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The Next Billion Net Users Coming Fast

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by Kevin Maney
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Mar 19 2008 12:00am EDT

The Next Billion Net Users, Coming Fast

Technology companies are in a hurry to get the next billion people online, adding to the approximately 1.2 billion people already on the Net in some way. Two reports today show how that's coming along. In India, cell operators are adding 8 million subscribers a month -- in other words, adding the population of New York each month. Total Indian cell users is up to 246 million, nearing the entire population of the U.S. Of course, not all those cell customers are on phones that can tap the Internet, but surely a lot are.

Also today comes news that Intel's Classmate PC is showing up in retail stores in the Philippines. The Classmate is meant to be a laptop for people who previously couldn't afford computers. The price: about $400. Although, that doesn't seem so amazing these days. Asus is selling EeePCs for less than that.

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