder
Legal Counsel
Wikimedia Foundation
415.839.6885 ext. 6867
@yanatweets <https://twitter.com/yanatweets>
NOTICE: As an attorney for the Wikimedia Foundation, for legal/ethical
reasons I cannot give legal advice to, or serve as a lawyer for, community
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On Sat, May 31, 2014 at 5:52 AM, Jens Best <jens.best(a)wikimedia.de> wrote:
News from Chile
Chile’s Subsecretaria de Telecomunicaciones just decided that zero-rating
is a promotion tool which is against net neutrality. Therefore all
zero-rated-related marketing deals have to stop at the 1st of June.
According to a WMF-list in Chile no provider has been offering Wikipedia
Zero. Also I'm not sure if this dismissal reflects only on zero-rated
offers where payment of money is done by the content provider. So it still
needs to be checked how/if this decision is influencing our intent to
spread Wikipedia Zero.
All in all it shows that we have to improve our arguments in a broader
scale if we don't want to get caught by promoting Free Knowledge" but in
fact 'only' pushing the use of a reduced version of one (very well known
and superb) website which stand exemplary for this idea. We are caught in a
dilemma which imho only can be solved when reaching out to more partners
which stand for Free Knowledge and Free Education. Not sure how this could
work, but fortunately that never was a reason to stop.
News from Chile:
http://qz.com/215064/when-net-neutrality-backfires-chile-just-killed-free-a…
http://www.subtel.gob.cl/noticias/138-neutralidad-red/5311-ley-de-neutralid…
Overview Wikipedia Zero:
https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Mobile_partnerships
2014-05-30 6:59 GMT+02:00 rupert THURNER <rupert.thurner(a)gmail.com>om>:
participation is another aspect. wp zero allows
free reading. it does
not allow free participation. write emails, search for references,
download and adjust code. just as a side note, the oxford university
stated: until 2012, europe, i.e. 10% of the worlds population,
produced 50%+ of wikipedias geotagged contents [1].
imo it is not necessary to terminate wikipedia zero, it "just" needs
to be negotiated differently: if a telco wants to support our case,
give every person 200mb free internet access. unrestricted. or, if we
need to break some law like now or be in the grey area, we could
support additionally a viral model, like: if somebody is a wikipedia
contributor (as defined in election criteria, or like in ghana, 3
edits per week), give them 2 GB free internet traffic for free,
unrestricted.
if the WMF legal department would be able to negotiate _this_ e.g. in
nigeria or india, i would have _big_ respect for them, and with
pleasure say in future: you guys are worth every cent of the 5 million
we pay you a year.
[1]
http://geography.oii.ox.ac.uk/?page=the-geographically-uneven-coverage-of-w…
On Fri, May 30, 2014 at 12:43 AM, Jens Best <jens.best(a)wikimedia.de>
wrote:
"Giving access to educational
resources" isn't the same statement as
"zero-rating wikipedia" - If the mobile providers are willing to give
more
open educational ressources (incl. video) a
zero-rated access to the
people
THEN you can say "giving access to
educational ressources for free" -
right
> now it 'only' means "giving free access to wikipedia" (which is
great
and
> awesome for the wikipedia and the people).
>
> Let's not be naive on the point that mobile providers have different
> motivations for zero-rating services as the movement has for fighting
for
free
knowledge around the globe.
In the beginning it was mainly zero.wikipedia (text-only), now more and
more providers giving access to m.wikipedia (some-pictures), but where
are
their restrictions and what will these
restrictions mean for further
development on free knowledge and free education? - And above that what
will be our argument when other free knowledge/free education
organisations
> don't get zero-rated? When it becomes clear that the marketing scoop of
> giving "free wikipedia" wasn't at all meant as the start of giving
free
> access to free knowledge around the world?
>
> I'm all in to make all open knowledge and all open educational
ressources
> zero-rated available around the globe - but
I'm also quite sure that
this
> is not the deal the mobile providers are
looking forward to. I prefer
to
stay
critical and not giving up an important principle like net
neutrality
just because some mobile providers made a nice
marketing deal with us
which
seemed to serve our own goals in short-term, but
isn't reflected enough
on
its deeper implications on a free web and its
liberated use.
best regards
Jens Best
2014-05-29 23:31 GMT+02:00 Marc A. Pelletier <marc(a)uberbox.org>rg>:
> On 05/29/2014 05:24 PM, Jens Best wrote:
> > A noble cause
> > doesn't necessarily make breaking an important principle
unproblematic.
>>
>> In my opinion, if the definition of the principle makes the obviously
>> perverse conclusion that a beneficial thing like giving access to
>> educational resources for free to the world's least economically
>> fortunate people "a bad thing", then the definition is obviously
broken.
> It could be the time to start talking
> globally about an in-the-future exit strategy on the surely noble
> initiative e.g. when certain milestones are reached in participating
> countries/regions.
So you're telling me that there is a point where we can say "Oh, you
can't afford access? Too bad." and it's not a bad thing because some
/other/ metric has been reached?
-- Marc
--
Jens Best
Präsidium
Wikimedia Deutschland e.V.
web:
http://www.wikimedia.de
mail: jens.best <http://goog_17221883>@wikimedia.de
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