United Nations mashups: Visualizing world challenges

April 8, 2008

It is quite exciting to see that the United Nations and their different branch-organizations are slowly harnessing the potential of the web in innovative ways. I have previously blogged about the idea of a huge interesting UN aggregator project and the UNDP water wiki during the last web4dv conference. To offer openly information sources and especially to visualize information is essential to understand our complex word from different perspectives.

Gapminder is a great example for that. And another one is the tactical technology collective with this booklet: Visualizing Information for Advocacy: An Introduction to Information Design.

It is promising to see that UN organizations such as UNEP follows the same steps and offers the Atlas of Our Changing Environment on Google Maps:

Through illustrations, satellite images, ground photographs and powered by Google Maps, this interactive media depicts and describes humanity’s past and present impact on the environment.

Today also UNHCR announced a mashup with Google Earth Outreach program, “which punveiled a powerful new online mapping programme that provides an up-close and multifaceted view of some of the world’s major displacement crises and the humanitarian efforts aimed at helping the victims.”

Here is the actual site, but you need Google Earth to load it.

Patrick Philippe Meier writes about it: “the next step for an iRevolution is to enable refugees to access this information on a regular basis. This need not require high-technology. The information could be broadcast by radio, for example.” I believe it will become even more effective when refugees themselves can add information and update those visualized contexts from their perspective.

One other excellent source was recently launched, UNdata, with over 55 million records and comprehensive statistics.

Search the web for global development topics

March 29, 2008

If you want to find decent information about development aid, Focuss.info is a good source to start from. Basically, it works with a customized Google search, which allows you to search only certain websites — in this case, within many websites relevant to development aid. Focuss.info, an initiative by the Overseas Development Institute ISS institute and in particular Richard Lalleman, goes one step further indexing websites from a community of social bookmarkers. So, through my del.icio.us account, I can contribute to the search easily with my bookmarks. Through a RSS feed, all of these bookmarks are added to the search engine.

The other day I got an email from Richard, telling me I was the social bookmarker of the month. Many thanks! To me, social bookmarking is one of the key tools of the participative web, which gives me valuable information. So, if you also share bookmarks and are interested in topics related to development, you should join this community. Send an email to: info(dot)focuss(at)gmail(dot)com.

And to conclude, for more information about the web2fordev conference, Arne Wunder and Paul Matthews gave a presentation about the evolutionary history of focuss.info.

Web2.0 - potentials or obstacles for connectivity?

March 25, 2008

The discussion about web2.0 and development is divided roughly into two groups. One argues for the potential of the social web and that finally the users shape the web and applications to their benefit. And the other side wonders what does web2.0 make for a difference in the field of ICT4D, and doubt whether the chit-chatting over blogs will change anything, and what is so new about it anyway. The skeptic people believe that connectivity shall be a primary concern. In my view, the latest developments are promising, whether they are called web2.0 is secondary. New innovations can make a difference in connectivity, however, the danger of repeating old mistakes exists.

I remember when Tariq Khokar Jackson from Aptivate said that the Web2fordev conference website can, with its 300 kB, take up to a minute to load from a dial up connection. In an interview, he underlines the importance of simplicity in webdesign and its obstacle for connectivity. To get an impression of what that means, you can use the Aptivate Low Bandwidth Simulator. I checked it through CNN.com and it took 4 minutes to load the website with a 20kb-normal-African-university-connection. I, myself, had an interesting experience when I was in South Africa last year. I was faced with volume packages for internet. Suddenly, a YouTube video was not a choice, and Skype calls were much shorter. I had to think it twice whether to go on overloaded fancy news sites or not.

So, what are some of the potentials and obstacles? I tried to list the points I could think of and hope you will have some other points to add.

