Mark Zuckerberg said today at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, that Internet.org, Facebook’s effort to subsidize Internet access in the developing world, has brought new people online and helped telecommunications operators pick up new data subscribers around the world. “It works,” Zuckerberg said.
Zuckerberg cautioned people not to focus too much on Facebook’s plan to deliver Internet connectivity via drones. Although that aspect has attracted a lot of attention, he said, the technology is “actually at the fringe of what we’re working on,” since most people live within range of more conventional infrastructure. Continue reading Zuckerberg: Internet Growth Means More than Drones→
The sound of a mobile phone is routine in much of the world. But it’s a recent arrival here in Talea de Castro, a mountain town in the southern state of Oaxaca, Mexico.
This radio report first aired on NPR’s Here and Now in partnership with IEEE Spectrum: [html] [mp3]. See also a related news story for The Economist’s Tech Quarterly: [html].
Engineers David Díaz and Nahielly Cervantes teach recyclers in Ixtlán de Juárez how to separate plastic for recycling into 3D printer filament.
Plastic bottles at the recycling center in Ixtlán de Juárez, Mexico. They could be milled, melted, and extruded to make filament for 3D printers.
Recyclers in Ixtlán de Juárez, Mexico, learn how to separate plastic bottles for recycling into much more valuable 3D printer filament.
Plans at the FabLab in Oaxaca, Mexico.
Plastic pellets that engineers at the FabLab in Oaxaca, Mexico, will melt and extrude into filament for 3D printers.
The engineers at the FabLab in Oaxaca, Mexico, use a toaster-oven to heat plastic pellets.
Engineer David Díaz adjusts the plastic extruder at the FabLab in Oaxaca, Mexico.
A 3D printer with 3D-printed plastic parts at the FabLab in Oaxaca, Mexico.
Engineer Matt Rogge demonstrates the 3D printer he built at the FabLab in Oaxaca, Mexico.
A busy street climbs a hill on the edge of Oaxaca de Juárez, the capital of the state of Oaxaca in southern Mexico. Up one flight of stairs in a fresh-painted white residential building you’ll find the FabLab community fabrication center and Oaxaca’s first locally-produced 3D printer and plastic extruder.
This radio report first aired on Deutsche Welle in English: [html] [mp3]. The photos here are mine and first published here.
Luís Euxebio Irías Calderón is the operator of a small hydroelectric power plant in the mountainous coffee country of northern Nicaragua, and he’s singing a song he wrote about turbines and transformers, to celebrate the arrival of electricity here in his remote corner of the country.
This radio report first aired on NPR’s Here and Now in partnership with IEEE Spectrum: [html] [mp3]. See the related magazine feature here: [html] [pdf].
