Welcome to the global village

摘要

Segaya shalini is an unlikely internet entrepreneur. She lives in Pinjavakkam, a village of about 500 people 100 kilometres west of Chennai in Tamil Nadu. Pinjavakkam has an intermittent electricity supply and only five telephone lines, yet Shalini has organised an "always-on" internet connection to let locals surf the web as they would in any other internet cafe. With her webcam and microphone, Shalini offers her customers email access, virtual consultations with a doctor, a weekly Q&A hour with farming experts in Chennai and even the chance for people who won't or can't use a keyboard to catch up with distant friends and relatives. Shalini's business has been made possible thanks to Ashok Jhunjhunwala of the Indian Institute of Technology in Chennai, who is creating cheap technologies that will extend the modern world to the most remote places. Pinjavakkam is one of 193 places in the area that are part of his most successful project so far.