"Free Basics by Facebook"- Interpretation by Technologies33

Facebook is vehemently advertising for Free Basics over the internet over the past few days. Also, we saw their one page advertisement in newspapers for 2 consecutive days.

What do they say : (The Gist) They will connect millions of people with a smartphone but no money to pay for data services with the internet. And increase connectivity giving a chance to people to access jobs and other services.

How does it sound !?

It sounds like a good idea, and Facebook is thinking so much about the poor people and how they can contribute to the society at large.

It did sound like a great idea to us as well when we read the advertisement by Facebook.

But I also read a few valid questions raised by the people who oppose it.

• If people have the money to buy a smartphone but no money to pay for data usage (though I don’t agree of such a condition), will they want to ever look beyond the free service by Facebook?

• How much of internet would they be able to access ? I mean sites like Facebook and the others which Facebook agree to give access to the people via their service?

• Who gives the right to Facebook to decide on the pattern in which people will start using internet specially as a first time user?

• If Facebook teams up with some big technology giants or big websites and reaches to people without them to have to pay for internet, then why would people want to pay for data usage and check content of small startups ? Who will be at loss in this case ?

• Would it not  be a complete ecosystem that Facebook would be operating eventually ? And accessing a bigger market (of paid and unpaid data usage users ) and just driving out any possible future competition ?

• Would it not be a loss of startup culture in any country affected by such free basics program ?

• Would any startup not have to accept the Supremeness of Facebook and comply to their terms and condition should they wish to reach a bigger market ?

• Would Facebook not be controlling and accessing the usage pattern of an all the more bigger number of internet users ?

• Does it not sound like a situation where they do not want to lose a big market like China to a regional Social Networking Player like Weibo and they do not want another Weibo to happen in a country like India ?

• Who is paying for the Data Usage in this Free Basics Program ? If it’s actually the Telecom Companies, like in this case its Reliance Gio then how would they benefit eventually?

• If it’s actually for the benefit of the people, can’t the telecom companies allow free internet access of a few MB(data) to users and let them choose how they wish to use it ?

• Not many of you would be aware but Facebook has already done beta testing of showing all possible service providers in your area using their website.

         Link : https://www.facebook.com/services

         This kind of a service when coupled with Free Basics would completely drive out   

         any possible competition for the market.

         Then is it not using Money Power to kill any possible innovation?

Technologies33 believes: It’s more of a vociferous attempt by Facebook to capture a huge market of users by giving them internet for free and kill any possible competition threat, which is why you would see it being promoted only on Facebook or on Reliance Gio Sites or some one pager ads in the newspaper.

They want the numbers to show TRAI of how much people support their Program. They have done all analysis to reach the right people who would not use a lot of brains and support them.

They have even advertised to support to people outside the concerned country as well. but why? They seem to need numbers by hook or by crook.

The people who would understand this strategy is us, who are regular users of internet and now its up to us to choose the future we want for us and the small technology companies like Technologies33.

Support Net Neutrality : Send in an Email on advisorfea1@trai.gov.in

Supporting Net Neutrality and Turn Down Free Basics of Facebook.

Save the Internet !

Let us know if you have any feedbacks for us.

Mobile Responsive Site or Mobile Application !?

Actually Both !

It would always be good to have both to cater to both kind of users, who search for mobile apps and the others who have been using or accessing your website and search for the same on mobiles/tablets too.

Incase you have to choose between the two for some reason then a few things should be taken into consideration.

If you already have a web presence, then you need to use some kind of analytic tools (maybe start with Google Analytics) and constantly monitor the number of returning users and new users, along with total website traffic.  If you have a good number of users then  a mobile responsive website as a first step is the only logical thing to do.

Likewise, if you have spend money on Online Advertising or SEO then a responsive site would be a good decision and mobile application can be taken up as a second thing.

However, if the plan is to launch a new system and you need to decide between a mobile application or a mobile responsive website then a lot would depend on what kind of system do you plan to have in place, If it sells something like a product or a service then a mobile app would be a better choice. However if its just an informational system then maybe some good blogging and a website can be a better step.

