Facebook offers free data on mobile phones in India |Free-App Plan Gets Competition

As Facebook offers free data on mobile phones in India, a competing plan makes the same technology available to any Android app in 15 countries.

 Facebook offers free data on mobile phones in India |Free-App Plan Gets Competition
Facebook is confronting controversy in India over its Net.org app, which would use an idea called “zero rating” to convey individuals free access to Facebook and selected different websites, like Wikipedia, through one carrier

Currently a startup says it's a means to significantly expand—and democratize—this concept of free Internet usage.

The new system announced nowadays by Jana, a Boston startup, will create it potential for any app developer to underwrite a user’s cost of downloading and using an app. The finish users get a credit on their bills—and a bonus of extra airtime that can be used for any on-line activity.

Jana’s service, implemented through Jana’s Android app, called mCent, may have broad impact as a result of Jana will not serve as a gatekeeper or limit it to 1 carrier. “We have a tendency to aren't interested just in free Facebook and free Wikipedia, but free Net for everyone, so we tend to are giving folks the power to earn credit in their accounts to use it for anything,” says Nathan Eagle, founder and CEO of Jana.

Meanwhile, Facebook has revised its own set up. Facing criticism that the Web.org app violates the concept of net neutrality, founder Mark Zuckerberg said Monday that he was expanding the India set up thus that any developer can offer an app through Net.org if it meets sure pointers. About 1,000,000 Indians had e-mailed the Telecom Regulatory Authority asking that it not approve the arrange.

Jana features a distinctive base from that to offer its service. It has relationships with 237 mobile carriers. That is how it will place credits on customers’ accounts. “The reason why this hasn’t happened before is as a result of we have a tendency to spent the last eight years building infrastructure that connects to hundreds of mobile operators’ [billing systems],” Eagle says. “This lowers the barrier for app developers.”

Jana’s technology got its begin in 2006 as a means to reimburse health staff in remote locations in Kenya for the airtime they spent in sending health data to a government ministry on their mobile phones. It later expanded the concept with a service on basic feature phones that offered free airtime for users who stuffed out promoting surveys.

Last year Jana extended that idea additional with mCent. Released last year, it was initially engineered to compensate consumers for information usage related to downloading (however not using) apps from the likes of Twitter, Amazon, and China’s TenCent, among several different services. About 25 million folks have registered for the app, that is offered in fifteen countries together with India, Indonesia, Nigeria, and Brazil.

The new twist announced nowadays detects and reimburses actual app usage—creating a full zero-rating service.

If an app developer becomes a Jana client, that app gets presented through the mCent app and advertised on the users’ phone. Jana collects fees in a manner just like how ad networks conduct business. Essentially, Jana advertises a consumer’s app on users’ smartphones in proportion to how a lot of the app developer has paid—a version of an auction system.

Source:- TechnologyReview
Facebook offers free data on mobile phones in India |Free-App Plan Gets Competition  Facebook offers free data on mobile phones in India |Free-App Plan Gets Competition Reviewed by Newstechcafe on May 11, 2015 Rating: 5

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