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'Wikipedia Zero' is a zero-rating [1] scheme where many ISPs and network operators offered data access to certain Wikimedia sites (or just Wikipedia) at no mete

'Wikipedia Zero' is a zero-rating [1] scheme where many ISPs and network operators offered data access to certain Wikimedia sites (or just Wikipedia) at no metered-data cost to the line's subscriber. Zero-rating's relationship with the broader subject of net neutrality has been hotly debated, and some legislation considers it a violation of net neutrality, while others don't. Nonetheless, fierce backlash against Facebook's zero-rating scheme in India was contrasted with Wikipedia's zero-rating which was broadly popular, exposing a dilemma. By Wikimedia discontinuing this scheme, the situation moves towards resolution: no longer does it need to be debated whether Wikipedia's zero-rating is a net good, but Facebook's, although ostensibly also for public benefit, is something to be avoided. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-rating https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-rating

John_KZ 9y ago
Besides India, Zero-rating has recently began being abused by mobile providers in the EU as a workaround to net neutrality laws. Apparently the 2015 law left a gray area and many mobile data plans now include a number of zero-rated websites.
- jakecopp 9y ago
  This also happens in Australia.
  - opportune 9y ago
    To an extent, it does in the US as well (T-mobile zero-rates Netflix, Youtube, HBO, etc.)
    - eli 9y ago
      I don't think they offer those plans any more.
- dogma1138 9y ago
  It didn’t leave a gray area if you pay extra you can avoid data caps on specific services e.g Spotify I don’t see how this has an impact on net neutrality.
dingaling 9y ago
> Facebook's, although ostensibly also for public benefit, is something to be avoided. Without descending into hyperbloics: why? If people want to use Facebook then why shouldn't they have the choice of doing so without additional cost? Many mobile providers zero-rate music streaming such as Spotify. Is that bad too?
- BoorishBears 9y ago
  To blanket proponents of Net Neutrality, yes. The logic being, if you want to start a Spotify competitor, you’re now competing with a solution that has free data baked in. Even if your service is good, Spotify will be much cheaper. My position is a bit more nuanced than that but I’m weary of being blanket downvoted and derided for not just accepting net neutrality as our lord and savior so I’ll stop here...
  - andybak 9y ago
    I'm in the mood for some heresy after seeing the WSJ/Peter Thiel article killed just now. Please go on.
    - BoorishBears 9y ago
      Our comments are already all but removed from the conversation... But it's nothing new, my views are just centered around focusing on competition. I don't agree that bits are "just bits" anymore. If we all used internet to read HTML-only websites I'm sure ISPs could guarantee faster speeds and actually keep the guarantees for much less than they do now. Realistically it takes more infrastructure to provide certain types of content at scale and I respect the ISPs rights to reflect that in their pricing. People don't seem to get how Zero rating can benefits consumers without increasing the price of other data. They assume "If Spotify is free, they must be baking the cost into non-Spotify data". Which is not true. People just won't use data if most of their uses of data immediately blow up their data usage (remember back when Internet on phones was measured in KB? Some phones started coming out with J2ME apps for streaming video, but who would be foolhardy enough to use them when you were being charged several cents a minute?). Zero rating lets ISPs allow usages that would otherwise turn people away from data completely, while still charging from uses that are incidental. You'll be more likely to use your phone's data if you also have it on while in the car to stream music, the sum for the ISP is less money per MB on average, but more MBs in total. And of course we all act like not having blanket net neutrality laws prevents the FCC from acting in outlying cases. I'm all for targeted FCC intervention, we've seen it work in the past, I don't know why it'd stop working. The campaign for net neutrality has also become centered on half-truths and complete embellishments that take advantage of the average person's lack of technical knowledge which doesn't sit well with me. Technically I guess that's neither here nor there, but us "techies" only get the soapbox every once in a while, if we waste it on claiming false doomsdays like "You'll have to pay to watch porns and read Reddit!!!!!" and it doesn't come to fruition, next time something serious comes up the response will be "well last time nothing really happened did it?".
cornholio 9y ago
The Wikipedia trafic (mostly text and thumbnail images) is also becoming quickly negligible compared to, say, Facebook with autoplaying videos, Youtube or other streaming providers. They hint that the global penetration of Wikipedia in the rest of the world is less one of connectivity and more one of local politics and interest in permitting and encouraging such an open tool.
- katastic 9y ago
  It cost mere 2 million (of their huge budget) to serve ALL of the pages from Wikimedia Foundation for 2017. It can't cost "that much" for someone to download Wikipedia pages. And if so, you can still buy a Wikipedia snapshot CD/DVD. - But if Wikipedia is "too much" bandwidth (1) then what CAN you access on the internet? Why would you expect any utility from the internet at all, if a mostly text page is too much? - Unlike Wikipedia taking on the world itself, Wikipedia should be LOBBYING people with even more money to do it for them. You know... building internet infrastructures. Think how bad our internet would be today if in 2005 they said, "Let's work on minimizing the bandwidth usage instead of complaining that our ISPs need to get faster." It's like someone who wants to get out of poverty by spending less. Yeah, that's great. But you want an easier way to get out of poverty? Make more money. Trust me, I know. We should be elevating internet quality (and incomes) around the world, not minimizing usage for one of the already tiniest bandwidth websites on the planet. (1) BTW, there's also bandwidth reducing plugins for Chrome that have a 3rd-party convert them to black-and-white/low-res. [edit] There's even an official Google plugin! (If you're okay having them basically store the contents every site you visit...) https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/data-saver/pfmgfdlgomnbgkofeojodiodmgpgmkac?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/data-saver/pfmgfdl... I don't recall the 3rd party one I used but it definitely worked when I tested it out. It might be this one, Bandwidth Hero: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/bandwidth-hero-live-image/mmhippoadkhcflebgghophicgldbahdb?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/bandwidth-hero-liv... (Basically search "Bandwidth saver" in extensions.)
  - mixmastamyk 9y ago
    katastic, I see many of your comments are dead, and they don't look like low quality as far as I can tell. Best guess is that the are a bit unkind to popular tech companies. Might wanna mail hn support?

