2010 March

Wiring Indonesia with WARNETs, Wifi Hotspots, and Mobile

On March 31, 2010, In Government Regulatory, International ICT, Internet and Telecom, Social Issues, Social Networking, By Administrator

Jakarta is a city of cafes, coffee shops, and mobile phones. With a mobile penetration hitting nearly 62% of the population, the world’s 4^th most populace nation represents a huge market, and tremendous infrastructure challenges. With more than 50% of the country making less than $50/month, the percentage of people with access to mobile phones and the Internet is astonishing.

This is very apparent when driving through villages that are well under the poverty line, such as you will drive through on the way from Balikpapan to Samarinda (in Eastern Borneo, East Kalimantan Province). A large percentage of the “homes” you pass would not have a prayer to hold water out of the “house” during a heavy rainstorm, but you will see many, if not most, of the residents carrying a mobile phone.

Most of the mobile phones are pre-paid, meaning of course the user pays up front for the handset and phone minutes, however even the poorest people have access to handsets.

The next interesting item is the ubiquitous “WarNet.” WarNet is actually a combination of two words, Warung (Café) and Internet. While not as available as mobile phones, nearly every village has one or two WarNet rooms, which (from my observation) have most of the available terminal stations filled with users.

As a large percentage of the population lacks disposable income needed to purchase their own computer, or Internet access, the WarNet is the only place young people (and older folk) are able to access and take advantage of either computers or network-enabled communications.

Strolling the streets of Samarinda after 2200, in an entirely unscientific poll, I was able to count about 2 WarNets per city block in the downtown area. A similar stroll earlier in Batam (a free port near Singapore) yielded similar results, with Jakarta only slightly less, probably due to the fact my unscientific strolling poll was confined to a relatively opulent area with more WiFi hotspots available at coffee shops such as Starbucks and the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, with patrons carrying their own laptop computers.

This did drop the number of WarNets to a scarce one per city block when you are off the main roads.

WarNets are Not Just for Fun

While the Korean Internet Café experience of the 1990s was fueled by insatiable demands for higher performance multi-user gaming networks, the Indonesian experience appears to be much more broad in scope. According to Mr. Ibenk, an official with the Indonesian Government’s Kominfo (national ICT organizer), WarNet’s serve the community by providing both exposure and low cost access to the Internet for students, business people, as well as access to social media and entertainment.

“Access to a WarNet costs users less than 3000 Rp (Indonesian Rupiah, around $.35) per hour. While still a reasonably high cost to a poor user, nearly everybody can afford at least a couple hours per week to access the network” added Ibenk.

WarNets are used by students, professionals, and from my observation a lot of foreign tourists trekking through both Jakarta and other more remote locations. Students spend a lot of time on the Internet, and it appears schools encourage use of WarNets for some students to access research, write reports (most WarNets also have sideline services such as printing, copying, and faxing), and as one student told me, they are now even submitting some homework assignments through the Internet.

You may question why this would be necessary, and the answer is simple – most schools in poor sections of Jakarta and most rural areas do not have sufficient budget to build ICT within their school or curriculum. However both students and teachers know that for a child to be competitive in the new wired world, they need exposure to Internet technologies to gain skills critical to their future success in a global economy.

Porn, hacking, and other nefarious use of WarNets

While it may seem unbelievable, most WarNet operators claim use of WarNet’s to access pornography and conduct illegal activities occurs, it is probably at a level much lower than we’d expect. “Niki,” a former WarNet operator in Sumatra now working as an ICT manager in Jakarta, explained “Indonesia is a Muslim majority country. Muslim’s may have a stricter social manner than in some other countries, and thus the negative uses of WarNet’s may be lower than you would expect.”

Not sure if that is entirely true, however most of the WarNet’s I visited during the past 10 days in Indonesia appeared to be meeting the objectives noted above. Just a lot of people chatting, researching, doing email, or using word processing programs (including Google Docs and MS Live Office). Cloud computing, whether the users know it or not, has actually made a very positive contribution to the community by providing applications and online storage that would not have been available just a couple years ago.

WarNets are a Positive Contributor to Indonesia

A report by Rudi Rusdiah, from APWKomtel, claims WarNet’s account for more than 40% of all Internet access in Indonesia. I’d believe that number is actually higher, given the number of WarNets I observed in rural areas throughout Java, Sumatra, and Kalimantan.

