Web Analytics India Blog

The government announced a $2-billion public-private partnership to provide broadband and internet connectivity in India’s rural areas.

Union Minister of State for Communications and Information Technology Jyotiraditya Madhavrao Scindia, speaking at Global Telecom Summit here, said that $1.5 billion for the project would be generated from the private sector and the balance would be funded from government sources.

The minister also announced 112,000 broadband centres would be set up in rural areas across the country, within a year.

“We will also have a policy for Wi-Max so that connectivity for broadband, particularly for rural India, becomes easier and convenient. The entire countryside would be provided with this facility, largely under the public-private partnership,” Scindia disclosed.

The ministry of communication & IT is also expected to unfold its third generation of mobile phone standards and technology - 3G service - guidelines by June this year. The 3G services are expected to be rolled out by the end of current year, said the minister.

Web Innovation 2007 kicked off in Grand Ashok on an unusually cold and cloudy Tuesday Morning in Bangalore with traditional candle lighting ceremony by the sponsors.

We were there early as instructed for registration, to collect a cool bag and funky Web 2.0 badges.

Once we reached the conference hall, it was amazing to see so many people from all parts of India who flew down just for the conference.

Conference started with Kiruba Shankar (who was filling in for the MC) asking the panel of speakers…. “What the hell is Web 2.0?” which, for me, sounded more like “What is Life?”.

I guess lot of people in the audience wanted to know the answer.

What’s amazing is answer to the question is same as answering what is life. Everyone knows the answer but no one can explain it to you, you will have to understand it. However the speakers handled it pretty well by various and simple definition of Web 2.0.