Microsoft to Offer Internet to Everyone with Shape the Future Program

In this globalizing world today, Microsoft has major role played and in the coming years too. And the next step Microsoft would take is to offer Internet to everyone around globe. The giant company has also started working with the governments around the world to make this happen. It has launched a new program called Shape the Future that works with national or municipal governments in both public-private partnerships, to connect the billions of people that presently do not have access to Internet, the priority being students and their families along with educators.

Dan MacFetridge from Microsoft’s Shape the Future program said

Education is always a government priority, but changing the conversation from ‘prove that a PC makes for better grades’ to one where you can demonstrate the political and economic value makes these initiatives rise to the top of a government’s priority list.

The Shape the Future program has already been launched in several countries, including the Philippines, Georgia, Brazil, Kuwait, the UK and Portugal, and so far it is a win-win-win situation for all parties, MacFetridge adds.

The governments are working on improving social and economic development along with the country’s competitiveness, by slackening digital teaching and learning skills for teachers and students, and simultaneously, students and their families have access to information anytime and anywhere that makes studying and a career more successful.

He further adds

whether in the suburbs of London or a remote hillside in Mongolia, equal access to quality education is a critical determinant of success and integration to society,” and this program helps people that otherwise would not have had the opportunity of having their own computer.

reaching the next billion users will come as a result of creating these inclusive and sustainable initiatives. It is not about donating software; it is about investing in the future of the next generation of business leaders, consumers and educators.

Shape the Future program will not stop until its mission is complete, because as MacFetridge says “access to the Internet and technology should be a right, not a privilege.”