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This is... Shockingly reasonable. Would be perfect if it included other essential services e.g. domains used for online banking.

meanwhile Czechia literally BANNED free Wi-Fi in restaurants and other establishments during COVID, so people will spend there less time, I understood the rationale if people already didn't have mobile data in phones anyway

other things Czech gov banned during COVID-19 was singing in public places, no kidding!

And I'm not even going to complain they banned sale of the toys, colored pencils and other items so people will spend less time in the shop, so me and kids could just look at the colored pencils behind the tape because we had to go to shop anyway.

Umm, was it more than an oppportunistic attack at net neurality?

Here in Spain a few years ago some ISP's just put a data cap about 2.7KBPS (2-3G?) and call it a day. Enough for text sites, messages and the like. But if you were smart (mosh, NNTP)... you could connect to some public Unix servers and fire up Lynx/Links at crazy speeds under a Tmux window and be able to read sites/blog posts and the like. And with edbrowse, even comment on some simple JS sites.

With some cachés set for my audio player I could even listen to some odd Avant Gardé radio streams -think Frank Zappa like- at http://dir.xiph.org with 16 KBPS quality in OPUS format. Not totally robotic, it sounded better than old MP3's at 32KBPS.

> of lets say 200-300 USD for a somehow solid phone

More like 30-50 USD, judging by the research I did in 5 minutes (or 20-30 USD if you agree to a used phone).

No, I understand that Americans love to pay several times more for their houses, healthcare, education, coffee and everything else simply on principle, pretending that there are no other options, but you can literally google the largest phone manufacturers in the world and look at the prices of their current starter models.

And yes, we are talking about full-fledged smartphones that are quite pleasant to use, with up-to-date hardware and the latest versions of the operating system. Not some outdated torture devices with zero reliability.

Phones can be had for a lot less than that - you can find decent enough used phones that will last a year or two for under $100, which is cheap enough that almost everyone can scrounge together the money for it.

In SF, I commonly see homeless people with cell phones

A weird part about the modern world is that a cell phone is incredibly cheap compared to shelter, food, or just about anything else. You’d be surprised how many homeless folks have phones.

TIL, it's not a perfect solution but given how rough telecoms are here it's at least something I guess.

I work with a US non-profit that has provided both free and very low cost Internet access over the last 4 years (fixed home wifi, no phone). We have primarily used 4G/5G, including private networks built and owned by the non-profit, public/private partnerships with cities that own a 4G network, and now primarily very low cost wifi hotspots serviced by a major carrier.

The federal plans still exist, and the wires are already there in most homes, so most providers offer a tiny plan to fit the subsidy.

Something being a right does not mean that it will be provided for you. It simply means the government will not infringe on that.

Ah, so it's like the right to own jewelry (historically, there have been places where only nobility could legal own and wear it): you have the right to buy them, no one would stop you or take them away from you, but you still need enough money to buy it.

I imagine the same applies to the rights to live, to have access to water, and to receive medicine help (which is IIRC is why the Soviets claimed they refused to sign the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: they argued for their version of the declaration that would actually bind the stated to make sure those goods/rights are actually universally provided; incidentally — and it's one of the examples they've actually used — that would mean that e.g. printing political leaflets for distribution, falling under free speech and political distribution, would also have to be paid for by someone. As you may imagine, most of the other countries weren't particularly fond of the idea that they'd end up themselves financing the printing and distribution of Communist propaganda).

You mean the USA had affordable broadband:

"The Affordable Connectivity Program stopped accepting new consumer applications and enrollments on February 7, 2024....On January 11, 2024, due to a lack of additional funding from Congress" [1]

I think SK did the right thing. Access to information is important even at 400kbps which is pretty darn fast considering some people grew up running 56kbps and never complained.

1. https://www.fcc.gov/affordable-connectivity-program

Imagine how wonderful it’d be if the US had fiber to the home that would trickle at 1-10mb/s even with no subscription- but you could subscribe with any provider for more.

Ah, the dream.

Kinda surprising so many in the thread have no clue the US has the lifeline program and there's a few providers that will sell 'free' basic lines. It even became a meme when Obama was president: https://www.wikihow.com/Get-an-Obama-Phone

> That's like saying that using tax dollars to pay for roads assumes that everyone has a car.

Well once the government subsidizes roads they proliferate it and becomes more difficult to exist without a car. Your example supports my argument.

>try using "Parkmobile" without a mobile phone.

I would never, ever try using "parkmobile"

> Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Science and ICT Bae Kyunghoon said the scheme is needed because citizens can’t do without access to online services

So indeed it actually is intended to make online services necessary.

Parkmobile lets you call their customer service number to pay for parking, so (assuming that process actually works) you would indeed need a mobile phone, but not a smartphone.