When last did you visit a cyber cafe?
Eight years ago, my answer would have been “right now”. I would have been writing/reading this on a computer in a cyber cafe. Right now however, I am lying somewhere comfortable in my home, whilst punching the soft keys on my laptop. A few years ago in Accra, one could count more than ten internet cafes between Vodafone (then Ghana Telecom)’s Head Office around Kwame Nkrumah Circle and BusyInternet on Ring Road Central. There were: True Internet, WWWPlus Mega Cafe, Krofa Internet Cafe, Java Internet Cafe, and several others, whose names I do not remember at this time. Sadly, most of them have closed shop. Whilst several reasons could be offered for the failure of these enterprises, one cannot overlook the solid impact of mobile phones and mobile internet technologies.
Mobile Websites
A quick glance at the traffic metrics website Alexa.com reveals that the most visited websites in Ghana include: Facebook, Yahoo, Google, YouTube, Live.com, Wikipedia, MSN, GhanaWeb, BBC. Email used to be the most popular online activity in this part of the world but social networking websites seem to have taken the lead in recent times. News websites come third. Thus, the composition of the ten most popular websites is not much of a surprise. What is more interesting is that ALL the most popular websites have mobile versions of their services. Typing facebook.com into a mobile web browser for example, automatically redirects one to a mobile version of the popular social networking website. The mobile websites are stripped-down versions but offer a lot of functionality, in a layout small enough to fit into tiny mobile phone screens. It is thus now common place to find people get busy with chatting, twittering, reading the news & more, from their mobile phones.
Smartphones
Smartphones are raising the stakes and pushing more possibilities into our hands, literally. They now have enough processing power to stream high-definition video and enough memory to download and store databases of music, photos and videos from the Internet. Some smartphones come with full QWERTY keyboards and thus making typing a pleasure. Emailing, blogging, chatting can now be done virtually anywhere.
Lower entry costs
Personal Computers are no longer the exclusive preserve of the rich and well-educated. 10 years ago, the pricing of an average laptop was about $2,000. Not any more. New, more powerful, full-featured laptops are available today for as low as $700. Their smaller cousins (netbooks) even come at lower prices; mwave.com currently prices an ASUS EPC900B-BLU01X Eee netbook PC at only $209.99
Used and probably refurbished PCs even drag the entry costs lower, for obvious reasons.
USB Modems
Those little devices have further democratised internet connectivity. Where mobile phones and smartphones are not enough, one could easily buy a USB Modem for as low as 60 Ghana Cedis (about $42) and connect it to a desktop, laptop or netbook for a full Internet experience. MTN Ghana is currently offering their USB modem at that price. Gone are the days when one needed to obtain a hard-to-comeby fixed phone line from the telecom monopoly or a fixed wireless antenna pointed at the Internet Service Provider’s radio mast, or a VSAT satellite dish + modem. None of these came cheap.
The more spectacular thing is that 3.5G USB modems offer real broadband speeds today.
Back to those cyber cafes. The rapid closure of cyber cafes is not limited to Ghana. 234Next.com, a leading Nigerian news source, today published a report titled: Cyber cafes are vanishing
“In those days, around 2000 and 2001, I used to go to cyber cafe, pay money to check my yahoo email. You know the feeling that time was powerful. I was the only one who could browse amongst my friends then. We will go to a cyber cafe and crowd around one system, five of us, and then the systems were always very slow, so if we hear that one cyber cafe somewhere was fast we will go there,” said Solomon Edema, a computer engineer. “Now, all of us browse with our phones. I also used my laptop. I have not gone to a cyber cafe for over a year now, Mr. Edema, adds.
Nowadays, the proliferation of computers and 3G mobile phones, including the famous China phones, has resulted in cheaper prices. As a result more people can afford internet-enabled phones. Similarly, the competition in the telecom industry has also led the telecom firms out-doing one another in offering cheap modems and internet access. Traders at Computer Village, Ikeja, now offer software that enable free internet access on laptops and mobile phones.
It is clear that mobile phones, are pushing cyber cafes out, the same way public phone booths and “communication centres” have become endangered species. What waits to be seen is how long the few cyber cafes that remain would last. Would they close shop or evolve their business model? Time would tell.
If all you do is Facebook, the mobile phone is enough. If you are involved in anything serious on the internet where you interact with a global audience via video, audio and email, you will realize how important an internet cafe is, even a crappy one.
My two cents. Most of those cafes closed down because of
1. Legendary electricity supply
2. Nonsensical taxes, levies, fees, fines name it. All the forms of state sanctioned extortion you can think of.
We cannot deny the impact of mobile devices. Thanks for your perspective.
Nah. I am not denying it. Mobile broadband is actually my primary means of accessing the internet at home. However, it is an expensive choice when one has to undertake a data intensive exercise like downloading and updating ones OS. In this case, the internet cafes play a vital role.
It can’t come soon enough for me. I look forward to students revising for their exams or taking a distance learning class on their mobile phones.
PS: My location should say Wilf from Freetown (:)) via Kent..
