Slashdot Mirror
Comparing Internet Cafe Rates Worldwide
tcd004 writes "I recently began compiling the hourly rates from Internet cafes around the world into a map. The result reveals wildly different prices, even in countries with similar economic conditions and technological development. This often puts access out of reach for large populations in developing countries who live on less than $1 per day. It seems government policies and telecom deregulation (in countries like Nigeria) are often the strongest forces determining a cafe's hourly rates. If you want to do some of your own rate hunting, take a look at sites like Cybercafes.com."
What's interesting is that internet cafes in a number of the countries with low rates (Pakistan $0.60, Ghana $0.60, Indonesia $0.66, and Turkey $0.50) use government subsidies to keep their rates down. Ghana, in particular, has done this as they believe that increased exposure to the outside world will help encourage its citizens to become literate.
I AM THE SON OF A WEALTHY INTERNET CAFE GENERAL...i have a vast fortune that needs to be transfered out of the country...
We can start compiling better (and statistically, better 'weighted') indicators of PPP than the incredibly successful (but somewhat outdated) Big Mac Index.
I can't believe South Korea was skipped in this survey. They have one of the highest rates of internet cafes of any country I've ever been too. And they're really cheap to boot.
Crappy cybercafe listing on Cybercafes.com. It still lists Cyber X in Minneapolis. That place has been out of business for many years.
The site doesn't even have a function to add or modify listings. All it has is a banner ad for cheese!
Globe199
Yes, I know that spammers use Internet cafes to do their dirty deeds, but the spam-filters should somehow have the ability to detect a genuine e-mail sent using the webmail service.
Prices at Internet cafés are perhaps more interesting for tourists than anyone else. Then again, isn't the point of being on holiday to get away from it all, including (and especially?) the computer?
People say I'm crazy, I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes...
I think those people have more serious issues than not being able to access the Internet. Sure, they cannot afford to view the internet, but the bigger question, is can they even afford to clothe themselves, eat, and have proper housing? When those three issues are resolved, then we should worry about the cost of internet cafes there.
~ kjrose
I love their sliding scale. When it's dead, you can get an hour for like 1 euro. If it's packed and super busy, it's 5-10 euro and hour.
"This is you left and that's your left. This is your right and that's your right. You're gonna die!
That's an odd graph. Australia's rates show up as $7.50US an hour, that's over $10 AUS an hour.
I've never seen internet cafe rates that high here, the most I've paid is $5AUS an hour, and that was in a music store that also provided free coffee.
1) In the short- and medium-term, the question is what kind of access middle-class and upper-class people have. There seems to be some obsession with getting illiterate farmers technology that the average person in wealthy countries doesn't have, but to my mind that's far less relevant than the overall level of computer use and access.
2) This analysis also ignores numbers. A single, dirt-cheap cyber-cafe provides far less access than 50 expensive, well-maintained ones, and it's the higher prices that allow greater numbers and decent tech and maintenance. Again, I suspect I'm going against the political grain of that site by saying so.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
At least in Bomba, where I lived till 2002, cyber cafes cost a lot less than the $1.35 claimed... Rs.60/hour. I think Rs.25-30 is more typical.
That said, maybe its different in smaller cities where cable/DSL isn't available, adn competition hasn't driven down ISP charges as much
In Brazil, at least where I live, its hard to find a cybercafe that costs more than $1/hour.
Over here in Oslo, I see lots of Internet cafés and they're almost always empty.
People say I'm crazy, I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes...
Who needs internet cafes? There are plenty of unsecured wireless access points.
Keep in mind that although they only make 1$/day, it probably costs a whole lot less to live in those countries, us americans have the highest cost of living in the world
The page linked to from "under $1 a day" does not carry information/statistics about specific countries, but provides only an overview by continent. I'm a little skeptical about the "Percentage of population living below $1.00" - according to the map, only 5 countries: Nicaragua, India, Namibia, Ghana and Kenya qualify as "dark red". I would suspect this is not the case - Pakistan and other fareastern countries for example should be in this range, rather than the green (developed) range.
And again, I'm not sure how useful the "under $1.00 per day" statistic is, because it most certainly does not take into consideration, the standard of living - a loaf of bread costs about $2.00 in the US and 25c in other countries I know.
Just my vulcan $0.02.
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
How many businesses would let me stay if I came in and started spraying skunk-juice around? That is exactly the effect that smokers have on the rest of us. Just stand with a group of smokers for a while and your clothes, hair and everything are reeking of smoke for the rest of the day.
You can smoke all you want... do it in a space suit so you don't stink up the place for the rest of us, mm kay?