Potentials

  • Websites become more lightweight, the separation of layout and content gives more ways to access.
  • Device independent publishing such as RSS feed.
  • Beta mode of websites focuses on its users and offers multiple channels to distribute and exchange information from Email to SMS.
  • Mashups allow to mix and filter content before it is delivered to its users. That means standard searches, feeds or information channels can be individually subscribed to get relevant content.
  • The fusion of mobile phones and the web allow new ways of access and interaction. Market information systems are one way, but tools, such as Twitter, open a two-way conversation.
  • There is a boost in languages, especially through open source software. Excellent publishing software is freely available in dozens of different languages such as Arabic, Swahili, etc. Web2.0 has a boost in forming own distinct language spaces.
  • The personal computer plays less of a role with new innovations such as software on a USB flash sticks or web based software.

Kevin Painting makes a good point in this post:

In a delicious irony, the Web2.0 paradigm to move the “desktop” from the PC to the Internet has created (for some) a host of seemingly old fashioned problems of connectivity which, of course, are the daily lot of many in developing countries. To wit, in a Web2.0 world, when all your programs and files are on the Internet, what do you do when you can’t connect to the Internet? There is much activity now to develop applications that work seamlessly in an on-line/off-line world that will be of enormous utility to developing countries where lack of access to the Internet is not an occasional nuisance but a daily reality. The big players have been very active here: Google with its Gears application, Adobe with Air, Microsoft with Silverlight. We can only look to developments here with heightened anticipation.

By the way, this paragraph is part of a blog post series about a “One Laptop Per Farmer” by Hans Jörg Neun, who is director of CTA.

Obstacles

  • The major concern certainly is the bandwidth issue which, nowadays, websites need. Websites not only have many photos but also widgets and many third party applications.
  • Podcasts and video streaming is in many places extremely pricy. For example, in South Africa only volume tariffs are offered.
  • To interact fully in the particapative web, one needs to be frequently online. Most of it becomes even instant communication and leaves out those who have only sporadic access.
  • Most resources are invested in new fancy and high bandwidth applications, and less into innovative lightweight applications for small connectivity.
  • Often, important rules of usability are left aside and websites are confusing and overloaded.

I am sure there are more points and hope you can add some. But, I think there are further challenges, which I wrote in a post bak in January.

Is mobile development repeating ICT4D errors?

March 16, 2008

In the mobile and development list of Dgroups, Prof. Richard Heeks wrote this message recently:

There’s a notion that “m-Development” will be more attuned to the needs and context of users than was the initial round of ICT4D projects (what we might call “ICT4D 1.0″). But I wonder if, in fact, some of the some mistakes aren’t being repeated. I’ve come across a couple of project descriptions in recent days - using mobiles in the health sector in South Africa; using them in the agricultural sector in West Africa - where the projects have been designed and driven by technical staff, and which turned out to be technically well beyond both the technological and human infrastructural readiness of their intended user settings. This techno-centric approach was a characteristic of the first ICT4D projects, and it would be disappointing if the m-development field equally started to get ahead of itself; forgetting that the main uses in poor communities are voice and, to some degree, SMS on basic handsets.

This triggered an interesting discussion among some of the people who were in the list. For example, Steve Song, who has an interesting new blog, wrote:

I think you will always get technocentrics chasing new ideas and applications of technology without a clue about development, just as you will get development people chasing new ideas without a clue about technology.

I think that the difference with m-development is that you stand a) a closer chance of developing something scalable, affordable in developing countries and b) you potentially open the doors to innovation simply by putting tools in play, witness beeping, SMSing, air-time transfers, m-Pesa. Jan Chipchase of Nokia Research points out that Nokia has no idea what the future of mobiles looks like. They are trying to design to enable innovation.

And Patricia Mechael added to the discussion:

Often times, people start with the technology and look for ways to apply it to address development objectives rather than looking at development objectives and then identifying tools (high and low tech) to help leverage their achievement. In relation to mobile phones one area that has not been well studied or documented is the role of basic two-way voice communication within a broad range of development activities.

