Eutrusca
06-01-2006, 15:09
COMMENTARY: The cat's out of the bag now! Free the Internet and help guarantee freedom for the Iraqi people? Verrry interesting! :)
Iraqis making connection
to the outside world online (http://www.military.com/earlybrief/0,,,00.html)
By Zaid Sabah, USA TODAY
BAGHDAD — Mohammed Rahi has an addiction that's been growing in Iraq since soon after the U.S. invasion: the Internet.
"I spend six hours on the Net every two days," says Rahi, 25, at one of 20 personal computers in the Center MBC Internet Café. The addiction, as he calls it, costs him about $70 a month, a hefty sum in a country where most government salaries are in the range of $200 to $300 a month.
Not only can he explore a world of websites not accessible during Saddam Hussein's era, but "I use the Internet to download the software for my job," selling and servicing mobile phones and other electronics, he says.
Internet service has been one of the most dramatic changes in Iraq since 2003. Like cellphone service, it has expanded sharply.
Mohammed Rafiq, director of Internet services for Iraq's Ministry of Communication, says service was tightly controlled under Saddam.
In 2003, there were only about 10,000 users in a country of 26 million people. Content was filtered and sites offering free e-mail were blocked, forcing people to use the government-monitored e-mail.
Today, the state company has 200,000 subscribers on dial-up, for which it has a monopoly. And it increasingly offers services to private Internet cafes, universities and other public buildings. New technologies are arriving rapidly, include DSL broadband and wireless broadband for government offices around the country.
Because many of Iraq's phone lines are in poor condition and connections slow, Internet cafes are often easier than logging on from home. Monim Ibrahim, 33, the Center MBC Internet Café owner, says people in his neighborhood in east Baghdad barely knew what the Internet was three years ago.
So he and his employees started giving customers lessons on using the computer and the Internet. "It was really difficult, but later they start learning and the number of users grew."
Users on the cafe's computers pay $1.35 an hour, he says. Recently, he began offering wireless service for $50 per month, and it's on 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Among the most popular services is chat, which Iraqis use to keep in touch with friends and family outside the country. One of the downsides of Internet freedom has been customers who access pornographic sites, Ibrahim says. He says he hopes that the government Internet company will come to his neighborhood with cheap high-speed service that blocks the pornographic sites.
Users say they are just happy to have Internet access.
Omar Muwafaq, 31, a contractor, says he didn't use the Internet under Saddam because he considered it dangerous with the government watching every word. "Now I have friends everywhere around the world, especially from the U.S., and they're always asking me about the situation here in Iraq," he says.
In a sign of progress for the government, Iraq has secured the suffix ".iq" for its new Internet addresses. The government is in the process of creating e-mails and websites using the country's suffix abbreviation. The initials will be attached to Internet addresses, indicating they originate in Iraq.
Establishing the .iq extension is considered "a big and important event for the Iraqi nation," says Siyamend Othman, executive director of the Iraqi National Communication and Media Commission. It "represents in the Internet world the state flag," he says.
Iraqis making connection
to the outside world online (http://www.military.com/earlybrief/0,,,00.html)
By Zaid Sabah, USA TODAY
BAGHDAD — Mohammed Rahi has an addiction that's been growing in Iraq since soon after the U.S. invasion: the Internet.
"I spend six hours on the Net every two days," says Rahi, 25, at one of 20 personal computers in the Center MBC Internet Café. The addiction, as he calls it, costs him about $70 a month, a hefty sum in a country where most government salaries are in the range of $200 to $300 a month.
Not only can he explore a world of websites not accessible during Saddam Hussein's era, but "I use the Internet to download the software for my job," selling and servicing mobile phones and other electronics, he says.
Internet service has been one of the most dramatic changes in Iraq since 2003. Like cellphone service, it has expanded sharply.
Mohammed Rafiq, director of Internet services for Iraq's Ministry of Communication, says service was tightly controlled under Saddam.
In 2003, there were only about 10,000 users in a country of 26 million people. Content was filtered and sites offering free e-mail were blocked, forcing people to use the government-monitored e-mail.
Today, the state company has 200,000 subscribers on dial-up, for which it has a monopoly. And it increasingly offers services to private Internet cafes, universities and other public buildings. New technologies are arriving rapidly, include DSL broadband and wireless broadband for government offices around the country.
Because many of Iraq's phone lines are in poor condition and connections slow, Internet cafes are often easier than logging on from home. Monim Ibrahim, 33, the Center MBC Internet Café owner, says people in his neighborhood in east Baghdad barely knew what the Internet was three years ago.
So he and his employees started giving customers lessons on using the computer and the Internet. "It was really difficult, but later they start learning and the number of users grew."
Users on the cafe's computers pay $1.35 an hour, he says. Recently, he began offering wireless service for $50 per month, and it's on 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Among the most popular services is chat, which Iraqis use to keep in touch with friends and family outside the country. One of the downsides of Internet freedom has been customers who access pornographic sites, Ibrahim says. He says he hopes that the government Internet company will come to his neighborhood with cheap high-speed service that blocks the pornographic sites.
Users say they are just happy to have Internet access.
Omar Muwafaq, 31, a contractor, says he didn't use the Internet under Saddam because he considered it dangerous with the government watching every word. "Now I have friends everywhere around the world, especially from the U.S., and they're always asking me about the situation here in Iraq," he says.
In a sign of progress for the government, Iraq has secured the suffix ".iq" for its new Internet addresses. The government is in the process of creating e-mails and websites using the country's suffix abbreviation. The initials will be attached to Internet addresses, indicating they originate in Iraq.
Establishing the .iq extension is considered "a big and important event for the Iraqi nation," says Siyamend Othman, executive director of the Iraqi National Communication and Media Commission. It "represents in the Internet world the state flag," he says.