Ken Banks, BBC News 14 Jul 08;
Elephants might not be able to make phone calls, but that doesn't stop them carrying mobiles. It doesn't stop crocodiles or seals, either.
Today from Kenya to South Africa, from Sweden to Greece, conservationists are using mobile networks to track a range of endangered species using GSM technology.
The advance of mobile technology has touched just about every aspect of the non-profit world, whether the focus is wildlife conservation or human health, and we've only just begun to scratch the surface.
It's easy to forget just how young the mobile industry really is.
The real beauty, of course, is that few people saw this coming.
Back in 2003, while I was researching for one of the early publications on the use of mobile phones in international conservation and development, there wasn't a huge amount to report other than largely scattered anecdotal evidence.
Back then, many believed that people in developing countries, particularly those living off a couple of dollars or so a day, would never be able to own a phone. How wrong they were.
Today, in Sub-Saharan Africa, 30% of the population own a mobile, equating to in excess of 300 million people.
Many more have access to the technology through Shared Phones, Village Phones or family and friends.
Direct link
This explosive growth is largely down to a vibrant recycling market and the arrival of $20 phones, but is also down in part to the efforts of forward-thinking mobile manufacturers, some of whom spend increasing amounts of time trying to understand what people living at the so-called "bottom of the pyramid" might want from a phone.
Mobiles with flashlights are just one example of a product that can emerge from this brand of user-centric design.
Seeking to appeal to the needs of people lacking any kind of reliable lighting in their homes, some phones are now marketed with a strong emphasis on them being "much more than a phone". Innovation doesn't just happen in the West.
Local entrepreneurs are also getting in on the act, setting up shop wherever they see a need - which is almost everywhere - providing charging and repair services to help people keep their phones up and running for as long as possible.
The end result of all of this - the manufacturer's "formal" activities and this hugely impressive grassroots "informal" activity - means that more phones are getting into more and more hands, and staying there for longer.
Mobile phones are today providing a direct line of communication to farmers, doctors, patients, nurses, teachers and youth, or anyone else the non-profit community might seek to engage.
This is allowing patients to be sent reminders to take their medicine, or market prices to be sent to farmers, or to enable citizens to help monitor elections, or activists to report human rights abuses.
Text solution
The potential for mobiles in conservation and development work is huge, and evidence of their use is increasing. Many grassroots non-profits, however, still struggle to successfully implement them in their work.
A key problem is that many of the phones circulating through recycled markets are generally older, legacy handsets.
Thanks to the ingenuity and efficiency of the many mobile phone repair shops, it's not uncommon to find people happily using phones six or seven years old.
But providing data services of any kind, let alone a full web experience, is a bridge too far for many of these devices.
The solution is often the humble text message (SMS).
But in a world where the mobile phone is regularly touted as the device which will help close the digital divide, text messaging isn't necessarily the solution people had in mind.
While many developers concentrate on building smart applications for smart phones, grassroots non-profits with only SMS at their disposal are largely left behind.
Building applications for a target audience limited by their own unique blend of cultural, geographic and economic constraints can be a real challenge, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try.
For the past three years I've been working on my own solution, and it will come as no surprise that it's based on the text message.
Health check
FrontlineSMS is a messaging hub which allows non-profits in developing countries to manage bulk two-way communications using a mobile phone attached to a laptop computer.
When I built the first version in 2005, I was surprised to find that almost all bulk messaging software was web-based. Getting online on the edge of Kruger National Park, or in a remote Kenyan village, is a challenge to say the least.
Today, FrontlineSMS is being used by grassroots non-profits in over 40 countries for a wide range of activities, and was used in Nigeria to monitor the 2007 Presidential elections.
In Malawi, a student from Stanford University - armed with just 100 second-hand mobile phones and FrontlineSMS - is currently helping a rural hospital revolutionise healthcare for 250,000 people.
There the software is being used to connect St. Gabriel's Hospital in Namitete with 600 community health workers over 100 sq mile (260 sq km) area.