Anthony Makumbi emphasized the importance of livelihood:

My view is the only way this can be avoided is to build technology on existing livelihood development programs. Technology comes in to enhance particular areas of the livelihood programs. Here you are introducing technology to the end user with a direct meaning unlike projects designed from the blue with different sentiments and imaginations, with no direct fit with the normal livelihoods of communities. With that said, with the mobile phone there is great potential in getting a direct community fit and with the current penetration rates of the Mobile phone in Africa, there is a mass opportunity in the adoption rate within rural communities.

In my opinion, ICT4D had many challenges in the past, but nowadays there are more opportunities to do differently. Two decisive developments are mobile phones and web2.0. One allows finally massive access, sharing information and communication technologies, and the other brings the potentials for collaboration and a multitude of creative applications to its users.

kiwanjalongtail.jpg

Ken Banks from kiwanja.net has an fascinating post about “Social mobile and the long tail“, where he argues the great potential of low cost solutions with mobile phones, and made this excellent graphic. He writes, “Solutions are tantalisingly close, but without the tools and a practical helping hand, most of these NGOs remain passive observers.”
Two interesting events around this event will be held this year. One is a conference organized by W3 called “Workshop on the Role of Mobile Technologies in Fostering Social Development” and another is the MobileActive08: Unlocking the Potential of Mobiles for Social Impact.

Web2.0 and development studies

February 4, 2008

In my last post I argued that the collaborative web has its implications for development aid. And yesterday I read an interesting article by Mark Thompson from the University of Cambridge titled “ICT and development studies: towards development2.0.” The article is an attempt to highlight the potentials of the web for development, its push for openness and collaboration will effect development aid and at the end this can fit in an theoretical framework of development studies. Most interesting to me is his argument about how the “philosophy”, “approach” or “pressure” - or however you want to call it - behind web2.0 goes way beyond using ICT more efficiently in development work: It does influence and ultimately will push forward a different approach to development.

The key insight here is that in its emerging Web 2.0 form, ICT can no longer be conceived as assemblages of hardware, software, and user behaviour. Viewed instead as an ‘architecture of participation’, ICT becomes an opportunity for generating, mediating and moderating a particular paradigm of social life; and this paradigm poses a direct challenge to much of the way in which ‘development’, with its associated visions for social life and supporting infrastructure, has been conceptualised and delivered to date. As public goods and services, developmental initiatives are arguably subject to modern, ICT-driven critiques about the need for public service reform such as Leadbeater and Cottam’s The User Generated State: Public Services 2.0 (2007), which calls for a shift from the focus on ‘delivery’ during the last ten years (also seen in the developmental discourse) to a focus on ‘co-creation’.

My contention is therefore that the increasing ubiquity of ICT within development has implications that extend even beyond its role as mediator of economic, social, and political opportunity. Conceived as ‘Web 2.0’, a paradigm for technology-enabled social life comprising diversity, collaboration, and multiple truths, ICT now poses a direct challenge to development studies itself, demanding attention to ways in which, in the future, Web 2.0 models may drive increasing calls for a much more plural and collaborative Development 2.0. The next section

The whole article can be downloaded here.

Not English, but a multilingual social web is the key for collaboration

December 17, 2007

The social web is quite separated in different language domains. English is a key language to bridge different cultures, but it can also be a dead end. Worldwide collaboration can only work in a multilingual network.

English is one of the major languages on the net, whether it is on blogs, social networks or the chitchat on twitter. But languages are still breeding fast though the social web; the Japanese blogosphere is one of the biggest ones, for example, Google’s social network, Orkut, is the biggest in Brazil and India. Tanzania is also one example for a vibrant Swahili blogosphere. Chinese mandarin will be the most spoken language on the web. Global Voices is one of the few websites trying to connect cultures. Volunteer translators give insights to countries and cultures where usual media outlets do not report from.

But let’s have a look at the issue of language. Dave Gray has a nice visualization for different dimension of language here. He drew the four steps of language:

  1. Communication
  2. Conversation
  3. Collaboration
  4. Co-creation

On this United Nation website for cultural diversity it says, “Language not only communicates, it defines culture, nature, history, humanity and ancestry.” There are between 6.000 and 7.000 spoken languages on this world and unfortunately half of them are in threat of extinction. Language is fundamental for the collaborative web. It can enrich a discourse through blogs.