Rusdiah’s report includes a listing of the positive social impacts of WarNet’s, including:

Extending public Internet access to serve people with no computer or Internet access at home;
Providing value-addition to small and medium businesses in the community, strengthening the economy by creating employment and business opportunities;
With the support of the Ministry of Industry and Trade, setting up of Warsi (Warung Informasi or Information Centers) near small traditional industry clusters;
Providing Internet access and literacy to the small businesses in the community and cluster;
Promoting the products and services beyond local and traditional markets, to global and national reach;
With Open University and OSOL, programs to promote the use of IT as a tool for education;
Providing tourists, travelers and commuters with Internet access.

In a world where many governments struggle with bringing broadband Internet to every home as a public utility, developing nations need to exercise great creativity in delivering “any” internet access to the community. The WarNet provides that utility, and the creativity of Indonesians to find ways to deliver Internet to nearly every community in the country through use of satellite, microwave, mobile phones, DSL, and telephone access should be applauded.

Not the final solution, but with the world’s fourth most populace nation getting wired, we will expect a lot of new ideas from a lot of motivated Indonesians in the near future.

Tagged with: batam • ict • indonesia • internet • jakarta • samarinda • warnet

Indonesia’s ICT Policy Provides a Success Story for Developing Countries

On March 24, 2010, In Government Regulatory, International ICT, Internet and Telecom, Open Topics, Social Issues, By Administrator

In the mid-1990s, as an operations manager with Sprint International, I worked in Jakarta to deliver a direct X.25 expansion to PT Indosat from the old SprintNet packet switching network. 15 years ago walking around the streets of Jakarta gave the impression of despair among much of the population, with large groups of unemployed men hanging around street corners. As a relatively well-off foreigner, I drew stares of both wonder and contempt. Internet access was possible through dial-up connections through the X.25 network and a gateway to SprintLink, Sprint’s Internet network.

Returning to Jakarta in 2010 is a shock. While there is still a visible dichotomy of wealth vs. low income population, the changes in Jakarta today are stark. Aside from the rapidly rising skyline, bringing back memories of Shanghai in the 1990s, the other most obvious change is the people. Everybody is going someplace or doing something. Nobody hanging around the street corners (at least from the areas of Jakarta I have traveled over the past few days), and high end shopping malls are everywhere.

An Internet Connection on Every Corner

Jakarta is wired. Sitting in my hotel room I count not less than 20 visible WiFi connections. Along the main routes and shopping malls coffee shops are a standard fixture on just about every main street, and nearly every restaurant boasts a free WiFi connection for patrons. If you do not have the money to pay for an Internet services account, but do have a laptop computer, there is really no reason you would ever be without WiFi access within the downtown area.

And throughput is very good. The World Bank reports that average access speeds for Internet connections within Jakarta hang around 1Mbps. My experience sitting in a WiFi-enabled coffee shop at the City Walk shopping center (near the Jakarta Intercontinental Hotel) gives me around 3.5Mbps on test downloads.

And sitting here I could have run the same test on about 10 available WiFi networks, all serving nearby coffee shops and cafes.

Wiring Indonesia

Indonesia’s National
ICT Vision is
“to bring into reality a
modern information society, prosperous and highly competitive, strongly supported by ICT“

(Ministry of Information and Communications Technology, Republic of Indonesia)

While you would expect the best Internet access within Jakarta, the capital city, Indonesia is aggressively working to overcome national shortfalls in Internet access around the country. As the world’s fourth most populace nation, and a geography covering nearly 2 million square kilometers, with more than 10,000 populated islands, Indonesia does face challenges.

Mobile phones have shown the greatest success. With more than 140,000 mobile subscriptions, and a quarterly growth rate of 14%, Indonesians are getting connected. However, national broadband access does not share the success of mobile, with only 1.5 million people of a population exceeding 200 million having direct access to broadband – and the majority of those users are in Jakarta.

The government does understand the connection between having broadband access and the potential growth of Indonesia’s economy. Tim Kelly, a policy expert at the World Bank stated in his Digital Africa 2010 speech that for every 10% increase in a nation’s broadband access, the country will experience a 1.3% increase in their economic growth. And of course those countries not hitting that number will continue to fall further behind the rest of world – a statistic that the world’s fourth most populace nation might not find attractive.

