Why should the internet be free. A persuasive piece by Twiss.

What percentage of the world’s population do you think currently has access to internet? 75%, 50%. Answer is much lower than that at only 33%. That’s 5.3 BILLION people without access to the things we take for granted everyday. They have never read an E-mail or checked the news online, sometimes in countries where newspapers and TV are scarce they may not have access to the outside world. They don’t have access to the many jobs you can earn money off on the internet. This is something that has been around for 35 years and still some countries are completely unconnected.  

The internet is not free and for some people the price of internet is way too high. In America, the richest country in the world, 26 million people cannot afford internet. This means they have access to the internet but can’t afford it. The average price of internet in America is $63 New Zealand dollars a month and the average of price of internet here is even higher at $85 New Zealand dollars a month. There is no reason for these high prices, for example, South Korea the country that has the fastest internet in the world, only costs $36 New Zealand dollars a month. It’s not that expensive to run and provide internet as South Korea shows us, the high internet prices are because of greed.

But why do we need to give internet to those who don’t have it? Imagine if you didn’t have internet, no e-mails or YouTube, no googling things you don’t know, we would be set back years without the internet. Now put yourself in the shoes of those billions without the internet. Maybe it’s because these places don’t have stable enough internet to power a server but for the places with power the internet should be available and free.

If the internet was opened up to all the people without it then millions of jobs would be opened up, be it in the IT industry maintaining and upgrading internet servers or working online from home, earning an income and providing for their families.

In a perfect world the internet would be free and available for everyone, but the world is not perfect. Yet. Give it a few decades and maybe the world will be a better more internet filled world.