Translating machines have improved significantly. One example is the google translation for Arabic. But when it comes to collaboration, it is up to users to find a way to interact. How can we achieve this multilingual web? It needs a high language skill to collaborate effectively and creatively. A long tail of language has emerged. The future focus should be on networks with cross language interaction. Each language has a unique set of concepts, beliefs and expressions, which risk to be lost if all relies only on English.

So it is a dilemma. On one way English allows us to communicate worldwide, but at the same time it narrows down the potential for collaboration by simply contradicting cultural diversity. It greatly connects worldwide people, however, it is limited to small proportions of web users capable to read and write in English. I am personally in the same dilemma. I would love to blog in German — as being it my native language, my writing is much better — but I decided to blog in English to be able to network in this vast social network. Mixing languages can be possible as we have done it through the web2fordev conference blog, but even for that blog it was quite difficult to get French speaking authors involved.

Here it is an interesting statistic for the main languages in the Internet. There is a tendency towards a few strong languages. There are four languages not based on Latin characters. By the way, it took more than ten years after the Internet’s major breakthrough for ICANN to announced on the Internet Governance Forum to offer internationalized country code for top-level domains — and this just happened recently. This would mean that Chinese or Arabic letters become possible in domains. Ethan Zuckerman wrote more on that, and here, the UNESCO.

internet-languages.jpg

At last, languages are also important to protect our environment and can be decisive to preserve our biodiversity.

The links between language, culture and the environment suggest that biological, cultural and linguistic diversity should be studied together, as distinct but closely and necessarily related manifestations of the diversity of life on Earth. Researchers have referred to this new field of study as “biocultural diversity”.

Notes from the web4dev conference

December 3, 2007

Continuing with the web4dev conference in Nairobi, I wanted to add some more personal perspectives. During the conference, on the second day, twenty different workshops were offered. We, Nynke and I, gave a presentation that same day, and as with most other sessions, not many people showed up. We highlighted some lessons we had learnt at the web2fordev conference and showed different examples which will be described further in a future post. From my impressions, many tools of social media were presented, but the philosophy of openness and sharing and the implications for a new era of collaboration had not yet arrived to the web4dev conference. Still, there were promising signs such as the water wiki from UNDP.

There were a lot of interesting people, as well as some examples worth mentioning. One interesting workshop I attended was about the idea for a huge United Nations aggregator, “One Source,” collecting information from all UN organizations. All these agencies such as UNHCR, UNAIDS –just to mention a few– have different IT-systems, content management systems, etc. The idea is to develop common schemes (XML) so all information is available in RSS-Feeds. These feeds would be a independent platform for different devices and can be sorted through all the existing ontologies or taxonomies from the different UN-organisations. Quite an ambitious project, which shall be launched in January 2010. One aspect about it that I liked in particular, is that it will allow to localize feeds, which can be nicely done with mashups through yahoo pipes.

Another session, which was also very interesting, was held by Christopher Fabian from UNICEF, whom I unfortunately missed. But luckily he came to our presentation and told us a bit about his interesting projects. It is all about giving young people a voice in developing countries through the web.

These tools “include using mobile phones to collect data from young people, bootable USB sticks that turn any laptop into a radio station, and technologies to allow people with landlines or mobile phones to record stories onto the Internet.”

For that, one great example is “Our Stories,” which is a “collaborative project that leverages new digital technologies to help capture and preserve individual stories from around the world.” They had a nice video showing to many storytellers a flight around the world; unfortunately it is not on the web. Another tool, which was mainly developed with partner organizations in South Africa, is a poll feature that can be accessed and retrieved via mobile phones. The full list of the tools is here.