The good news is that Indonesia has a very open telecom market, with several companies including Telkom, BizNet, Telkomsel, Indosat, Excelcomindo, Bakrie, and XL making huge infrastructure investments. This includes developing high capacity backbone fiber systems throughout the country, which will allow even better development of wireless and cabled communications infrastructure in rural areas underserved today.

The government is also considering releasing more spectrum to wireless companies that can be used for WiMAX development, primarily in the 700Mhz and 1900/2100Mhz range. In addition, the government will also encourage mobile operators to share common infrastructure such as towers and backbone capacity to reduce the capital expense requirements for building into rural areas.

This includes development of the “Palapa Rings” that will expand existing fiber plant all the way to Papua, although admittedly this will still not meet the needs of most islands, which will still need to use a combination of microwave and VSAT access to interconnect with the rest of the nation and world.

Indonesia also supports use of Internet exchange points (IXPs), including the nation’s largest IXP, the Indonesia Internet Exchange (IIX) to retain most domestic Internet traffic within the country. There are several smaller Internet exchange points located in larger cities throughout the country, including a private IXP operated by a large domestic fiber and Internet provider BizNet.

The Bottom Line

It is easy to look at a country like Indonesia with a critical eye, and come up with lots of suggestions on how the country may more rapidly develop Internet broadband infrastructure. That is until you travel within the country and learn the true meaning of “rural.” Indonesia’s government understands the value of integrating eLearning, eGovernment, eBusiness, and eEverything into the Indonesian socio-cultural DNA. And the government is encouraging Indonesia’s private sector to invest.

As foreigners looking in, we should step back and remember the Jakarta and Indonesia of the mid-1990s, and consider the remarkable development that has occurred over the past decade, and congratulate the government in its current success, while encouraging further growth. A well-educated, well-wired, and productive Indonesia is both important and valuable to the international community, and from what I have seen over the past few days the country is making great progress in meeting their goals.

Tagged with: broadband • ict • indonesia • jakarta • mobile • palapa

Broadband as the 4th Utility Gains Traction

On March 19, 2010, In Energy, Government Regulatory, International ICT, Internet and Telecom, Social Issues, environment, By Administrator

Broadband communications access is rapidly gaining traction as a “4^th Utility” in countries around the world. Recently, at Digital Africa 2010 in Kampala, several ministry-level delegates referenced their national initiatives building the “4^th Utility” as among their highest priorities. On March 16^th, FCC Chairman Genachowski stated “…broadband is essential for opportunity in America – for all Americans, from all communities and backgrounds, living in rural towns, inner cities, or in between.”

This means that broadband communications should be considered a basic right for all Americans, and persons from all countries, at the same level of other utilities including:

Heating
Water
Electricity

None of the above utilities are free, all require major infrastructure development, and all are basic requirements for survival in the 21^st century.

Genachoski went on to set some ambitious goals for the United States, as included in the “National Broadband Plan,” that include:

1 gigabit to every community
affordable 100 megabits to 100 million households
raising adoption (of broadband access) from 65% to 90% adoption, heading to 100%

Not a Bad Start

FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn stated in a March 10^th release that 93 million Americans still do not access broadband communications at home. 36% of those indicating they are not using broadband cite the high cost of access as their major reason for not gaining access, or terms of broadband access are unattractive.

While it would be easy for us to say Internet and broadband providers should be regulated on pricing and terms of service, we should also, if we want to consider broadband a 4^th utility, compare the terms of access with other utilities provided to citizens of the United States. The cost of broadband will no doubt change based on:

Location – rural vs. urban
Number of providers in a community or market – including wireless
Distance from Internet interconnection and exchange points
Subscriber density in a specific geography (sparsely populated areas will have a higher cost of service)

The National Broadband Plan adds additional goals and action items that further reinforce the idea of broadband as a 4^th utility, including:

Goal No. 1: At least 100 million U.S. homes should have affordable access to actual download speeds of at least 100 megabits per second and actual upload speeds of at least 50 megabits per second
Goal No. 2: The United States should lead the world in mobile innovation, with the fastest and most extensive wireless networks of any nation
Goal No. 3: Every American should have affordable access to robust broadband service, and the means and skills to subscribe if they so choose
Goal No. 4: Every community should have affordable access to at least 1 gigabit per second broadband service to anchor institutions such as schools, hospitals, and government buildings
Goal No. 5: To ensure the safety of American communities, every first responder should have access to a nationwide, wireless, interoperable broadband public safety network
Goal No. 6: To ensure that America leads in the clean energy economy, every American should be able to use broadband to track and manage their real-time energy consumption.

