At a dinner hosted in honor of Indian prime minister Narendra Modi, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella outlined the company's plans to roll out low-cost internet access to 500,000 villages in India. The initiative will leverage the unused TV "white space" spectrum.

Microsoft tested a pilot program to deliver internet using this method last year, and is now working with central and state governments to bring internet access to rural regions. From Nadella:

"We believe that lost-cost broad band connectivity coupled with the scale of cloud computing intelligence that can be harnessed from data can help drive creativity, efficiency and productivity across governments and businesses of all sizes. 

A key part of both Make in India and Digital India, bringing world class infrastructure into India, respecting India's digital security, sovereignty and privacy is a key milestone for us."

http://www.windowscentral.com/microsoft-bring-low-cost-broadband-access-500000-indian-villages

Heal the world M$... 😇

P.S. - Tina Desai, I love you 💗💕💓

Cool, good on MS.

Good! I know how much internet could cost in a third world country. Does it have normal speed though?

I think slow speed is better than any Philippines internet. 😅 When I'm in Philippines, I usually go with Smart unlimited data. They usually have reasonable speeds. But in providences not close to cities, all carriers suck. Hard lines are terrible compared to cell data a lot of the times too.

Fucking good guy Microsoft, I love it when colossal companies do shit like this.

I use Globe. Sometimes it's good, sometimes it's way too slow.

So why can't we have that here? My cable wifi router can't even decently cover the whole house. Over the air tv has been dead for years, tons of white space available.

Huge market without internet, potential profits area.
Good on MS makeing a cheap option avalible to those areas though.

Just read up on this white space tech:

TV white spaces are the unused TV channels in any given market that could be used to deliver broadband access, services, and applications. TV white spaces devices and networks will work in much the same way as conventional Wi-Fi, but because the TV signals travel over longer distances and better penetrate walls and other obstacles, they require fewer access points to cover the same area. These excellent range and obstacle penetration characteristics explain why people increasingly refer to TV white spaces as "Super Wi-Fi."

http://research.microsoft.com/apps/mobile/showpage.aspx?page=/en-us/projects/spectrum/technology.aspx

There's actually some pretty solid technology behind it. I would love for them to put white space modems in cars.