For the first time, drug adherence monitors are able to message the hospital, reporting how local patients are doing on their TB or HIV drug regimens.
Home-based care volunteers are sent texts with names of patients that need to be traced, and their condition reported.
Leaders from the "People Living with HIV and AIDS" support group use FrontlineSMS to communicate meeting times.
Volunteers can be messaged before the hospital's mobile testing and immunisation teams arrive in their village, so they can mobilise the community.
Essentially, FrontlineSMS has adopted the new role of coordinating a far-reaching community health network.
SMS has been the surprise package of the mobile industry but, despite its dominance, obvious limitations remain.
There may be better and smarter technologies around the corner, but for many grassroots non-profits looking to help people today it remains a hugely relevant and powerful tool.
Mobile phones may present us with the best opportunity yet to bridge the digital divide, but we mustn't lose sight of the bigger picture and must always remember that the technology comes last, not first.
Ken Banks is the Founder of kiwanja.net, where he devotes himself to the application of mobile technology for positive social and environmental change throughout the developing world
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Social Networking for Green
From festivals to the blogosphere, 'connectors' keep green movement momentum strong
CSRwire 20 May 08;
In The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell points out the pivotal role of "connectors" in spreading ideas through social networking. Thankfully, the ideas of green and sustainability are catching like wildfire, in no small part due to social networking.
Take, for example, Co-op America's Green Festival, where an estimated 30,000 people gathered this past week in Chicago. A primary mission of the Festivals (which also happen in Seattle, San Francisco, and Washington, DC this year) is to provide "structured networking opportunities . . . throughout the conference so businesses can meet and build connections with other business owners to form synergies and grow together." In other words, people attend to rub elbows, a peculiarly effective method of generating momentum for the green movement.
Web-based networking represents a much less carbon-intensive method for spreading the word. JustMeans launched a mere half-year ago as a social media website for socially responsible individuals and businesses, with job offers providing the primary social lubricant. CraigsList meets FaceBook, for the green crowd. JustMeans establishes credibility by association, linking itself to a set of A-list founding members - including eight fellows of the prestigious Ashoka social entrepreneur organization founded by Bill Drayton. These organizations support JustMeans because it simultaneously demonstrates and stimulates the growth of socially and environmentally responsible enterprises.
Blogging similarly leverages the connective power of the Internet to virally spread ideas far and wide. No wonder environmental guru Bill McKibben is endorsing Brighter Planet's 350 Challenge to harness the blogosphere in raising awareness about tackling the climate crisis. Carbon offset firm Brighter Planet invites bloggers to write posts describing the need to reduce atmospheric carbon concentration from 383 parts per million to 350, explaining the scientific consensus that this reduction will likely avert triggering catastrophic climate feedback loops. The first 350 bloggers who download the 350 Challenge badge will receive 350 tons of carbon offsets from Brighter Planet.
Perhaps most importantly, social networking injects fun into the otherwise daunting task of saving the world.
CSRwire 20 May 08;
In The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell points out the pivotal role of "connectors" in spreading ideas through social networking. Thankfully, the ideas of green and sustainability are catching like wildfire, in no small part due to social networking.
Take, for example, Co-op America's Green Festival, where an estimated 30,000 people gathered this past week in Chicago. A primary mission of the Festivals (which also happen in Seattle, San Francisco, and Washington, DC this year) is to provide "structured networking opportunities . . . throughout the conference so businesses can meet and build connections with other business owners to form synergies and grow together." In other words, people attend to rub elbows, a peculiarly effective method of generating momentum for the green movement.
Web-based networking represents a much less carbon-intensive method for spreading the word. JustMeans launched a mere half-year ago as a social media website for socially responsible individuals and businesses, with job offers providing the primary social lubricant. CraigsList meets FaceBook, for the green crowd. JustMeans establishes credibility by association, linking itself to a set of A-list founding members - including eight fellows of the prestigious Ashoka social entrepreneur organization founded by Bill Drayton. These organizations support JustMeans because it simultaneously demonstrates and stimulates the growth of socially and environmentally responsible enterprises.