This is a pretty comprehensive framework, adding additional forward thinking such as using broadband to support the “intelligent grid,” and wireless communications. And there is still a lot of work to accomplish. The broadband.gov website now includes several utilities used to both give consumers an idea of their current broadband performance, as well as show a very good map on the best places in the United States for accessing Internet services, and the worst.

The best states, which give an average data download speed of greater than 10Mbps, include:

Massachusetts
Delaware
New Jersey
Maryland
Virginia

And the worst averaging less than 2Mbps downloads including:

Alaska
Idaho
Montana
Wyoming
New Mexico

Even the best locations in the United States are a fraction of the average Internet and broadband access speeds enjoyed in countries like South Korea, with average home access throughout the country nearing 50Mbps today and plans to increase that to 1Gbps by 2012 (Brookings Institution).

The Overall Framework

The National Broadband Plan correctly looks at more than just home access to the Internet. As a utility, the broadband plan must cover all aspects of society and life that require communications, and includes reference to broadband categories such as:

Broadband and US economic opportunity (global economy)
Education
Health Care
Energy
Environment
eGovernment
Civic Engagement
Public Safety
Entertainment

Next Steps in Broadband

Powerpoint slides and MS Word documents are fine, however we need to focus on tangible results that are measured by meeting our goals. Those goals start with digging holes in the ground, constructing towers, and pulling cable into houses and offices. Everything else is cute, but noise.

“This plan is in beta, and always will be

Like the Internet itself, this plan will always be changing—adjusting to new developments in technologies and markets, reflecting new realities and evolving to realize previously unforeseen opportunities” (From National Broadband Plan)

The National Broadband Plan was delivered to the American people on 17 March, 2010. The goals (as above) are mandated to be in place by 2020. It is an aggressive plan, however Chairman Genachowski appears to have the sense of urgency needed to get it done – unless of course American politics create barriers preventing success.

Americans, and people of all nations should take a close look at the US National Broadband Plan, and those of other nations. If the US and other nations around the world truly consider broadband access as a 4^th utility, those who do not have that utility will not be functional in the mid-21^st century.

The US plan and strategy is available to all at broadband.gov

Tagged with: 4th utility • broadband • digital africa • fcc • genachowski • national broadband plan

Digital Africa 2010 Ends with Resolve for a Better African Future

On March 12, 2010, In Government Regulatory, International ICT, Internet and Telecom, Social Issues, By Administrator

Concluding three days of intense discussion, debate, and a surprising sense of cooperation, on Thursday evening the Honorable Aggrey S. Awori, Uganda’s Minister of ICT, brought the Digital Africa Summit 2010 to a close.

The summit brought representatives and ministers from most countries in Africa, as well as from the private sector, including telecom carriers, Internet providers, content providers, and some equipment vendors. All had a common objective – close the doors, throw their national a regional issues on the table, and as a community set aside politics and social differences in a brainstorming session to make a better Africa.

The problem is clear – without 21^st century ICT infrastructure, Africa will not compete in the global community. No ICT infrastructure, then Africa will not be able to compete on a level “playing field” in education, business, and government with their global counterparts.

The highest priorities:

Backbone telecom infrastructure
Local access (the final mile)
Education
Generation of local hosted services and content
Development of eEverything (eLearning, eGovernment, eBusiness, eXXXXX)

Business Excellence Global Media hosted the conference at Kampala’s Munyonyo Commonwealth Resort on the shores of Lake Victoria. Far enough away from the city to isolate attendees from external distractions, close enough to the community to offer a constant reminder of the reality of Africa’s economic and social challenges, all attendees set aside their home affiliations and shared both problems and best practices as a single community.

Africans Working Together

As an American, I have no particular emotional ties to my neighbors to the north and south. While Canadians, Mexicans, and Americans generally have no major problems, we do not consider ourselves North Americans as a secondary social affiliation. Perhaps that is because all North American countries are heavily populated with immigrants, and secondary affiliations are likely to be to their native countries.

