02.22.06
Sri Lanka ……… On Line
Well it’s nice to see the rapid rise in internet traffic on the island. Everywhere you go you see internet call centers and people talking about online this and that. I presume that eventually the popularity of the internet is going to catch up with our tiny island. Why has it taken longer in our country compared to other places ? We need to identify what Sri Lanka needs to get connected and the milestones that need to be achieved to reach connectivity. A lot of people in Sri Lanka would benefit from an email address … what would make the general population want to have email? Mobile phones have rapidly caught up and cost much more. Ease of access and instant connectivity make the mobile phone a better choice. Our present commercial setup and infrastructure has promoted the development of mobile telecommunication faster than any other medium. Your thoughts?
ICT for Peacebuilding » Blog Archive » Mobile phones for greater access : But where is the content for peacebuilding? said,
May 16, 2006 at 11:01 am
[...] Virtual Island has two ideas related to the use of mobiles in Sri Lanka. In the first, it is stated: We need to identify what Sri Lanka needs to get connected and the milestones that need to be achieved to reach connectivity. A lot of people in Sri Lanka would benefit from an email address. [...]
Fashion Guru said,
August 19, 2006 at 2:28 am
i never thought sri lanka will not be connected.. you guys have the best batsman in the world but no internet.humm.. i guess you have an opportubity to start a website / email something which would go down in srilankan history
Nirmal said,
March 22, 2007 at 10:45 am
Sri Lanka is on-line, yes, but in line for a major disaster as well. The Stupid government does not do anything to bolster the online economy of this country. It’s almost on par with a less-than-developing country, say, like Zimbabwe, for example, where government regulations don’t allow for anything to go through. The only things that we can be proud of in this country are its cricketers and the history. Nothing is worth anything anymore. The PayPal argument found in another blog in this site is the prime example. I think the government is looking upto the sky for some aliens to come and give them foreign currency. Their argument is that we lose foreign currency when online payments are done, so they don’t want to make it easier to pay for anything online. What they don’t know is that the coin has two sides. We, the people in this country, are intelligent and willing and able to make millions (I am talking Benjamins, greenback, the United States Dollar, not Sri Lankan Rupees) online (as a community), only if there is the possibility of legally doing so.
Buying something online is a major hassle over here too. Whatever site I went to to buy something, I was told that they don’t deliver to Sri Lanka. Sometimes they deliver to Maldives, through Sri Lanka, but not Sri Lanka (please bear in mind that maldives is made up of hundreds if not thousands of islands, and transport is a bit more difficult than Sri Lanka, ONE island)
Unless the business community or the ICT community (of whom both are being very very lackadaisical about these issues, understandably so, as their views are never heard let alone heeded before anything is done) does something radical (stop paying their taxes if the government doesn’t change their stupid laws or something else that extreme), the country will never stop going downhill.
Of course, every Sri Lankan who can make a difference in this country are either abroad or are planning to go there. Who can blame them?