$2.50/hr for China? Perhaps in hotels and other places that cater to businessmen or "rich" foreigners, but even in Beijing, in college areas, you can get online for 10 yuan (about $1.25)/hour at most. At some second-tier cities, the going rate is about 2 yuan (25 cents). You get exactly the same access -- the only difference is that you might be surrounded by smoking kids playing Counterstrike around you...
There's 10 types of people in this world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
And as for the relationship between price and government policy, I would be more interested to see what the relationship is between government policy in new areas like the Internet vs the government policy in general.
In Kazakstan, the capital had a couple of Cafes that went for $1 or 2 / hour. It made life much more bearable there when the only English is the occasional English language video on the TV.
Whre I live you can get Ar $1.5 per hour. And that's in the main city. Since exchange rate is Ar$3=U$S1 it's like 50 US cents per hour. The only way they could reach that cost is on certain cibercafes on remote tourist zones where they might cost that. I've only seen two and those where on places where only hicking and alpinist tourists go.
The overwhelming amount of population has U$S0.66 an hour internet in this country. So I might take a serious dubt about the veracity of those numbers.
Just looking at the numbers, the article seems to capture non-tourist prices. But it's important not to forget that prices are often not based on real cost, but on the customer's willingness to pay.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
I travel on a regular basis and have to work away from my hotel for very long (but sparse) hours. This leaves me much free time where I wish I could get to a net connection. The solution? Public Libraries. Almost every library in the country even remotely close to a decent sized population will have some sort of internet connection available to patrons, for *FREE* 90% of the time.
Just a quick response to many of the excellent points made in the comments so far:
1. "Hey, I was in X country and the price was cheaper/more expensive!"
Yes, prices vary dramatically across nearly every country. When we compiled this data we were seeking out numbers that best represented the most common price in a particular country. For instance, in Saudi Arabia, you can pay $15 U.S for access if you want, but you can also find places who offer it for $3. These numbers are in no way meant to accuraly represent every price of every internet cafe in every country.
2. What do the grey areas represent? Aren't there more countries with high poverty levels?
Grey countries were not included in this survey. Data may have existed for them, but this was originally published in print, and we had a limted amount of space. And yes, many, many other countries live on less than $1 per day. We simply picked a representative sampling.
3. Why do people who live on $1 per day need to worry about internet access?
Good question. First of all, don't literally think of "$1 per day" to mean just that. The point of this exercise was to show that Cafe prices don't often serve their local populations, due to the fact that they're too expensive. The $1 figure is simply an effective way to point out countries with large populations of people living in poverty.
Why do poor people need the internet? Well, often the internet is considered to be a great democratizing and equalizing force. The people who most need equalizing are people who live in poverty. If they can't afford to get on the internet, then how is it improving their lives? Maybe through indirect means?
In any case, our goal was simply to inspire people to ask questions like these. We seem to have been successful. Thanks for your comments!
Tcd004
Good lord, no wonder they're scamming. They're not trying to get rich, they just don't have any other way to afford Internet connectivity!
On the other hand, it does make me feel even better about baiting the scammers. Every minute wasted sending me email (even more when they send me silly pictures of themselves dumping water on their heads) is money that they've lost.
STOP MISUSING APOSTROPHES, YOU MORONS!!!
In related news, a study has shown that the high price of luxary cars puts them out of reach of large populations in developing countries.
Hell, internet cafe rates put internet access (through a cafe anyway) outside the reach of large populations of AMERICANS. Newsflash: Stuff isn't free, and poor people can't buy non-essential stuff.
Slashdot: The Obvious for Nerds. Stuff any idiot with a little bit of common sense already knows.
paintball
I looked at Ireland's entries on the world-wide map, and most of the prices seem to be quoted in Irish Pounds. Since Ireland's been using the euro exclusively for a year-and-a-half (I lose track, lving away from home), either (a) the info's out of date; (b) the contributers are using the pound symbol instead of the euro. Which is it?
The reasons for low prices, however maybe related to the fact that minors go to internet cafes a lot to play Counter Strike, GTA etc. Obviously this is because, in Turkey, many houses don't have computer. As the minors are the main customer group, and they cannot effort expensive prices, I think math is clear.
I should also mention that, my friend's internet cafe is always full during the summer. I don't know much about the school period though.
In Tashkent, Uzbekistan (right below Kazakstan) last December, I went into a cyber cafe that was $0.30/hour. I was impressed. But of course the average salary there is $50/month. Yes, per month. Average.
I've recently been to Chile and Russia and paid less than $1 an hour in each. Nowhere near the $3 listed. Where did these guys gather their information from, tourist hotels? No matter how poor the country, internet access can only get so cheap, you still need a computer which is likely imported. Elecronics always seem to be about the same price, no matter what country you're in.