The only way these cyber cafes can fight the bigger competition is to create add-on services to the already existing cyber cafe biz. People will still go to cybercafes in Nigeria, because there are some sites you just cant browse on your mobile, and some times you have to upload documents and do other p.c based work on the internet. I work alot with FTP programme, and that definitely i cant do with my mobile except i’m not using Blackberry or some other high tech phones.
Yes, mobile phones are pushing them out of business. With even cheap chinese phones out there today, people now find it very easy checking their emails, downloading pictures/musics and updating their facebook. Even if you have serious things to do online, using cyber cafes is not safe and thank God, with cheap modems and cheap laptops out there, I wonder why cyber cafes will not varnish as time passes by…
Well I find the internet service in Ghana very expensive $100 or just under per Gig. You cant download anything close to 100mb or more like movies. I feel Ghana in trems of the internet has a long way to go. The government are not investing to lower the cost of high speed internet access to our homes.
High speed cafes like vodafone will still be around for a while. Now the internet is part of our way of life. Not every one can afford a laptop or a computer in Ghana yet. People are just moving out of it because its less profitable due to the intense competion.
@Ogbonge
While i agree with you that cheap laptops and cheap modems abound, what about the internet subscription? it’s not cheap but its not over killing either. And it is not one i think any average nigerian can sustain year in year out. And occasionally there have downtimes in the modem services, so when you are left in the desert you think of a cafe. Even some longstanding cafes have light of speed downloads than some of these isps, so when your modem service is messing up or slow in downloads, you can just use a cafe. But i think if you got a broadband, then you can have a very fast speed and may never mind the cafe.
I am into the business of cybercafe, i will tell you it is a lot of work to make money from the venture these days. Your article is like helping to remove the scales from my eyes. Unfortunately in Nigeria most people do not write a plan before starting a business, you see more cafes open everyday especially in the suburb of lagos where they are lot cheaper to open. It is not only about cybercafes but any business that is easy to start is no business.
One incident that happened shortly before I left Nigeria is still fresh in my memory. I remember sending an email in Kaduna in 1999 at one of the only cybercafes in the country then. The email was sent to a primary recipient and copied to 6 other people. I remember being charged 100 naira for the primary recipient and 70 naira each for the rest of the 6. Daylight robbery. So this can only be a good development for Nigeria. With access to information comes a different kind of power. Such is the power that Nigerians (especially the youth) wield now. If Nigeria does change politically for the better, I will not be wrong in attributing it to the information revolution.
LOL 😀 at the per receipt charge. You really can’t blame those people. When email technology became commercial in Nigeria, we were not sure how to handle it. Therefore, the default line of thought was to treat it like postal mail delivery and hence charge for each recipient of your “posted electronic letter”. I paid N50 per email a few times and also paid N30 for typing. I stopped paying for typing when I saved my email text unto a floppy from home.
Anyway, enjoy the current revolution.
you think cyber cafe is easy to start? cost of systems, modem, generator, rent, diesel and the rest.. think again.
Power (Nepa) EFCC and the police killed cyber cafe business. First there is no electricity and they have to burn diesel and secondly most are afraid to broswe there as police keep raiding there for free money while the real yahoo guys (that has money) browse from their homes. I believe cyber cafes can’t go extinct ‘cos even in developed countries like UK where there is power and the telecom giants, cyber cafes are still working.
Cybercafes will not completely dissapear because they offer “on the go” solutions for when you want to access information fast. Again not everyone can afford the cost of owning their own laptop and connectivity. It also depends on how much you want an online presence. A lot many people dont use a pc for more than checking the odd one or two mails once a week. Its cheaper popping to the local cafe to do that.
Quite interesting thoughts. However, I think the fact that cybercafes are shutting down should be attributed more to their inability to plan and manage their business properly. For example, you see more and more cyber cafe businesses opening up in developed countries in spite of the recent surge in technology advances.
The ability to access the internet via mobiles has certainly impacted cyber cafe’s negatively. My last 4 visits to Nigeria over the last 4 years, my primary means of internet has been via my MTN sim card. I sig up for the daula package they offer, and then just use it via the phoen or by connecting the phone to my laptop. The signal is 3G too, so it’s faster than most of the cyber cafe’s speed. The ability to be able to get on the net 24/7 as I choose cannot be beaten. And this has certainly pu a big dent in the profits of the Cafe’s.
I’ve not been to a cafe in ages!
Well, the world isn’t a stagnant place. Change is meant to happen. Cyber cafe owners who realize this will think of alternatives fast like converting the cafes into training centres or adding other services. With these telecom operators introducing data plans as part of their normal bundles… Nigeria is changing fast.
The rise of mobile browsing is really great in nigeria especially, visitors to my site consist of 90% of mobile users. the main reason pple dont go to cafes anymore is definitely due to this rise, cos havin ur own pc with internet is not dat cheap here in naija, but almost evrybody can afford a mobile with cheap mobile internet bundle.
Things are going to get worse for cybercafes. As the cost of operating these centres is going up, Telcos in Nigeria will continue to increase what they are currently offering subscribers in terms of speed and bandwidth for less cost. This leaves cybercafe operators with too much to compete with and having too little advantage. Imagine being able to watch youtube videos on your phone without breaks in the streaming and doesn’t exhaust your data allowance why on earth will I go to a cybercafe when I can lie on my couch and achieve more?