Blogging similarly leverages the connective power of the Internet to virally spread ideas far and wide. No wonder environmental guru Bill McKibben is endorsing Brighter Planet's 350 Challenge to harness the blogosphere in raising awareness about tackling the climate crisis. Carbon offset firm Brighter Planet invites bloggers to write posts describing the need to reduce atmospheric carbon concentration from 383 parts per million to 350, explaining the scientific consensus that this reduction will likely avert triggering catastrophic climate feedback loops. The first 350 bloggers who download the 350 Challenge badge will receive 350 tons of carbon offsets from Brighter Planet.
Perhaps most importantly, social networking injects fun into the otherwise daunting task of saving the world.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
Estonians scour country for junk in big clean up
David Mardiste, Reuters 3 May 08;
TURI, ESTONIA (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of Estonians scoured fields, streets, forests and riverbanks on Saturday to amass tonnes of rubbish in the Baltic state's first national clean-up.
Using Google maps from the Internet and Global Positioning technology to locate junk, people collected every kind of garbage from tractor batteries to plastic bottles and paint tins and ferried it, often in their own vehicles, to central dumps.
The campaign, which aimed to collect up to 10,000 tonnes of rubbish, was organized by Internet entrepreneurs.
"It is not really about the rubbish. It is about changing people's mind sets. Next year it might be something else," said Tiina Urm, spokeswoman for the Let's Do It! event.
Estonia inherited a mass of rubbish after it regained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 but it has only added to the problem since.
"It has to be done, it can't stay here," said Mats Eek, 17, cleaning up a site in the middle of a forest near the central town of Turi, 100 km (62 miles) from capital city Tallinn.
He and the rest of his team worked to remove old metal, plastic, glass, bottles, and remains of farm medicals and household garbage hundred of meters from deep in a forest.
The organizers mapped and photographed illegal rubbish tips, then put them on the Internet using Google Earth as a platform.
They then used satellite photos and Global Positioning System (GSP) devices for accuracy in finding the clean up sites and asked people to register on the Internet to participate.
(Editing by Richard Balmforth)
TURI, ESTONIA (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of Estonians scoured fields, streets, forests and riverbanks on Saturday to amass tonnes of rubbish in the Baltic state's first national clean-up.
Using Google maps from the Internet and Global Positioning technology to locate junk, people collected every kind of garbage from tractor batteries to plastic bottles and paint tins and ferried it, often in their own vehicles, to central dumps.
The campaign, which aimed to collect up to 10,000 tonnes of rubbish, was organized by Internet entrepreneurs.
"It is not really about the rubbish. It is about changing people's mind sets. Next year it might be something else," said Tiina Urm, spokeswoman for the Let's Do It! event.
Estonia inherited a mass of rubbish after it regained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 but it has only added to the problem since.
"It has to be done, it can't stay here," said Mats Eek, 17, cleaning up a site in the middle of a forest near the central town of Turi, 100 km (62 miles) from capital city Tallinn.
He and the rest of his team worked to remove old metal, plastic, glass, bottles, and remains of farm medicals and household garbage hundred of meters from deep in a forest.
The organizers mapped and photographed illegal rubbish tips, then put them on the Internet using Google Earth as a platform.
They then used satellite photos and Global Positioning System (GSP) devices for accuracy in finding the clean up sites and asked people to register on the Internet to participate.
(Editing by Richard Balmforth)
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Slideshow tips
A while back, I gave a talk in NUS on environmental community groups. I put the slides on slideshare.net and Otterman gave some feedbacks and tips for better presentation.
1. Prepare your next talk really well.
2. Have a clear message, define sections.
3. Define each section with a question which you answer.
4. Keep transitions consistent per section.
5. Illustrate each section with a story which has a beg-mid-end.
6. Max four components for a one hour slot.
7. Target 45 min at most.
8. Design a story line and then build up slides.
9. Less patchwork (multiple image per slide).
10. Invest more time in preparation.
11. Design breaks, funny slide, question, knowledge base slide etc. E.g. American Idol used stand up comics to break up their intense show at regular intervals.