I paid about 10 UK pounds (about $18 or something) for a week at Easy Internet Cafe in London a few years ago. No time limit other than that (they closed at 2AM).
They are one of the following:
A: Way too old. It hasn't cost that much on average for several years now.
B: Only sampled from some particular hotels etc, that aren't internet cafés as such.
C: Made up.
Matrix, a large internet café in Stockholm charges around $4/hour for non-members. They also have some packages where it becomes cheaper. Dragons Lair charges around $2/hour. Nexuz about 2-4, depending on time etc.
Same thing with other places around Sweden.
It seems government policies and telecom deregulation (in countries like Nigeria) are often the strongest forces determining a cafe's hourly rates.
Are we really sure we want any more Nigerians on the internet? Haven't they abused it enough?
But on a more serious note, back in '98, I helped open the first two internet cafes in Playa del Carmen, Mexico. Playa is a pretty big tourist destination these days. At the time, there was only one ISP in town (which I assisted at off an on as well). We started off sharing a 56k dial-up line with 8 computers at each cafe. When we first opened, we were charging a peso a minute, which is roughly $0.10/min. We were making a killing.
Well, word got out we were making bank and within 1 year of the first cafe opening, there were 26 of them in town. Then the price wars began and we eventually ended up at around 10 pesos/hr (about $1.00/hr).
The two owners of the first cafe split (because one was an alcoholic and he spent most of the company money on the most expensive booze he could find). That first cafe went out of business within a few months. Largely because of the alcoholic owner, partly because of the mice, scorpions, and other things that made it just a nasty place. But in fact, a lot of the cafes that appeared in that first year went out of business because of the price wars.
Our second cafe ended up surviving the war (and is still around today, visit Atomic Cafe on Calle 8 con Avenida 5), but largely because we made internet a secondary concern and concentrated on the bar business. There are still a couple of places that offer exclusively internet access and I have no idea how they survive. Most of the rest that survived ended up doing other things.
Anyway, that's my internet cafe story. Glad to be out of that business now. The early days were fun, though.
(It's spelled "segue", people. That said, you make a valid point -- either (Seg)way.)
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
I live in Mexico City. The site says the rate here in this country is $2.25. You can find this rate in the most exclusive cafes in the city; however there are places that go for $1.50 and even $1 in other areas.
In Xalapa, the capital of Veracruz, the hourly rate is about 50 cents of a dollar. There are even some places that charge by the minute, 12 cents of a peso for a minute (which amounts to about 63 cents of a dollar, for a whole hour).
So, is this chart showing the price for the most expensive rate found in the country, or for an average, or what?
Does anybody know if the rates shown for other countries are as inaccurate as the rate for Mexico?
Go hug some trees.
Economic growth is the only way to raise standards of living in developing countries -- or any country for that matter. The Solow Growth Model explains that this is a function of capital-labor ratio and population growth, but technological growth can impact this as well.
In order to have growth, access to the rest of the world is pretty much a prerequisite, as is some element of a knowledge economy. For these to occur, access to the Internet is essential the way that the telephone was 50 years ago.
So Internet access impacts food, clothing, and shelter. Western countries can give handouts and solve the problem for the time being, or we can help promote Internet access and solve the problem permanently.
Moreover, many people in the US and EU do not have enough food, clothing, or shelter. Does this mean that we should ignore science and technology until everybody does? No rational economist would argue this.
There is a good deal of research that shows that deregulation of telecoms leads to wider access at lower prices. (Examples can be found in Turkey, Argentina, and Ghana.) So the best thing that developing countries can do is liberalize their telecom infrastructure and stimulate investment in telecoms and IT. Does this preclude subsidies? Of course not. We subsidize in the US and it's a good thing. And it's a good thing in developing countries.
Not necessarily. I know where a lot of Internet cafés are located in Oslo, but I have no idea what they charge. If someone on one of the travel boards I'm on asked me for prices of Internet cafés in Oslo, I'd investigate for them. Other than that, I have no reason to know, and wouldn't be able to help someone who asked me on the street.
People say I'm crazy, I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes...
about $0.80/hr
Again, thanks for feedback and comments.
We collected prices by calling, visiting cafes, emailing, and via cafes' published rates on the internet.
There is no guarantee that all of our prices are perfect repesentations. Even sampling 20 or 30 cafes in a country that houses 20,000 is too limited of a sample to be called definitive.
In some cases, we may reevaluate our data if we can get solid evidence that our prices are wrong. Again, this is a piece meant to illustrate the divides between many countries and regions. Even since this map was originally published, prices have begun to drop in Nigeria thanks to better regulation.