The first day of the discussion was very much about connectivity and the great challenges on which especially many countries in African focus in that regard. But from having different conversations with many different participants, I concluded once again that the situation varies from country to country. Whereas in some countries through competition the prices are very high, in others, such as Sudan, there are four providers competing for low prices and offering the mobile web everywhere in Sudan.

I also met Helene Karamagi and beside from exchanging some iphone hacking tips, I asked her about the ICT4D in Uganda. She gave me some interesting insights I would like to share here. From her point of view, Africa is going to face promising times when it comes to ICT4D. Her sister runs the famous Brosdi example presented on the web2fordev conference. The following three points she highlighted for Uganda:

  1. In Uganda, by next year, all local districts will be connected to the Internet. This will enable a new way for information sharing between rural and urban areas.
  2. This means that there will be a high demand for web solutions and all sorts of applications that will lead to a rise on new enterprises in that domain.
  3. Whereas in the beginning it was to NGOs, slowly the private sector is getting involved asking how to contribute to ICT4D. It is entrepreneurs, who try to develop business models for connectivity and web solution, which make profit and are potentially more sustainable.

Once again, it shows that information and communication technologies develop very different on industrialized countries. Whereas in Germany companies watch out for the best ring-tone business model, many essential, valuable and innovative ICT-solution are on the rise in developing countries. David Galipeau, who I met first on the little barcamp kind of event before the conference, underlines this development and says that it is on the eighty per cent of the south where the future innovations will come from and not the 20 per cent of the north. By the way he just started a foundation called eighty20.org.

From small to big engagement - big players are entering the web2fordev field

October 27, 2007

This week two interesting web2.0 projects for development were released. One is a new website from Ebay called MicroPlace, and the other is a new blog called ideas 4 development. Slowly, big players such as development organizations or companies use web2.0 technology to promote discussions around development or to bundle their capacity to leverage the power of micro-financing.

Ideas 4 development
Some days ago I got an email from Quentin Lebègue telling me about a new blog:

I read your post “an overview of blogging for development“. You’re right, there are not a lot of blogs about development. I wanted to present you a new collective and international blog on development: Ideas for development.

At first, I was surprised about the “viral marketing” for such a “top” blog, but then I was also impressed about how people behind it take the blogosphere and its networked conversations serious. I read some of its articles and followed with interest that the posts from people such as Pascal Lamy from the WTO have triggered some first discussions. I could not find any provocative comments or expressions of doubt or frustration as Pierre Jacquet (Chief Economist - Agence Francaise de Developpement) said on the launching press conference:

“The heads of development organizations are sometimes portrayed as inaccessible bureaucrats, who decide among themselves on the faith of the world’s poorest nations. Through this blog the members will openly share their ideas, their doubts and even their frustrations manifesting their interest for dialogue with other development professionals, students and the broader public. We hope that this initiative will be the provider of fresh ideas and a catalyst for improvements in the way multilateral and bilateral organizations, as well as their partners in the south, see development. This blog is in your hand let’s begin the debate.”

I find that the approach of the blog goes in the right direction and this blog will lead to an authentic conversation, if the above taken statement is meant serious. The need for an open dialogue is obvious or inescapable. The discussion will be held anyway and its audience is on the rise, even the old media is following it. Therefore, I wonder why is it limited to the directors of such organizations? I am curious what the outcome would be? Will it then be used as a feedback mechanism? Will the comments be back channelled to the development organizations and lead to change? For example, so far, not a single commenter seems to have an answer, and some blog posts are pretty close to a public relation message.

MicroPlace - Invest Wisely. End Poverty.
The second interesting news this week was about a platform for microfinance called MicroPlace, where according to Ebay “you can make investments that reach millions of hard-working poor people worldwide.” It is an interesting attempt to widen the scope of peer to peer lending, to connect lenders and grant seekers worldwide in a transparent process. NextBillion.net describes in their interesting post the difference between Microplace and Kiva.