The surprising revelation for me was the sense of community delegates from all countries felt for each other. Although the French speaking nations had a bit of difficulty communicating with English speaking nations, there was enough common language among all attendees that any differences in language were met with a bit of laughter, an explanation in simpler terms, and a period of mutual learning that resulted in friendships developing among the delegates that will last far beyond Entebbe Airport.

Digital Convergence and Innovation Driving Positive Change

“Optimizing Infrastructure Opportunities,” “Infrastructure Impacting Socio-Economic Growth,” “Creating Innovative Mobile Ecosystems,” and many other topics attracted interesting presentations, case studies, and debate.

Given the presence of national regulators at the conference, several other statements gained increased hope and credibility.

All nations give higher visibility and priority to building human and intellectual capacity through access to ICT
Interconnect all African cities by 2012
Interconnect all African villages by 2015

Most would say, “that is really nice to say, but with a reality check it has little meaning.” Then we find that with the expansion and construction of mobile phone systems in locations such as Uganda, which claims 100% of the country is addressable with their existing tower infrastructure, the vision gains more credibility. Much more. Technically, with use of wireless access points, it is possible.

Digital Africa 2010 is over, and the delegates on the way home. But friendships and connections are made, and all displayed a hunger for improving their individual countries and continent. Yes, a bit of rivalry, but a healthy rivalry that will stimulate construction competition.

We look forward to attending Digital Africa 2011, and I leave Uganda with a strong sense of hope and confidence Africa will deliver.

Tagged with: convergence • digital africa • ict • uganda

Do You Mean We Import Chalk?

On March 10, 2010, In Government Regulatory, International ICT, Internet and Telecom, Social Issues, By Administrator

Dr. Gilbert Balibaseka Bukenya, Vice President of Uganda told a story during the opening session of Digital Africa 2010. While traveling within the country, he paid special attention to small schools. While lacking nearly every normal school resource, each school had one common denominator – they all had black boards and chalk.

The question started nagging him. As the VP, he was in pretty good touch with imports, exports, and manufacturing within Uganda. But chalk, as an ubiquitous tool, was nearly completely imported from China. Something as simple as chalk, a tool used by nearly everybody n the country, was not being produced in the domestic business sector.

Dr. Bukenya changed that. The chalk problem was quickly rectified, and a new program of “can we make it in Uganda” started. The basic idea is if the product is capable of being made in-country, then Uganda should not pay another country for the product.

Reward local innovation, but don’t forget we are part of a global community

It is very easy to slap a flag on a cardboard box identifying the origin of contents with a “Made with Pride in ____.” And a good idea. If the materials and labor force are available, those things should not be imported, and the product may actually be robust enough for export. In the US we are nearly militant in our enthusiasm supporting “Made in America” campaigns, almost to the point of being accused of a shortfall in patriotism for buying foreign materials.

But let’s keep in mind we are part of a global economy. Innovation and entrepreneurship occurs in every nation of the world, and although it is difficult to admit, some ideas are better than ours. And at some point we like variety. And we can call this world trade.

Be a Hunter, not a Gatherer

Dr. Bukenya further challenged the delegates to change our minds (as a society) from accepting handouts from others, buying everything we use from others, and being dependent on donors for our livelihoods. Take control of our own destiny, and start producing. Nurture entrepreneurs, nurture innovation.

This includes innovation in the ICT sector. Dr. Aggrey Awori, Uganda’s Minister of ICT, stated “broadband (communications) and ICT are now the greatest enablers of modern society.” He went to make an even stronger statement “access to ICT is a basic human entitlement.”

Evidence indicates this is not idle rhetoric, but actual policy. The Open Internet Initiative (ONI) does not find any evidence of government filtering or censoring within the country. The major obstacle in Uganda’s efforts to bring Internet to the people being a lack of basic infrastructure, including both telecom and electricity.

The eLearning Component

Ugandans enjoy government mandated education up secondary school. However, while the basic literacy rate is high (66.8%), there is little wide spread access to advanced education tools such as Internet. Thus students complete their education at a great disadvantage to students in other countries with much greater access to network applications and technology.

Chalk is easy, producing software or manufacturing consumer and industrial goods for export is not. While Dr. Bukenya’s “can we make it in Uganda” idea is worthy, to make it work will require considerably more attention to building basic infrastructure needed to prepare workers for the global marketplace.

