Comment Cart before horse. (Score 1) 253
It's not just the Internet -alone- that is encouraging such things as competition and product development. For instance, having a reasonably non-corrupt judiciary to adjudicate commercial disputes, and a flexible economic system that can readily shift labor and resources according to demand, is rather fundamental. Having a reasonably well-educated population that is already sufficiently wealthy in resources that many can afford to take business risks and -fail- is also critical.
If you're in a massively corrupt state, even a potentially fairly rich one, where between mismanagement and outright corruption plus disruptions in critical infrastructure from violent unrest, things are going to be slower whether or not you have Internet access. If you're busy trying to subsistence farm and worrying about both food prices plunging from imported food aid, or bad soil and weather conditions from decades of ecologically destructive practices, you have bigger fish to fry.
If you're in a massively corrupt state, even a potentially fairly rich one, where between mismanagement and outright corruption plus disruptions in critical infrastructure from violent unrest, things are going to be slower whether or not you have Internet access. If you're busy trying to subsistence farm and worrying about both food prices plunging from imported food aid, or bad soil and weather conditions from decades of ecologically destructive practices, you have bigger fish to fry.