Big players - a shift in the web2fordev field?
These two examples show that slowly conventional and rather big actors are harnessing the potential of web2.0 for development. Small agile players such as Kiva.org and many fascinating blogs out there proved the innovative and network potential of web2.0 tools. I wonder whether they will be capable of a two way conversation and whether their work mode is web2.0 compatible, as there is so little about tools and much more about culture. Granting Oxfam and Care, guests commentary fields, are just the beginning. Organizations gradually will have to interact with a multitude of actors ranging from individual activists, groups, NGOs, business and so forth.
So far the most innovative ideas came from individuals or teams, and the Internet helps millions of people to benefit from this ideas. However, in the case of MicroPlace, “a new peer-to-peer lending platform backed by eBay that has gone through all the necessary SEC regulatory hoops that make it possible for investors to invest in these individuals and make a return on their investment.” I wonder to which extend the capacity is needed to get these platforms established. So far, to me, the strength lies in social networks through blogs and all kinds of innovative platforms driven by enthusiasts.

3 different conversations: blogs to fight poverty

October 8, 2007

Thanks to Tom L. and Peter Ballantayne for their very interesting remarks on my post “an overview of blogging for development.” Peter argued that there are a lot different blogs in development aid or international cooperation out there and “must be loads more, just not very visible.” And Tom had a great point:

What’s probably as important as noting the existence of the blogs themselves is tracking the development of the aid-development blogosphere, examining the connections (strength, regularity, theme) between blogs and seeing if there are purposive and deliberate communities building out there. Not many groups are actually taking aggregation a step further and building connections and seeking to create value to the profession from the new-found willingness to share online.

I agree with Peter that there is probably much more of it out there, but I criticize that in most cases it is not linked and therefore has no networks. And as Tom rightly points out, there is little knowledge sharing and discourse between different bloggers, different organizations. I give you three examples how different the approaches are and what is behind them. I analyzed all three blogs with technorati.com and aiderss.com to find out about their network and discussions.

Blog World Hunger
This blog is from the International Food Policy Research Institute. They also presented their web2.0 approach on the web2fordev conference. They have been experimenting with blogs internally for knowledge sharing for already some years. This internal blogging seemed to me quite vibrant since it involves a lot of staff. However, when you look at the external blog, you have a complete contrast. Six posts and seven comments in 2007. I wonder why they even use a blog and not a normal website. In Technorati, it has 9 blog reactions in 2007 (other blogs linking to it), and in del.icio.us it has been bookmarked only one time (from me!).
Certainly not a blog to network nor discuss the issue of world hunger with a broader community. For example it does not link to any other blog. It seems to be a place to just drop various documents and articles.

The following two blogs are very different in which one is grassroot driven and the other from the World Bank.

William Kamkwamba’s Malawi Windmill Blog
This is a blog about William Kamkwamba, the 19-year-old self-taught engineer who built a windmill power system for his family’s home in Malawi. His story was broadcasted at the TEDGlobal 2007 in Tanzania. (Check out all the other great presentations). His blog, which started back in June, got over 222 blog reactions according to Technorati. It has been commented 52 times and it has been bookmarked 48 times in del.icio.us. No doubt that that blog is a great storyteller and invites to read and interact. It also clearly is meant to support William in his eduction. Furthermore, it has been nicely embedded into the wider blogosphere and the result is remarkable. It has big attention.

End poverty in South Asia blogEnd poverty in South Asia
This is a blog run by the Shanta Devarajan, the Chief Economist of the South Asia Region at the World Bank. His statement “End poverty in one generation. It can be done in one generation” makes the goal clear. It is quite an offensive approach for an organization such as the world bank in my opinion. This has triggered already 49 comments two 12 posts since it started in September, and it has aroused over 20 blog reactions so far. Similar to William’s blog and in contrast to the world hunger blog, it gives a personal perspective, and evokes feedback. However, I am curious to see how an organization such as the world bank will keep such an open discourse and how it can contribute:

This is why I am starting this blog. To contribute to the debate (sometimes, to start one) with ideas, analysis and evidence so that South Asians—and people who care about South Asia—can have a dialogue on these critically important issues, so that together we can end poverty in South Asia. (Shanta Devarajan)

In conclusion, I think blogs are used in more and more different ways. However, blogs are often not part of networks nor refer to each other. The communication is a one way street or the discourse is not happening in a social network of blogs. And interestingly there is still a wide gap between the many piles of documents for development themes and the few pioneers tempting to have a two way conversation about development.