As we’ve discussed in previous articles, ICT is the 4^th utility. Roads, power, and water are now joined by information and communications technology. Without ICT infrastructure as a basic requirement, a country cannot compete in the global marketplace, and will be restricted to depending on global donors for its existence – not to mention the vulnerability such as country has to political upheaval and violence.

Uganda gets it, and the delegates of Digital Africa 2010 get it. Now it is our job to make sure the rest of the world gets it.

Previous article in this series:

Digital Africa 2010 and Cloud Computing in Developing Countries

Tagged with: 4th utility • digital africa • Dr. Gilbert Balibaseka Bukenya • elearning • ict • uganda

Digital Africa 2010 and Cloud Computing in Developing Countries

On March 9, 2010, In Government Regulatory, International ICT, Internet and Telecom, Social Networking, Virtualization, citizen journalism, cloud computing, environment, By Administrator

At the Digital Africa Summit 2010 in Kampala, Uganda, discussion is rightly focused on both telecommunications policy and economic development. Cloud computing is a topic heard among sidebar discussions, although it has yet to hit the mainstream of conference programming.

We will bring a series of reports from Digital Africa – it is a very exciting group of people who truly have the best interests of Africa as their key objective. Kicked off by Dr. Gilbert Balibaseka Bukenya, Vice President of Uganda, the conference also included ministers of communications from Uganda, Niger, Cameroon, and Burkina Faso. Other nations are well represented with representatives from the private sector, government, and education.

With that many politicians, you would think protocol would prevent any level of innovation or open discussion. Not the case, it was a very cooperative environment.

Why is cloud important in developing countries?

It is a reasonable question, and a reasonable answer. The basic requirements in developing countries (beyond clean water and food) are infrastructure, education, jobs, and eGovernment (including banking). Nothing works without the infrastructure in place. In countries without stable electricity and limited telecom infrastructure, this has to be a high priority.

When building out the basic infrastructure in countries with a tremendous amount of sunlight, wind or solar energy makes a lot of sense. A lot more sustainable than running diesel generators, and as an unfortunate byproduct of global warming, more sunny days each year are available to provide power.

In rural areas we are talking about enough power to provide electricity for schools, internet kiosks or cafes, and wireless access points in city centers. 15kW would do it, and that is not unreasonable. It is not unreasonable if we are looking at low-powered NetBooks and terminals that do not have a large burden of local resources for processing power, memory, storage, and high performance video applications.

According to several presentations at Digital Africa, there is strong evidence that with each 10% of any population in Africa having access to mobile or Internet technologies, there is a corresponding 1.8% increase in that nation’s GDP. Evidence that simply bringing Internet and education to the rural and unwired population will increase the national wealth, and quality of life, by a an annual increase of 1.8%

Bring the cable to the school, wire up a NetBook-based LAN, connect via wireless to a local access point, and you have an entry-level connected school. An entry-level school that can access Stanford classes online, from rural areas of Niger. Once that is available, and children are able to diffuse wired intellectual exposure into their intellectual tacit knowledge library, and we are creating a much more level playing field.

OK, let’s drop the physical fiber runs and electricity planning for just a moment. We’ll save that for a future article.

Cloud Computing Driving the Community

If we can build a data center in a couple of national locations with stable power, and with international or local funding build out a basic data center infrastructure, then with a bit of creativity and planning we will expect Infrastructure virtualization (IaaS) as a basic component of the data center.

Utility processing, storage, and memory available for the community. With a bit of further planning, adding one or more good PaaS models on the infrastructure, and we have a resource that can be used to host academic applications, business applications, and government applications. Remember this is the early days of development – in most cases there is no infrastructure to start with, so we can design this as a best practice from Day 1.

Take the burden of infrastructure away from the schools, startup companies, and existing SMEs and offer a virtual data center utility to server both their office automation and IT needs, as well as granting access to the global marketplace.

A Novel Idea – the Mobile Data Center

UConnect is a project run by several independent souls who want to bring education to the small rural school children in Uganda. A panel truck, lined with computers, and a server hosting a wide variety of eLearning applications, UConnect drives to schools and lets the children work on computers for a couple hours each week. A project bringing education to areas where just a year ago there would be no opportunity for children to be exposed to either computer technologies, or formal education materials.

