May 5 2015: Reacting to the widespread anxieties about Net Neutrality, the Facebook-led Internet.org organization has thrown open its platform to developers to create additional services and has tweaked the basic offering to give users more choice over the free basic services they can use.
In an announcement yesterday by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Internet.org promised to be "more transparent and inclusive."
He said: "At the core of our efforts with Internet.org are non-exclusive partnerships with mobile operators to offer free basic internet services to people through Internet.org. This is a set of basic websites and services to introduce people to the value of the internet, and that we hope add value to their lives.These websites are very simple and data efficient, so operators can offer these for free in an economically sustainable way. Websites do not pay to be included, and operators don’t charge developers for the data people use for their services."
"Giving people more choice over the services they use is incredibly important and going forward, people using Internet.org will be able to search for and use services that meet these guidelines."
"We’re building an open platform and anyone who meets these guidelines will be able to participate. Developers that join will need to follow three principles that we’ve followed in building versions of Facebook and Messenger for Internet.org. These are designed to align all participants’ incentives and bring more people online. Participation will remain free for any developer or user.We think these criteria will help us to connect more people faster, and add even greater value to people’s lives."
Websites must be built to be optimized for browsing on both feature and smartphones and in limited bandwidth scenarios. In addition, websites must be properly integrated with Internet.org to allow zero rating and therefore can’t require JavaScript or SSL/TLS/HTTPS and must meet these technical guidelines.
More information on how to work with Internet.org, here