Perhaps these numbers should be revised and revisited on a yearly basis.
Also, please do not consider this project to be a "Study". It is meant to illustrate a point, if loosely. but not to be a definitive-end-all-be-all study.
Thanks for everyone's feedback!
tcd004
The prices in Chile are nowhere near US$300 an hour.
In Santiago (the capital), internet access is around 400-600 pesos per hour. US$1 = CLP$650, so we are talking 60 - 90 US cents. I've also seen these rates on the beach side towns and in the south (on the Island of Chiloe, currently isolated from the mainland due to band weather, but still with reasonably priced internet).
In places like San Pedro de Atacama in the North and Puerto Natales in the South, both remote places heavily infested with gringo touriests, you might push $1000 an hour, so US$1.50 max.
Norman Cook's Ode to Sl
Now, not only are we exporting jobs, but we will export actual people as well as slashdotters look for a place to finally get a date!
For nearly every country we collected prices from at least 10 cafes. We eliminated the most expensive and least expensvie cafes, based on the assumption that these prices reflected tourist-type locations. (note that many "back-alley" or "grey market" cafes probably didn't make our study. These locations often have lower prices) At this point, we found it would be innacurate to take an average of the remaining prices. (the averages were too often different from the most common price, since even the prices left varied widely. So, we used the most common value or mode.
The $1 figure is from the United Nations Millenium Development Goals Indicators database.
In Cozumel, I was charged ~$6 hour on the beachfront street where all the fat American cruise ship passengers got drunk, and $1.50 an hour 6 blocks away where the wealthier locals shopped. The gradient was truly awe inspiring. One could escape 99% of the tourists by walking about 500 meters.
Not, mind you, that anything in Cozumel could be considered untouristy.
... grumble, grumble, grumble, mutter, mutter, Millenium... Hand... Shrimp, I tol' 'em, I tol' 'em.
I've used internet services in China, Vietnam and Russia and the rates shown on that map for those countries -- US$2.50 to US$3.00 -- bear no relationship to reality; they're pure nonsense.
Current rates in China are about RMB2/hour. That's US$0.25/hour, a tenth of what's shown. Maybe less at times -- I've paid as low as RMB1 -- and maybe a bit more, particularly for an LCD screen or such. But regardless of price, it's always broadband and always pretty quick.
That such a prestigious publication as Foreign Policy would host such a spurious study is dumbfounding.
Instead of posting excuses here, the author ought to be withdrawing the study and re-doing it properly. The results might surprise him.
We offer connectivity at over 100 locations throughout the Portland Oregon area for the amazing price of
$0
www.personaltelco.net
How do we do this? Its a little something called Community and it seems to be a far more powerfull force in this town then all the T-mobile run hotspots combined.
Welcome to Portland.
-tomhiggins
www.personaltelco.net
Poor little clams! Snap! Snap! Snap! Poor little clams! Snap! Snap! Snap! Poor little clams! Snap! Snap! Snap!
Here in Venezuela the rate is 0.60$ (without subsidies)
Gasoline costs 0.03$ per liter (gasoline is cheaper than coke and water).
A BigMac costs 2$ (too expensive for the crap you get).
A Whoper costs 3$ (this is a good meal).
A Grand Cherokee Limited 2004 costs NaN$ (30,000$ basic model, ouch!)
BTW, the minimum wage is 90$ a month, a graduated computer engineer (at least me!) makes 6,000$ a year.
There are some internet cafes in South Korea that charge 500W per hour. That comes out to $0.57 Canadian and $0.43 American, as of todays xe.com rates. Many other cafes charge up to 1000W per hour, but that's still pretty cheap compared to a few years ago back in parts of Victoria, BC, where you'd pay 9$ an hour and be glad for it. Some Koreans have brought the business model over to Canada and are giving the internet cafes a run for their money with the cheap service.
Downside: These are mostly for gaming, so a lot of the services that come in other internet cafes (like scanning) aren't always available. Don't know the rates or quality on printing, but I imagine they're probably a little cheaper than back home, IF the service is available.
Also, the machines are all in Korean, which isn't too much of a problem because Windows 98 is pretty brainless to use, until you want to try to hunt down programs in the menu hierarchy (the Run menu command recognizes things like Notepad fine, though). Also, trying to get help from the counter brings up the language barrier.
One of the nice things about the low rates is that some places let you bring a headset to the cafe, hook it up, and do long-distance phone calls over the internet. Stupid cheap.
Plus, 500W an hour means about 4000W a night, and if you can find a nice hidden place to nap you've got some of the cheapest overnight accomodations anywhere. (Haven't tried this out yet, though...)
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