By Ismael Peña-López (@ictlogist), 28 November 2006
Main categories: Connectivity, Hardware, ICT4D
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Mireia Fernández-Ardèvol is researcher at the Interdisciplinary Internet Institute, where she’s assistant to Prof. Manuel Castells, and Lecturer in Econometrics at the University of Barcelona.
She’s now published, along with Manuel Castells, Jack Linchuan Qiu and Araba Sey, the book Mobile Communication and Society and has kindly accepted to answer some questions about the book and about the use of mobile phones for development. Here they go:
Question: The book’s presentation says that Mobile Communication and Society looks at how the possibility of multimodal communication from anywhere to anywhere at any time affects everyday life
. Can you summarize 392 pages into 3.92 lines? ;)
Answer: Of course I can’t… But here you are some of our main findings:
Having a mobile phone, at least in developed countries where nowadays it is a personal device, means having Relentless Connectivity. Put it simply, we are available 24 hours a day, as well as our contacts are.
Communication is held among the different nodes of our Network of Choice. For instance, some times we prefer to call a friend asking for some indications to get a specific address than to talk to the bus driver.
As we are nodes of a network, we can establish Instant Communities of Practice. Flash mobs are one example, as well as it were the concentrations in front of the headquarters of the Spanish conservative party PP, in the evening of the 13th of March, 2003.
In this context, the Blurring of the Social Context of Individual Practice increases and our different everyday-life-roles are mixed. For instance, a security guard talks to her boyfriend without need of asking permission to her supervisor; students can communicate with other friends outside the classroom and do, at least, two different activities simultaneously, etc.
Q: Surely wireless technologies and applications are not used the same way everywhere, and thus their impact is different two. Could you point the main divergences in use and/or impact between developed and developing countries?
A: In developing countries, among less wealthy segments of population, the mobile phone is the first private telephone available to the family. It allows not only outcome calls but, most important, incoming calls. It is very often a collective device, thus all the members of the family use it… normally as it were a fixed telephone. However, sometimes the handset becomes mobile and goes out of home, often under the mother’s supervision.
On the other hand, boom calls (those made not to be answered) are used not only for fun but also in business. A customer could make a boom call to the milkman to order some milk. Usually, they had previously agreed the meaning of the boom call in order to avoid misunderstandings.
Finally, it is worth to point that in developing countries having a handset is not essential, and the SIM card would be enough to guarantee communication. A SIM card can be used in a mobile payphone, there you can also check if somebody has called you or has sent you an SMS. The SIM card works under a prepayment system so the expenses are kept totally under control.
All in all, the main difference between rich and poor users is that, among rich people mobile telephony is a complementary technology while for the poor it is an affordable substitute of the expensive, and sometimes inexistent, fixed telephony.
Q: Recently, some interesting books on wireless solutions for de developing world ([1], [2]) have been published. What do you think of initiatives such as Grameen’s Village Phone?
A: Around developing countries some innovative and fairly effective mechanisms and products are emerging to address the problem of telecommunication access. Some operators in there have begun to offer scaled down services, as in China (the Little Smart phone) and India (Wireless Local Loop telephony). But there are also grassroots’ projects, as the successful Grameen’s Village Phone program. Created in Bangladesh, it has been adopted in some other countries, as Uganda, South Africa and Ghana, in the same or in a modified form.
There is, indeed, a common agreement that this kind of initiatives increase consumer surplus as a result of reduced communication costs, and improve access to business information, while service providers have gained additional income (up to 40% of household income) as well as social and economic empowerment, especially in gender terms.
Q: Thus, “leapfrogging”: buzzword or keyword?
A: Time will say, but up to day what we can say is that landscape in some parts of Africa has changed. In the main street in a tiny rural town you can usually see two or three mobile payphones, and an antenna in the top on the nearest hill. There is a lot of activity around these mobile payphones.
Indeed, there is not overwhelming evidence to support the leapfrog hypothesis in terms of eliminating stages of economic development. However, and following Coyle (2005) 
(2.7 Mb), one of the most important identifiers of the potential developmental impact of mobile telephony could be its contribution to moving developing countries as close as possible to universal telecommunications service, which has been shown to have been the critical mass level at which telecommunications began to exhibit significant impacts on economic growth in advanced economies [emphasis is mine].
