Slashdot Mirror
Rolling Out Broadband Internet, On The Cheap
Mathamota writes "The goverment controlled telephone company in the city of Kolkata (Calcutta), India is providing a Internet access service called DIAS (Direct Internet Access System) which provides 24 hour connection at 128kbps (when the phone is being used, it drops to 64). However, the best part is that the cost of Plan I (which has a data transfer limit of 500 megs) is only Rs 825 ($ 16.50) per month, all inclusive.
The technology used in this stuff is quite interesting, and there is a whitepaper available at the site of the company which developed the system." At first glance, it sounds just like plain old ISDN; but after reading the white paper, it's a bit different. Cool idea.
The expansion of Internet access in any way is a good thing
Yes, it's always a good thing for american workers when 3rd world countries learn how to telecommute.
The government has a defect: it's potentially democratic. Corporations have no defect: they're pure tyrannies. -Chomsky
Either way, that's what I'd do on a busy day with a 56k dialup (downloading 24 hours straight).
Sounds like a pretty harsh limit, considering over here you could get an unlimited dialup account for about the same cost, and be able to pull off 30*500 = 15,000 MiB a month.
Oh well, I guess those guys are too busy taking over grunt level IP jobs to be leeching anyways.
begin rant
All you slashbots, stop saying MB (megabyte) when you mean MiB (mibibyte). Mega = 10^6 = 1,000,000, MiB = 2^20 = 1048576
It's needlessly confusing to overload an existing term when theres a perfectly good (and standard) term.
end rant
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Those from India subcontinent will know that considering the cost of living, cost of man-power (technical) and cost of running a business: this is not cheap at all. Even at this price, most middle class families with 2 kids in the school won't be able to afford this internet. Osho