2006 28
FON in North Korea? So Far More FONeros There Than in China!
Published by MartinVarsavsky.net in Fon with No Comments
Who is the totally unexpected Fonero country of the last days? North Korea!!!
SORRY after posting this I did more research as I found this information hard to believe and discovered, thanks to Jin Ho Hur´s help, that actually many South Korean Foneros where wrongly choosing North Korea as a country choice!!! We actually have no foneros in North Korea…as expected.
In any case the rest of the post still has interesting information as to where foneros are around the world.
Only yesterday we got 11 more registered foneros in North Korea and we have over 250 now. Now what I found WEIRD is that North Korea is a country that is supposed to be totally cut off from the outside world. But I guess they are not. Indeed the FON movement is growing nicely there, at a rate of 5% the rate of South Korea. And how does the Fon proposition work in North Korea, share wifi at home and roam the world for free? Can the North Koreans travel? What shocks me however is the disconnect that seems to exist with the Muslim world. Here´s a list of the top 30 fonero countries and there´s not a single Muslim country. What is going on here?
1 – Spain – 15675
2 – United States – 15107
3 – Germany – 14203
4 – Korea, Republic Of – 11145
5 – France – 7422
6 – Italy – 5746
7 – United Kingdom – 4015
8 – Sweden – 3140
9 – Netherlands – 2640
10 – Austria – 1415
11 – Switzerland – 1168
12 – Argentina – 962
13 – Belgium – 942
14 – Portugal – 911
15 – Canada – 779
16 – Finland – 634
17 – Taiwan – 569
18 – Denmark – 560
19 – Brazil – 469
20 – Japan – 423
21 – Ireland – 390
22 – Chile – 333
23 – Poland – 322
24 – Mexico – 316
25 – Hong Kong – 285
26 – Korea, DPR – 268
27 – Israel – 267
28 – Hungary – 265
29 – Norway – 248
30 – China – 240
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No Comments
euronerd on October 28, 2006 ·
Martin, why are you complaining about the lack of Muslim participants, and not about the lack of African participants?
Could there be any relation with the media fon has used to advertise and promote the concept.
Is there a relation to an existing need or market?
Maybe $5+transport is still too much, but what the heck, you gave away loads of Fonera’s in Europe, not in Africa or Asia, didn’t you?
Where does the sense of wonder prosper better than in a fly-by entrepeneur, somebody once asked. There may be an answer here.
Jin Ho Hur on October 28, 2006 ·
Martin,
I just read your blog on Foneros in North Korea.
Unfortunately, however, I believe all of them are Foneros from Korea (South), who mistakenly chose “Korea, DPR” instead of “Korea, RO” in the country selection during the FON registration. Many Korean cannot distinguish DPR Korea and RO Korea, hence this mistake.
In reality, no ordinary North Korean can access the Internet, except for quite few government people, not to mention unlikelihood of FON routers being delivered to North Korea.
Jin Ho Hur – Fonero Leader, South Korea
Kin Mak on November 1, 2006 ·
Martin, as for China, our company will be penetrating 300,000 China homes with a device that needs to work with a wireless router.
There maybe synergy between our businesses. We could even be your operation front end.Interested to pursue further? We would prefer to work with FOn headquarter instead of HK.
BTW, there should be a “contact us” tab in the website.
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killy-the-frog on October 28, 2006 ·
Time to have a team in China 😉