One of Facebook's board members has infuriated Indians with his comments on colonialism

Rob Price

Feb 10, 2016, 17:15 IST

Michael Kovac/Getty Images for Vanity Fair

Marc Andreessen.

Silicon Valley venture capitalist and Facebook board member Marc Andreessen has sparked an internet firestorm with his comments on colonialism. (We first saw the spat on Re/code.)

First, some context: India's regulator recently blocked Free Basics - a service from Facebook that provided free internet access to parts of the internet.

Depending on who you talk to, this is either a great thing - some internet is better than none, get the next billion online, etc. - or highly suspect, threatening to created a ghettoised internet for the poor while the rich get the full web.

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After heated debate , Indian regulator TRAI announced it falls into this latter category. Strict net neutrality rules have been introduced to the country, and Free Basics in India is no more.

On Tuesday night, Andreessen joined the debate, tweeting that "denying world's poorest free partial internet connectivity when today they have none, for ideological reasons, strikes me as morally wrong."

Benedict Evans, another partner at a16z, added sarcastically that "it's a terrible thing to offer people with no money the choice of something for free."

To which entrepreneur and VC Vikram Chachra replied: "That sounds like justification for Internet colonialism."

Andreessen responded: "Anti-colonialism has been economically catastrophic for the Indian people for decades. Why stop now?"

Twitter/Mahesh Murthy

Twitter users responded angrily to the now-deleted tweet, taking it as a defence of aspects of colonialism and a reflection of modern Silicon Valley's (alleged) paternalistic instincts towards India.

@BenedictEvans @aghoshal @pmarca @lemonandice Subtext: Colonialism would any day be better economically. Natives should learn to take help.
- sayeed anjum (@asanjum) February 10, 2016

In which a top Silicon Valley VC goes off the rails and calls for a return to colonial rule for India. https://t.co/cJrnwHlF2N
- Abhimanyu Ghoshal (@aghoshal) February 10, 2016

@BenedictEvans @pmarca @lemonandice so we're equating effect of upholding NN with low growth experienced by a country enslaved for 200 yrs?
- Abhimanyu Ghoshal (@aghoshal) February 10, 2016

Now @facebook Board Director @pmarca suggests being colonized was good for India & we should've let Fb do so:) pic.twitter.com/kq7ZsNTQGl
- Mahesh Murthy (@maheshmurthy) February 10, 2016

If ANYONE in Silicon Valley cares about @pmarca come and get your boy bc he's abt to yell "We gave those ungrateful natives the railroads!"
- Caille Millner (@caillemillner) February 10, 2016

yup @pmarca and @facebook clearly see themselves as the new East India Co colonial saviours to poor brown India https://t.co/DG29aAyn2r
- Gayatri Jayaraman (@Gayatri__J) February 10, 2016

Balaji Srinivasan, a board member at Andreessen Horowitz, has come to Andreessen's defence. "This is obvious to anyone who has >140 characters of context, but [Marc Andreessen] is *OBVIOUSLY* pro-capitalist and anti-colonialist. He's helped the careers of countless Indians in tech when others were fulminating about H1Bs [visas]."

4/ He's hired, promoted, funded, & supported Indian founders/CEOs all across tech, including Mixpanel/Instacart/etc. Deeds - not words.
- Balaji S. Srinivasan (@balajis) February 10, 2016

5/ Point: given that Indians run a sizable chunk of @pmarca's own portfolio, it'd be crazy to think he was against Indians running India!
- Balaji S. Srinivasan (@balajis) February 10, 2016

6/ So what was he saying? This: in the *name* of anti-colonialism, the British Raj was replaced by the License Raj. pic.twitter.com/yDk7JNfAyZ
- Balaji S. Srinivasan (@balajis) February 10, 2016

9/ It took till 1991 till we finally started liberalizing & shedding Fabian influence (itself a British holdover!) pic.twitter.com/qZl8tzrNbc
- Balaji S. Srinivasan (@balajis) February 10, 2016

13/ That's where he's coming from. He wants India to rise & have its pick of awesome tech. You may disagree on means, but probably not ends.
- Balaji S. Srinivasan (@balajis) February 10, 2016

Andreessen has said that "for the record, I am opposed to colonialism, in any country," and that he will refrain from discussing "Indian economics or politics" in the future.