This is creativity, and a refusal to let the children grow up in a world where they are completely out of touch with their global community counterparts. A technology baby step for us, a giant leap for Ugandan children. But not good enough. We need to inspire children to succeed, and to do that children need exposure to the same intellectual tools as a child in Calabasas, California.

Cloud computing can, should, and will be part of that plan. It makes sense.

Tagged with: burkina faso • cameroon • cloud computing • digital africa summit 2010 • Gilbert Balibaseka Bukenya • kampala • niger • uganda

Life without Internet in Ethiopia

On March 8, 2010, In Burbank, Energy, Government Regulatory, International ICT, Internet and Telecom, Social Issues, citizen journalism, environment, By Administrator

For the first time in over ten years, I spent the night without Internet access. Ten years of working in remote parts of Mongolia, Vietnam, Palestine, Indonesia, and other small and developing countries, and in March 2010 I finally hit the access wall. My hotel in Addis Ababa does not have Internet access. And not a single WiFi or wireless connection available nearby.

Maybe it is just not realistic to believe that in the year 2010 travelers or residents of a major city like Addis Ababa would enjoy the same sense of Internet entitlement we enjoy in other parts of the world. It is probably more realistic to think fresh water is a higher priority than Facebook. Probably a higher priority to think that basic nutrition is a higher priority to some people in the world than Twitter.

Having been plucked up from the opulence of Burbank, California, where Friday afternoon brought the amusement of watching about 50 SUVs and minivans queuing to pick up elementary and middle school children, as it is not reasonable to expect children to walk more than 100 yards from school to home, being denied email and net access for a night is shocking.

Does the Opulent World Owe the Developing World Anything?

There is an old phrase explaining that “nobody likes a victim.” When natural disasters occur, wars create a large number of refugees, or other events propel people to leave their homelands for safer places, the countries and people who are forced to absorb those refugees normally look at them with contempt. It is one thing to watch the impact of a typhoon or earthquake on a country via CNN, and maybe donate a few dollars to help bring food, but in most cases we want to watch a different story on the next day’s news, and we rarely welcome refugees with open arms into our community.

Easy to understand why. As a society and culture, wealthy countries have normally built their communities with hard work, and the residents enjoy the quality of life they’ve built. Visitors are welcome, but communities often find it difficult to absorb new people, particularly those with no money or have lost nearly everything they owned, into a community with a stable economy, school system, and social system.

We have some compassion for those who are in need, but much like driving past a major automobile accident on the freeway, we feel compelled to look, but then we drive past and soon forget the tragedy another human being is going through a few miles back on the road.

How We Reduce the Burden, and Strengthen our Global Community

For sure, Internet access may not purify or deliver water to those with a basic need. However education delivered to all levels of economic or social groups will potentially bring better intellectual capacity to those residents and leaders in poor and developing countries to plan for the future, with the ever-increasing capacity of taking care of their own problems. Educated people in most cases are simply better prepared to respond to disasters and problems when they occur.

Internet access is a very powerful tool in bringing basic and advanced education to any part of the world with a connection. When a student in Addis Ababa, or any other part of the country, has the same access to online lectures, course materials, and even formal education programs over the Internet, the national capacity for dealing with topics ranging from developing water strategies, to energy, to agriculture, to entertainment all become one small step easier to attain than if the developing country had to do it on their own.

But what about UN and other NGO Programs?

Like the community that does not want to be burdened with a long term, recurring commitment to absorbing refugees, global philanthropy has a time threshold. New disasters are happening daily. New wars are popping up around the world at the same rate as ever, and when your own disaster is falling behind the front page in priority, then it is the people of that location or country who eventually have to solve the problems on their own.

There are simply not enough resources, emotionally or economically to go around.

There is one common characteristic of communities which handle disaster better than others. They are well educated. California handles earthquakes and wildfires without bringing the state to a halt. France handles major flooding and other weather-related disasters, Okinawa finds Super-Typhoons a passing amusement, and Japan has tsunami response down to a science.

Sure, those countries have money, but even Japan and Germany started out with nearly no resources after the second war, and now are both economic powers. It is education, and the resolve of an educated society.

Back to the Internet

Delivering online resources to poor countries is becoming cheaper and more powerful every day. Wireless technologies are making fixed copper a legacy, and the cost of Netbooks and powerful workstations is dropping every day. Localization and language translation are becoming more powerful every day.