Though we always have good reasons to start with a web system in certain cases however the importance of mobile application can never be over looked and we have already mentioned quite a few things for the same in our earlier blog.

Hope you liked it.

Why businesses need a mobile Application

A question that all of us ask all the time is

A point of discussion doing the rounds has been if you need a mobile application or a web presence (a web portal or website) is sufficient !?

The answer is simple that mobile application is needed besides a web presence for all businesses and starters. But a very important question is that why has mobile presence become so important.

1. The first obvious reason is the huge number of mobile internet users across the globe which has fueled demand for mobile presence.

2. Recent studies have found that mobile internet users tend to search using keywords on Android PlayStore, Apple Store than on web browsers, hence mobile applications would always be needed.

3. With some users, we found that they end up using an application just once but the search was on app store than on a browser.

4. With Push Notifications, you are able to reach out to your users with anything important to you as a brand or anything important to your app users. Hence, a chance to bind with your consumers/users/audiences.

5. The importance of mobile applications can be gauged from the way e-commerce companies are pushing their users to download their apps and giving app only discounts. Global brands like amazon or regional players like Flipkart understand it. They understand the numbers that they would be able to increase their sales with a mobile application.

6. Mobile Applications are like Call to Action buttons for businesses looking to make online sales, without one the sales would be less than the competitors who have a mobile application.

7.  The chance to earn with huge downloads is comparatively more than unique visitors or traffic on your website as Google Admob pays more than Google Adword, also Advertising SDKs like Flurry and imob and chartboost place their ads strategically and you end up ads being clicked a lot of times and earning you some good money.

8. With Google being a dominant and the only player with a major market pie in search engines, website and web portal owners have to spend and pay a huge amount for SEO and takes a lot of time to time and effort and marketing and SEO to get user attention, but chances of success would be comparatively less than with mobile apps. App Store Optimization and is not shrewdly managed. It is very new and today all applications have a good and an equal chance of becoming a success.

9. You can also watch out for our next article on what could be the best ways to market and advertise your idea to increase you chances of a success mobile application.

Hope it helped. 

Proprietary Solution or Open Source !?

Proprietary Solution or Open Source is a question that has been long debated and still haunts a lot of companies and individuals. Its a difficult choice to make, specially to choose technology solution for the first time and update a legacy systems to an advanced automated system.

Just in case you wish to know what Proprietary and Open Source Solutions are:

Proprietary Solutions are the ones developed by one company and they sell these solutions to end users and charge for it and no other company has right to modify it like iOS(Apple) and Windows (Microsoft) and Photoshop (Adobe)

Open Source Solutions are the ones for which the original code is developed by one company and has given the right to other companies and individuals to modify and customize it like Android and Linux and Firefox

A lot of people think that Open Source is a better Solution as no single company has a monopoly to it but such is not the case. Both could be a good solution based on how you are placed.

For example: iOS and Android: I think between the two, if you have money and can shell out a few bucks on a good phone then iOS (Apple )- A proprietary Solution is the choice and if cost is a constraint then Android- Open Source is the one to go for.

The difference in the two's approach is that Apple charges you a one time bigger amount charge and give you a product and concentrate on coming up with better product and innovation while Android phones are not costly however make it mandatory for you to have a gmail account to be able to access their phones,  and they earn money by selling your information for various purposes. They track the way you use your phones and steal (if I may use that word) your personal information as all your phones usage is synced with their servers and they literally everything about you.

If you plan to update your legacy system then the choice of technology- open source or proprietary would make a difference between who do you plan to pay more - the company that is developing a tailor software for you, or  a renowned company which already has a product for companies like you and would customize their solution a bit to suit your needs.
But how does it make a difference to you ?
Well, a good and an important question.

Some companies have a unique work flow and process which is not generalized to other companies, and wish to retain the same after automation or technology integration.  and if you choose a Proprietary solution then that might be wise decision and the transition from being a legacy system to an advanced system would never be smooth and eventually the whole technology solution might fail and give you hard time. You might eventually scrap of this solution and go back to use the same old ways of working eventually costing you time and money.