Q: And what’s next? Where does research on wireless networks in the field of ICT4D head to?
A: Three studies I would recommend you:
And three general resources:
Thanks a lot for your time!
See also
By Ismael Peña-López (@ictlogist), 28 November 2006
Main categories: Connectivity, Hardware, ICT4D
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The MIT press has just published a new book in their The Information Revolution & Global Politics series, directed by William J. Drake and Ernest J. Wilson III.
Written by Manuel Castells, Mireia Fernández-Ardèvol, Jack Linchuan Qiu and Araba Sey, the book is describes the mobile revolution and how being constantly connected has affected our lives, getting into deep detail on who’s connected and how do they use this ubiquitous technology.
For ICT4D practitioners and researchers, chapters 7 — The Mobile Civil Society:
Social Movements, Political Power, and Communication Networks — and 8 — Wireless Communication and Global Development: New Issues, New Strategies — are of special interest as they deal with participation, development and social empowerment in general.
See also
By Ismael Peña-López (@ictlogist), 23 October 2006
Main categories: Connectivity, Hardware, ICT4D
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Most of us still remember — and will for a long time — the book Wireless Networking in the Developing World, created 100% in a decentralised way by people scattered all over the world, free to download or printable through Lulu.
Rob Flickenger and Marco Zennaro did it again, this time joining efforts with Enrique Canessa and Martin Belcher in the editorial coordination, as long as many other contributors. The book is called How To Accelerate Your Internet: A practical guide to Bandwidth Management and Optimization using Open Source Software. I here copy the official release note:
The BMO Book Sprint Team is pleased to announce the release of the new free book, “How To Accelerate Your Internet: A practical guide to Bandwidth Management and Optimization using Open Source Software”. The book was released in October 2006 under a Creative Commons license, and was written in an effort to help network architects understand and troubleshoot problems with managing Internet bandwidth, which often result in unnecessarily high operational costs in the developing world.
Network connections are very expensive in most parts of the world, and it is often costly and difficult to add additional network capacity. Therefore, effective management and optimization of bandwidth is crucial. Research and education benefit significantly from Internet resources, yet the majority of institutions take little or no action to manage their bandwidth usage. This waste results in high operating costs, slow network connections, and frustrated network users.
The goal of the book is to provide practical information on how to gain the largest possible benefit from your connection to the Internet. By prioritizing certain kinds of network activity, reducing the impact of spam and viruses, providing local content caching, and performing extensive monitoring and analysis of network usage, Internet consumption can be brought to manageable levels. This makes it possible to provide equitable access for all users, even when the available bandwidth is quite small.
But technical solutions only solve part of the problem. In order to prioritize network traffic, an organization needs to have a clear idea of the intended purpose of the network connection, as well as insight into how the connection is being used. The book addresses this complex topic by covering the three major components of effective bandwidth management: Effective policy, extensive monitoring & analysis, and solid network implementation. In addition, troubleshooting techniques, advanced performance tuning tips and tricks, and real-world case studies are also provided.
The Book Sprint began with online correspondence via email, which led to an initial face-to-face meeting of bandwidth management experts from around the world in May 2006. Intense online collaboration followed over the next few months, which then culminated in the production of the 300 page printed book, as well as a PDF and HTML version. The book was sponsored by the International Network for the Availability of Scientific Publications (http://inasp.info), and was produced in association with the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics (http://www.ictp.it), Aidworld (http://www.aidworld.org), and Hacker Friendly LLC (http://hackerfriendly.com). By releasing this work under a Creative Commons license, the Book Sprint Team hopes to disseminate it as widely as possible, bringing this information into the hands of people who need it most.
The book can be downloaded for free, or a printed copy may be purchased at the book’s website: http://bwmo.net
Related to this, Marco Zennaro also points me to a conference given by Les Cottrell (SLAC) in Trieste back in October 9, 2006. Entitled Bandwidth Challenges and Internet World Records it deals with actual broadband challenges and what can Internet2 bring. It is tough stuff for non-techies, and files are quite heavy, but at least a quick view to the slides should be done (full presentation is 54’30” long).
