Telkom eventually dropped the case (a year later and after SBC had sold its shares in Telkom), but the action goes a long way to show where AT&T's attitude to freedom of expression really lies.
Uhm... Yes it was. One of the conditions for the monopoly was that they connect the "previously disadvantaged". Telkom/AT&T reneged on this and paid an admission of guilt fine.
It's amazing how far behind the USA is when it comes to cellphones. I'm in South Africa right now and I still can't get over the fact that the iPhone doesn't have 3G, let alone HSDPA. Here, there are more private cellphone internet users than land line users. And yes, we've also had cellphone banking for years.
The problem with the laptop isn't the $100 hardware price tag, it's the $100+ per month internet access charges that these countries impose on their citizens.
Take a look at Kenya. It costs US$129.50 PER MONTH for a 128kbps ADSL connection. http://www.telkom.co.ke/AdslTarriffs.htm. This is by no means unusual for an African country.
As has been pointed out elsewhere on this page, $100 is a large amount of money for a poverty stricken third world inhabitant. Yet why should someone hand over that kind of money when access to the internet is so ridiculously over-priced that it renders the machine unconnectable?
Maybe no meltdown in Germany, but the next World Cup will be held in South Africa, which has an internet infrastructure that's at least 10 years out of date.
To give you an example of what we're dealing with here: In SA a 1024mbps ADSL line will cost you about $150 per month, and that's capped at 3 gigs of data transfer. It's also port shaped and the IP resets every 24 hours.
[shameless plug]Check out www.hellkom.co.za and www.mybroadband.co.za for more info[/shameless plug]
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Nope. I once ended up with a keyboard like that in my office. They're horribly, horribly real.
Anyone remember Liquid Motion, Microsoft's last attempt at a Flash killer? 1998 press release. History repeating indeed.
When Telkom SA were owned by SBC (Now AT&T, surprise surprise) they slapped one of their online critics (www.hellkom.co.za) with a 'hate speech' lawsuit worth (then) almost 1 million US dollars http://www.itweb.co.za/sections/internet/2004/0408111546.asp?S=Legal%20View&A=LEG&O=FRGN
Telkom eventually dropped the case (a year later and after SBC had sold its shares in Telkom), but the action goes a long way to show where AT&T's attitude to freedom of expression really lies.
Uhm... Yes it was. One of the conditions for the monopoly was that they connect the "previously disadvantaged". Telkom/AT&T reneged on this and paid an admission of guilt fine.
Except they never rolled out the infrastructure to those people. Telkom admitted guilt and paid a fine for failing to connect them.
It's amazing how far behind the USA is when it comes to cellphones. I'm in South Africa right now and I still can't get over the fact that the iPhone doesn't have 3G, let alone HSDPA. Here, there are more private cellphone internet users than land line users. And yes, we've also had cellphone banking for years.
Take a look at Kenya. It costs US$129.50 PER MONTH for a 128kbps ADSL connection. http://www.telkom.co.ke/AdslTarriffs.htm. This is by no means unusual for an African country.
As has been pointed out elsewhere on this page, $100 is a large amount of money for a poverty stricken third world inhabitant. Yet why should someone hand over that kind of money when access to the internet is so ridiculously over-priced that it renders the machine unconnectable?
To give you an example of what we're dealing with here: In SA a 1024mbps ADSL line will cost you about $150 per month, and that's capped at 3 gigs of data transfer. It's also port shaped and the IP resets every 24 hours.
[shameless plug]Check out www.hellkom.co.za and www.mybroadband.co.za for more info[/shameless plug]