John_KZ 9y ago

Besides India, Zero-rating has recently began being abused by mobile providers in the EU as a workaround to net neutrality laws. Apparently the 2015 law left a gray area and many mobile data plans now include a number of zero-rated websites.

jakecopp 9y ago
This also happens in Australia.
- opportune 9y ago
  To an extent, it does in the US as well (T-mobile zero-rates Netflix, Youtube, HBO, etc.)
  - eli 9y ago
    I don't think they offer those plans any more.
dogma1138 9y ago
It didn’t leave a gray area if you pay extra you can avoid data caps on specific services e.g Spotify I don’t see how this has an impact on net neutrality.

dingaling 9y ago

> Facebook's, although ostensibly also for public benefit, is something to be avoided. Without descending into hyperbloics: why? If people want to use Facebook then why shouldn't they have the choice of doing so without additional cost? Many mobile providers zero-rate music streaming such as Spotify. Is that bad too?

BoorishBears 9y ago
To blanket proponents of Net Neutrality, yes. The logic being, if you want to start a Spotify competitor, you’re now competing with a solution that has free data baked in. Even if your service is good, Spotify will be much cheaper. My position is a bit more nuanced than that but I’m weary of being blanket downvoted and derided for not just accepting net neutrality as our lord and savior so I’ll stop here...
- andybak 9y ago
  I'm in the mood for some heresy after seeing the WSJ/Peter Thiel article killed just now. Please go on.
  - BoorishBears 9y ago
    Our comments are already all but removed from the conversation... But it's nothing new, my views are just centered around focusing on competition. I don't agree that bits are "just bits" anymore. If we all used internet to read HTML-only websites I'm sure ISPs could guarantee faster speeds and actually keep the guarantees for much less than they do now. Realistically it takes more infrastructure to provide certain types of content at scale and I respect the ISPs rights to reflect that in their pricing. People don't seem to get how Zero rating can benefits consumers without increasing the price of other data. They assume "If Spotify is free, they must be baking the cost into non-Spotify data". Which is not true. People just won't use data if most of their uses of data immediately blow up their data usage (remember back when Internet on phones was measured in KB? Some phones started coming out with J2ME apps for streaming video, but who would be foolhardy enough to use them when you were being charged several cents a minute?). Zero rating lets ISPs allow usages that would otherwise turn people away from data completely, while still charging from uses that are incidental. You'll be more likely to use your phone's data if you also have it on while in the car to stream music, the sum for the ISP is less money per MB on average, but more MBs in total. And of course we all act like not having blanket net neutrality laws prevents the FCC from acting in outlying cases. I'm all for targeted FCC intervention, we've seen it work in the past, I don't know why it'd stop working. The campaign for net neutrality has also become centered on half-truths and complete embellishments that take advantage of the average person's lack of technical knowledge which doesn't sit well with me. Technically I guess that's neither here nor there, but us "techies" only get the soapbox every once in a while, if we waste it on claiming false doomsdays like "You'll have to pay to watch porns and read Reddit!!!!!" and it doesn't come to fruition, next time something serious comes up the response will be "well last time nothing really happened did it?".

cornholio 9y ago

The Wikipedia trafic (mostly text and thumbnail images) is also becoming quickly negligible compared to, say, Facebook with autoplaying videos, Youtube or other streaming providers. They hint that the global penetration of Wikipedia in the rest of the world is less one of connectivity and more one of local politics and interest in permitting and encouraging such an open tool.

katastic 9y ago
It cost mere 2 million (of their huge budget) to serve ALL of the pages from Wikimedia Foundation for 2017. It can't cost "that much" for someone to download Wikipedia pages. And if so, you can still buy a Wikipedia snapshot CD/DVD. - But if Wikipedia is "too much" bandwidth (1) then what CAN you access on the internet? Why would you expect any utility from the internet at all, if a mostly text page is too much? - Unlike Wikipedia taking on the world itself, Wikipedia should be LOBBYING people with even more money to do it for them. You know... building internet infrastructures. Think how bad our internet would be today if in 2005 they said, "Let's work on minimizing the bandwidth usage instead of complaining that our ISPs need to get faster." It's like someone who wants to get out of poverty by spending less. Yeah, that's great. But you want an easier way to get out of poverty? Make more money. Trust me, I know. We should be elevating internet quality (and incomes) around the world, not minimizing usage for one of the already tiniest bandwidth websites on the planet. (1) BTW, there's also bandwidth reducing plugins for Chrome that have a 3rd-party convert them to black-and-white/low-res. [edit] There's even an official Google plugin! (If you're okay having them basically store the contents every site you visit...) https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/data-saver/pfmgfdlgomnbgkofeojodiodmgpgmkac?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/data-saver/pfmgfdl... I don't recall the 3rd party one I used but it definitely worked when I tested it out. It might be this one, Bandwidth Hero: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/bandwidth-hero-live-image/mmhippoadkhcflebgghophicgldbahdb?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/bandwidth-hero-liv... (Basically search "Bandwidth saver" in extensions.)
- mixmastamyk 9y ago
  katastic, I see many of your comments are dead, and they don't look like low quality as far as I can tell. Best guess is that the are a bit unkind to popular tech companies. Might wanna mail hn support?