Development aid 2.0

October 2, 2007

I was interviewed by the Deutsche Welle (German version) last week during the web2fordev conference. As a result from the interview, an interesting article was deutsche-welle.pngpublished (Entwicklungshilfe 2.0) in which not only the potential of web2.o in the context of development is discussed, but it is also questioned whether web2.o will do a shift to development aid in general. Interesting point I thought, and a bit visionary. “With the access to information,” the author writes, “development aid can come closer to its goal to help for self help.”

The articles also describes a bit the work of Kabissa in Africa, and emphasizes the potentials for organisations to network more effectively and share knowledge. I know, from my working experience with civil society in Egypt, that cooperation between civil society is a key factor, therefore I am very curious to see how this will develop within the next years. Right now it seems to me that it is often driven by the diaspora or development agencies although there are many great grassroot initiatives.

The article in general does not grasp exactly the implications of we2.0 for development aid. It mixes up different notions of development. But, on the other hand, it highlights the two way conversation for development and what it could mean for development organizations to be much better connected with beneficiaries and obtain direct feedback. But as I questioned before on a panel of the web2fordev conference, “Web2.0 offers and relies on open communication and knowledge sharing. Therefore it has great potential for participation and innovation. But are development organizations ready for this kind of openness?”

Full article translated by google

web2fordev conference impressions (2)

September 30, 2007

Complexity
Another key lesson was the big question of ‘how to best combine all these web2.0 tools to obtain better results.’ Everybody is still experimenting –this might be what web2.0 is all about. Nevertheless, I understood the importance of taking a holistic approach and use a combination of blogs according to the objective. So, flickr nynkekruiderinkexperimenting still needs a strategic approach; in that way users do not fear an information overload. Blogs, for example, can be used for knowledge sharing, but then they may need to be very different when used for a campaign. And how are wikis and blogs linked to preserve transparency? I did not hear about strategies for best combining all the tools using available data and rss feeds. How do I offer all these channels for collaboration and still filter what is important to me? This has to be overcome to prove the benefit and not just use the technology for the sake of it.

I had the feeling everybody shared an enthusiasm for the potential that development can have, but I also only saw a few clear structured projects. A complete contrast to that was Damir Simunic, who talked about Collaboration on the Edge of Network. He basically argued that web2.0 is still too far away from broad usage by presenting a tool relying solely on emails, which has enough capabilities. Even though I find email is often an information overload application, Damir gave an interesting example: at the WHO, a 20.000 people network manages over easy mailing lists and easy features, proving traditional ways can be successful, especially in developing countries.

Networks
Dan McQuillan wrote a powerful wake up post and summarized very good the strategic questions about ‘dealing now with the available possibilities through web2.0.’ To me, it seems the power of web2.0 has been shared by most participants, but what could be done with it now and how to engage it was still unclear. In my panel, I asked therefore, whether organizations are open to sharing, willing to network and engage in such a participative manner. The conference showed how web2.0 brings an unusual mixture of individuals (e.g. activists), organizations, media and companies together. It needs a change in culture towards more openness and trust, which is not always easy –after all, who wants to or can accept that his or her wiki text has suddenly changed?
Collaboration through web2.0 is happening between a diversified landscape of these actors, and I wonder what will be the outcome of that. I liked the way Dan quotes Charles Leadbeater on ‘low-cost, self-organising networks will innovate all kinds of needed solutions.’ I hope that this innovation will be open source driven.