Some companies have a generalized work flow or at least wish to standardize their processes while upgrading to an automated system, then customized solutions (or Open Source) would never address the details and the final developed system might not as thought of as a proprietary solution and also would be a costly affair.  And Though a lot of people who always debate that in the longer run a custom solution pays off as you wont have to pay any renewable fee like you would for a proprietary solution however practically you would have never really been able to achieve the results that you had set out for besides automating the system and which was to standardize your process to a more common one.

So never rush in making a choice and list out the priorities that you intend to achieve before choosing a solution. 

Any questions or queries would always be welcome.

  

App Says

App Say's is Technologies33's attempt to create a viral application. Though on the onset it looks to be a not so entertaining application but it needs to be given a chance and be used for sometime. 

On Android Store: https://goo.gl/YkdJfG

On Apple Store: https://goo.gl/V82uUX

There are a few things that you can try on App Says:

1. The irritating sound bites would make you smile and play the bites repeatedly and irritate others.  

2. Some new Emoticons that express you better when you act mischievous.

3. We always want to say certain things to people in our life without revealing our identity,  App Say's is the way to do it. If you understand of what I mean to say :P

4. Search for for others have said about you on the application by searching your name on the application. 

5. Technologies33's coders have created App Says with some default Adult jokes and crude humor that will increase your vocabulary of international abuse words. 

6. Add new words and share your knowledge and innovativeness of abuses with the world.

App Says, Fuck Off Now

Ill Effects of excessive information on Internet

Internet is serving us to be the biggest source of information, but the big question that we need to understand is that are we getting to know the facts and reality yet ?

The answer may not be so positive.

If you have any kind of perception about any news or anything about which you are searching on the internet, then the keywords chosen by you would be a reflection of the same and Google God never disappoints anyone.  Users would always find content to support their belief and perceptions in the form of some website, some rigged statistical numbers, some photoshopped images or some blogs with good SEO. The result if that we are fooled into a trap of a meticulous work of one of the technically prepared team.

So, if you are looking for some honest answers or opinions or facts, it will take some amount of research for you to understand and realize the reality.

There are a couple of things you can do:

- You need to check the URL of the source and check its page ranking on alexa.com
- You can also check the owners of the domain on whois.net
- You can browse through other content on the website and judge.
-  The supported language on the website would also be a good indication of the website's take on things.
- You can always drop in emails on contact us and check their replies.
- Checking multiple sites on Google and sometimes trying some websites on second and third search pages could also be a source of some important information that was marred from appearing to a major section of users.
- Google Search Algorithm "PageRank" is nicely manipulated by SEO experts to reap personal benefits for their systems.

Hope you liked our perception :)

Your feedbacks would always be appreciated. 

Best Approach to being Successful with your Dream Idea

While getting your dream application or web portal developed we tend to work on it to a time till its in a perfect    shape and has all the features that we had initially thought of and think of or plan during the course of   development and are ready to shell out extra money for it as well.

Eventually when you launch this application and then it does not receive the response that you had wished it did then most of the time we loose all interest in the idea and just go about doing what we were doing prior to working on the dream project. We loose all interest and passion.

Technologies33 thinks that your approach should be to have basic important requirements in place on the application/web portal and launch the application and based on the response received you can always plan to choose your next step, which could be either to invest more in the application, alter your idea or maybe work on a new one.

This way the possibility of getting successful eventually increases many folds.

What we have failed to realize is, while everyone wants to be as successful as Mark Zuckerberg and want to see our first idea be a Facebook, its not always possible and a lot depends on your luck as well as current situation of the market and acceptability of your idea by the market.

So, the best approach to getting your dream idea developed and for you to become successful do not wait to get all the features in the app but get a basic application in place and go live as soon as possible and then decide on the next step based on the feedbacks of the users.

Hope the article was of help.

Thank you