A guide for what to do when crafting new slides:
1. Decide on a question.
2. Think about the topic (it's usually in the back of my mind).
3. Craft story line.
4. Version 1.
5. Version 2 - better flow, consistent transitions, better photos etc.
Keep some short sequences as modules in a folder, it might be 4-5 well prepared slides which summarise the problem, process, data, solutions/progress. Easy to insert in any talk.
Thanks Otterman! These are most excellent pointers which I thought would be nice to share with others who may be doing slide presentations.
1. Prepare your next talk really well.
2. Have a clear message, define sections.
3. Define each section with a question which you answer.
4. Keep transitions consistent per section.
5. Illustrate each section with a story which has a beg-mid-end.
6. Max four components for a one hour slot.
7. Target 45 min at most.
8. Design a story line and then build up slides.
9. Less patchwork (multiple image per slide).
10. Invest more time in preparation.
11. Design breaks, funny slide, question, knowledge base slide etc. E.g. American Idol used stand up comics to break up their intense show at regular intervals.
A guide for what to do when crafting new slides:
1. Decide on a question.
2. Think about the topic (it's usually in the back of my mind).
3. Craft story line.
4. Version 1.
5. Version 2 - better flow, consistent transitions, better photos etc.
Keep some short sequences as modules in a folder, it might be 4-5 well prepared slides which summarise the problem, process, data, solutions/progress. Easy to insert in any talk.
Thanks Otterman! These are most excellent pointers which I thought would be nice to share with others who may be doing slide presentations.
Green Global Voices: Web 2.0 Environmental Activism
from the reuters environment blog
Kenyan blogger Juliana Rotich is the editor of Green Global Voices, which monitors citizen media in the developing world, and will be a regular contributor to these pages. ReutersThomson is not responsible for the content — the views are the author’s alone. We welcome her first blog.
Kenyan blogger Juliana Rotich is the editor of Green Global Voices, which monitors citizen media in the developing world, and will be a regular contributor to these pages. ReutersThomson is not responsible for the content — the views are the author’s alone. We welcome her first blog.
Monday, April 21, 2008
The Internet and Beyond
Howard Lee, Today Online 21 Apr 08;
Smugly, my brother-in-law sent me a YouTube link of a BBC documentary, debunking the environmental doom-sayers. Dutifully, I went online. Yes, it was a critique on Al Gore's much-touted An Inconvenient Truth. But, because I am a self-proclaimed tree-hugger, I immediately Googled for the antithesis to this conspiracy theory.
But while a seed of doubt has been planted, I cling to my take on global warming. I am also aware that my brother-in-law is no lumberjack, but he has probably watched one too many episodes of Mythbusters and enjoys the scientific deconstruction of everything.
But what strikes me about our exchange is how the Internet has become the centre in our quest for knowledge, and that with a click of a mouse, it provides us with opposite views of a belief.
And that piece of reality is a far cry from Low Chee Kong's article "PM Lee on Internet lessons" (April 14), which suggests that the Internet today has been used to propagate information that does not give due consideration to the political motivations of those who disseminate them.
Such a preposition forwards two assumptions: First, that information available online is more skewed towards one particular ideal or agenda, compared to non-online media. And second, that the key problem of such a bias is that readers will believe whole-heartedly with the agenda proposed.
Superficially, the first assumption holds true. Writers are human, subject to their own biases, and online, short attention spans do not take kindly to dual analyses. A writer makes his point as quickly as possible, and usually that which is of the greatest concern to him. The Internet hosts a variety of views that are often one-sided in coverage. But, the Internet must be viewed in the larger scheme of things. It is full of opinions, some in direct contradiction to each other.
This brings us to the second assumption. We too often assume that the information we see online is taken in whole by its audience. In reality, readers often engage in a selective process of accepting or denying the information they consume. This is influenced by pre-conceived ideas of what the information is about, and the beliefs and concerns they have when reading it.