Content
Interestingly, there were few discussions about content. What is the type of content that will be delivered, shared and remixed through web2.0? What kind of content is there and how can it be virtually exchanged in a rather oral culture? Moses Kisembo and Jon Corbett summarized it nicely in a discussion we had. What helps all these new forms of information and technology when one does not know how to use them, and then it does not have any benefit, e.g. for a farmer? The question of relevance of all this user generated content was rarely discussed. Ethan Zuckermann emphasized in his presentation how important filters in this regard are. How to filter the information or voices to a meaningful size to find all that that is important to me. Aggregators can help, and so do social bookmarking sites, which show evaluated ranked webistes. More important are however, people, who sort, comment and translate content and make sense and relevance in the growing sea of information.

However, I imagine too that feeds and tagging can help. And as fast as the web developed, more things are coming up such as rss manipulation. That means, you drag data from different sources and with the sum of it, you make something better. And that is also what Michael Saunby’s presentation showed. With a mix of rss and data, manipulation fascinating new geographical information can be generated. These mashups can be mixed with all kind of freely available information sources, and as with Michael Saunby’s case, allow individual climate change analysis.

web2fordev conference impressions (1)

September 29, 2007

flickr nynkekruiderink Unfortunately, I did not have the opportunity to blog during the web2fordev conference. Organization work was more than what I expected, and of course there were so many interesting people to talk to around, I just couldn’t let go. Favourably, we got about 50 blog posts mainly from our journalists, who came from different African countries, and who of course did a great job reporting. Now some sessions can be watched completely over video (unfortunately only Internet explorer though). The week started with an interesting web taster day, and went through many more topics ending the week, yesterday, with a farmer led documentation workshop from Dorine Rüter. Interesting cases were presented, of how farmers in Africa use digital cameras to document and create awareness of their problems in order to help each other. Let me now summarize impressions from theses days at the FAO in Rome.

Inclusion
Seen by many people just as a technology, the web2fordev conference proved to me -once again- that people are more minded and complying when gathered together for so-called web2.0. The conference–even with the official and formal character it has within the FAO headquarter–got a neat unconference character; as the the director of FAO communication said at the end, “This halls have not seen this kind of event before.” It was a good mixture of people from many different backgrounds. There could have been more activists and pioneers in my opinion, but the conference fortunately attracted many people from all around the world.

Patience
Through the days, I felt again that we are still at the bottom or ground work of the using web2.0 for development. Many participants had just started experimenting with blogs, etc. by themselves, and had an understandable difficulty to grasp web2.0 in all its dimensions. Therefore, some discussions went not as deep as I wished, but the different perspectives were valuable. There was often a mixture of scepticism and enthusiasm. Will wikis make sense one day? How much trust do we need to place on wikis , and can we even establish that only virtually? Where is the audience for blogs and how can I filter all that information? That way, on one side, participants helped each other to make sense of all these tools, and on the other, sophisticated database RSS models were presented by Thierry Helmer or Thomas Metz. I wonder how can we cope with the challenge of having so many tools developed in such a short time? Many people are certainly not disposed or cannot follow.

Web2.0 in the field
The conference showed me clearly that a lot has been done in and between organizations. That is where the potential and the easiest implementation lies. There are a few projects in developing countries that have not yet implemented web2.0, but unless obvious challenges are not bridged, it will be difficult to implement more. It was, therefore, helpful and quite realistic to hear from Moses Kisembo and Kado Muir that blogs and wikis are not seldom light-years away from what is needed in Uganda or Nigeria. Nevertheless, bloggers such as Prince Deh from Ginks show how important this pioneer work can be. One high hope at the conference, which was often mentioned, was the mobile phone. Some presentations had in my opinion more of traditional web approach, but there were also many exceptional interesting cases such as Brosdi .org, which is supported by Bellanet. Market information systems and knowledge sharing via questions and answers (e.g. audioblogging from India) were the strongest examples in terms of rural development. One major success factor was that it has a benefit for the community, and in that way they are willing to contribute.

Please check the web2fordev blog for more information. There have been 50 posts written around the conference. Nynke Kruiderink and I give a little interview on tagging.


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