Don’t stop delivering clean water, but let’s carefully consider the long term impact of delivering a tool to the nations of the world, including the area I stayed in Addis Ababa, and give everybody access to the same intellectual development tools as our kids in Burbank.

Check out resources published by the World Bank, United Nations Development Program (UNDP), US Agency for International Development (USAID), and others to find how we might better support development of eLearning in the developing world, as well as development of basic infrastructure.

Tagged with: addis ababa • developing country • ethiopia • internet • UNDP • usaid • world bank

A Tsunami of Global Disaster Communications through Citizen Journalism

On March 1, 2010, In International ICT, Internet and Telecom, Social Issues, Social Networking, citizen journalism, By Administrator

The news started hitting California early Saturday morning with an SMS alarm on my mobile phone – a major earthquake struck Chile, and there was a potential of tsunami activity in California and Hawaii (as well as the rest of the Pacific). First stop – CNN. The news source was right on the story, with real time information flowing into the newsroom from, not on-scene journalists, but through Twitter and Facebook updates.

Another SMS message hits the phone letting me know there was a Twitter list at #hitsunami, and the discussion would include all the most current news related to tsunami preparations in Hawaii. Also gave a link to a web page that was broadcasting a live feed from KHON in Honolulu until the station integrated their feed on the KHON home page.

Back to CNN, cell phone videos began pouring in from Santiago and Concepcion. CNN began broadcasting directly from Chile – not from a CNN journalist, but from a Chilean citizen streaming video through a Skype connection. KHON also began streaming video and audio from a private citizen through BJPENN.COM in Hilo, as KHON also did not have a real time video feed of their own, or a journalist on site that could provide adequate real time information from the city.

Then, the same stream from BJPENN.COM in Hilo showed up on CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC.

Citizen Journalism is here to Stay

News media is changing forever. Citizens now have the technology, and savvy, to provide the world with real time, unedited news feeds 24×7, 365 days a year, and from nearly any single location on the planet. Neither mainstream news media outlets nor governments can fully control the presentation of events occurring around the world. With nearly every mobile phone equipped with a camera or video device, and the ability to send images through both the mobile networks and Internet, reality can once again be reality.

Government actions, law enforcement actions, and individual actions are now more likely to be recorded than not – ensuring that at a raw level, fact will become available to the world without government or media corruption of the source.

While the mainstream news media may still add “expert” commentary and attempt to interpret events, those events can no longer be controlled or hidden from the global community. There are exceptions, such as embedding journalists within military operations. The government will still control what the public views or learns from those journalists, and propaganda will still be part of our lives. Mainstream media will still try to interpret events in a manner supporting their political views (if in doubt, watch the US stations Fox, MSNBC, CNN, and BBC America for a variety of interpretations of a single event).

But that line of deception, or use of propaganda, becomes thinner every day as the diffusion of recording devices and communications continues to become available to nearly every person on the planet.

“We are getting Twitter reports and photos from the Big Island…”

With residents of the Big Island scattered along the shores of Hawaii, and nearly 100% of them with a mobile communications device, people on the island were kept up to date by the second of tsunami activity hitting the island. Emergency services broadcast information upon receipt of updates, and if there was ever a “dry run” for emergency communications, the people of Hawaii showed the world how it should be done.

As Governor Lingle stated in a pre-event news conference (broadcast to KHON studios via Skype), “the eyes of the world are now on Hawaii.” Gov. Lingle, and the people of Hawaii should be proud of the way they set a new standard for integrating citizen journalism, broadcast journalism, and emergency services into a single, integrated community.

CNN, Fox, and MSNBC had one theme in common throughout the rapidly unfolding Chile earthquake events, and preparations for a tsunami event around the Pacific – “send us your images, reports, and video, but do not put yourself in danger.”

Mainstream media gets it. They may not like it much, but they get it. iReports, real-time Skype and Twitter reports, SMS messages, and mobile imaging have given us the potential of having around 4 billion citizen journalists available to produce news content. CNN, Fox, and MSNBC are more than welcome to collate and interpret those events, but now we have a choice of making our own interpretations, listening to the mainstream media’s interpretations, or listening to the government’s interpretation of local or global events.

Tagged with: chile • citizen journalism • facebook • hawaii • mobile phone • propaganda • sms • tsunami • twitter

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