A case in point is the recent Malaysian elections. While it is easy to assume that Malaysiakini played a big part in turning votes against the ruling party, the truth is that voters saw a connection between what they experience in life and what was written online. No amount of virtual cajoling could have convinced them.
More often than not, online readers find an easy connection with what they read, or choose to search to read. In fact, with the diversity of opinions on the Internet, the bigger worry is not those who have a reason to seek out and find affirmation with information that they already believe in. Rather, it is those who have yet to decide which side they want to take that should concern us.
The writer is a PR practitioner.
Smugly, my brother-in-law sent me a YouTube link of a BBC documentary, debunking the environmental doom-sayers. Dutifully, I went online. Yes, it was a critique on Al Gore's much-touted An Inconvenient Truth. But, because I am a self-proclaimed tree-hugger, I immediately Googled for the antithesis to this conspiracy theory.
But while a seed of doubt has been planted, I cling to my take on global warming. I am also aware that my brother-in-law is no lumberjack, but he has probably watched one too many episodes of Mythbusters and enjoys the scientific deconstruction of everything.
But what strikes me about our exchange is how the Internet has become the centre in our quest for knowledge, and that with a click of a mouse, it provides us with opposite views of a belief.
And that piece of reality is a far cry from Low Chee Kong's article "PM Lee on Internet lessons" (April 14), which suggests that the Internet today has been used to propagate information that does not give due consideration to the political motivations of those who disseminate them.
Such a preposition forwards two assumptions: First, that information available online is more skewed towards one particular ideal or agenda, compared to non-online media. And second, that the key problem of such a bias is that readers will believe whole-heartedly with the agenda proposed.
Superficially, the first assumption holds true. Writers are human, subject to their own biases, and online, short attention spans do not take kindly to dual analyses. A writer makes his point as quickly as possible, and usually that which is of the greatest concern to him. The Internet hosts a variety of views that are often one-sided in coverage. But, the Internet must be viewed in the larger scheme of things. It is full of opinions, some in direct contradiction to each other.
This brings us to the second assumption. We too often assume that the information we see online is taken in whole by its audience. In reality, readers often engage in a selective process of accepting or denying the information they consume. This is influenced by pre-conceived ideas of what the information is about, and the beliefs and concerns they have when reading it.
A case in point is the recent Malaysian elections. While it is easy to assume that Malaysiakini played a big part in turning votes against the ruling party, the truth is that voters saw a connection between what they experience in life and what was written online. No amount of virtual cajoling could have convinced them.
More often than not, online readers find an easy connection with what they read, or choose to search to read. In fact, with the diversity of opinions on the Internet, the bigger worry is not those who have a reason to seek out and find affirmation with information that they already believe in. Rather, it is those who have yet to decide which side they want to take that should concern us.
The writer is a PR practitioner.
Web guru targets malaria with social network site
John Joseph, Reuters 20 Apr 08;
LONDON (Reuters) - The British entrepreneur who sold a football Web site at the age of 17 for $40 million (20 million pounds) has switched his attention to help launch a social networking site on Sunday designed to fight malaria.
Tom Hadfield set up Soccer.net in his bedroom before selling it to U.S. sports network ESPN, but now hopes the power of sites such as Facebook can curb a disease that kills an estimated one million people a year, many of them in Africa.
"I believe in the power of friends telling friends telling friends," self-styled part-time student and full-time entrepreneur Hadfield told Reuters in an interview.
"Our dream is tens of thousands of people will use social networking tools to build a movement that eradicates malaria."
Now 25 and a fourth-year political science student at Harvard university, Hadfield came up with the idea for www.MalariaEngage.org after a trip to Zambia last summer that gave him a close-up look at the mosquito-born disease.
"Travelling across Africa and seeing the devastation caused by malaria made me realise there was more to life than putting up soccer scores," said Hadfield.
"Everyone I met at an aid project making mosquito nets in Zambia had either lost a child to malaria or knew someone who had."
Hadfield then travelled to Dar es Salaam in Tanzania where he met researchers working on malaria treatments and discovered that their efforts were being held back by a lack of resources.
"It's shocking that thousands of people are dying every day from a preventable disease," said Hadfield, who was honoured as Global Leader of Tomorrow by the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in 2001.
"When I came back from Africa last summer, a lot of people asked me what they can do to help."
The site encourages people to donate $10 or more to help support seven different research projects in Tanzania, such as developing plants like lemongrass to repel mosquitoes. But Hadfield sees MalariaEngage.org as more than a fundraising tool.
"MalariaEngage.org increases the return on investment of donors by connecting them directly with researchers working on malaria prevention treatment," said Hadfield.
"It's about more than about giving money -- it's about creating connections. By encouraging individual participation and involvement, we will create international communities of common interest. This is the essence of social networking."
The seven projects were recommended by Tanzania's National Institute for Medical Research and once those have been funded, MalariaEngage.org will look to support new schemes across developing countries.
Due to marry in November, Hadfield co-founded the site with health professors Peter A. Singer and Abdallah S. Daar at Canada's McLaughlin-Rotman Centre for Global Health at University Health Network as well as the University of Toronto.
"We feel young African scientists have very good ideas that end up in the dustbin," said Singer. "This is about helping committed young researchers with good ideas to help themselves create a better future."
(Reporting by John Joseph; Editing by Giles Elgood)
LONDON (Reuters) - The British entrepreneur who sold a football Web site at the age of 17 for $40 million (20 million pounds) has switched his attention to help launch a social networking site on Sunday designed to fight malaria.
Tom Hadfield set up Soccer.net in his bedroom before selling it to U.S. sports network ESPN, but now hopes the power of sites such as Facebook can curb a disease that kills an estimated one million people a year, many of them in Africa.
"I believe in the power of friends telling friends telling friends," self-styled part-time student and full-time entrepreneur Hadfield told Reuters in an interview.
"Our dream is tens of thousands of people will use social networking tools to build a movement that eradicates malaria."
Now 25 and a fourth-year political science student at Harvard university, Hadfield came up with the idea for www.MalariaEngage.org after a trip to Zambia last summer that gave him a close-up look at the mosquito-born disease.
"Travelling across Africa and seeing the devastation caused by malaria made me realise there was more to life than putting up soccer scores," said Hadfield.
"Everyone I met at an aid project making mosquito nets in Zambia had either lost a child to malaria or knew someone who had."
Hadfield then travelled to Dar es Salaam in Tanzania where he met researchers working on malaria treatments and discovered that their efforts were being held back by a lack of resources.
"It's shocking that thousands of people are dying every day from a preventable disease," said Hadfield, who was honoured as Global Leader of Tomorrow by the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in 2001.
"When I came back from Africa last summer, a lot of people asked me what they can do to help."
The site encourages people to donate $10 or more to help support seven different research projects in Tanzania, such as developing plants like lemongrass to repel mosquitoes. But Hadfield sees MalariaEngage.org as more than a fundraising tool.
"MalariaEngage.org increases the return on investment of donors by connecting them directly with researchers working on malaria prevention treatment," said Hadfield.
"It's about more than about giving money -- it's about creating connections. By encouraging individual participation and involvement, we will create international communities of common interest. This is the essence of social networking."
The seven projects were recommended by Tanzania's National Institute for Medical Research and once those have been funded, MalariaEngage.org will look to support new schemes across developing countries.
Due to marry in November, Hadfield co-founded the site with health professors Peter A. Singer and Abdallah S. Daar at Canada's McLaughlin-Rotman Centre for Global Health at University Health Network as well as the University of Toronto.
"We feel young African scientists have very good ideas that end up in the dustbin," said Singer. "This is about helping committed young researchers with good ideas to help themselves create a better future."
(Reporting by John Joseph; Editing by Giles Elgood)
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