By Ismael Peña-López (@ictlogist), 10 July 2006
Main categories: Connectivity, Digital Divide, e-Readiness, Hardware, ICT4D
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New report developed by the International Telecommunication Union, the UNCTAD, the Ministry of Information and Communications of the Republic of Korea and the Agency for Digital Opportunity & Promotion (KADO).
This report charts progress towards the Information Society, in response to the call by the WSIS Geneva Plan of Action, for evaluation and international benchmarking, as well as the need for monitoring of WSIS follow-up and implementation (noted in the WSIS outcome documents). It evaluates access to telecommunications and digital opportunity in 180 economies worldwide in the context of the WSIS targets and Millennium Development Goals. It presents the Digital Opportunity Index, as called for by the WSIS Geneva Plan of Action, paragraph 28, and considers the policy implications for the further evolution of the Information Society. It reviews WSIS implementation and follow-up in different countries, and considers efforts to promote ICT development. It also presents the latest available data on 180 economies worldwide.
It is intended that the “The World Information Society Report” will be an annual publication.
So, it seems that the transition from the Digital Access Index and the Digital Opportunity Index has been done. Nevertheless, looking at who is backing the new report and, hence, the DOI, I guess there’s still some time until the Partnership on Measuring ICT for Development becomes really functional. I suppose it’s likely that next edition will be signed by the Partnership in its whole.
Digital Opportunity Index 2005. Source: World Information Society Report 2006
[click to enlarge]
The main two reflections that come to mind — besides the most evident about the digital divide and wealth distribution/opportunity-to-access in the world — are:
- There’s a urgent need to stablish an index covering the whole range of the digital divide and not just infrastructures: digital literacy, content and services use and policy, legal framework.
- Disturbing content and Diverted to bad sites stands for only 7% of the greatest online fears, being cibercrime (in its many faces) up to 91%. This makes me think about the unbalanced efforts made in censorship apps, filters and regulation by paternalist Governments in front of the real needs as perceived by users.
By Ismael Peña-López (@ictlogist), 07 June 2006
Main categories: Connectivity, Cyberlaw, governance, rights, Hardware, Participation, Engagement, Use, Activism
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In an effort to counter the once borderless Internet, states are seeking to create informational boundaries in cyberspace. This is accomplished through a combination of technical and regulatory means — including laws, licensing regimes, industry self-regulation, national filtering, and content removal — thereby creating a matrix of controls.
The OpenNet Initiative: Internet Filtering Map is a quickview way to show this matrix of controls
In other words, it reflects ONI’s work, that is:
The ONI mission is to investigate and challenge state filtration and surveillance practices. Our approach applies methodological rigor to the study of filtration and surveillance blending empirical case studies with sophisticated means for technical verification. Our aim is to generate a credible picture of these practices at a national, regional and corporate level, and to excavate their impact on state sovereignty, security, human rights, international law, and global governance.
[via John Palfrey]
By Ismael Peña-López (@ictlogist), 27 April 2006
Main categories: Connectivity, e-Readiness, Hardware, ICT4D
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The Economist Intelligence Unit 2006 e-readiness rankings have been published: the world in early 2006 may be proclaimed ever more “e-ready”. This year’s e-readiness rankings reflect such progress, as all but two countries have improved their scores from the previous year
.
I absolutely disagree with this following statement: Just as encouraging is the apparent narrowing of the “digital divide” in some facets of e-readiness. This is particularly evident in basic connectivity.
Just out context, the only thing I can say is that "digital" is not only about wires, and that "divide" is a relative indicator, not an absolute one. Actually, basic connectivity is absolutely different than broadband connectivity. Thus, while e-readiness might be actually improving (i.e. there’s more connectivity for more people), the digital divide could be simply widening (i.e. the connectivity for the less developed is, again, less good than the developed ones’): taking part in the race is good; winning a medal, much better.
On the other hand, that developing countries are also enhancing their e-readiness in other ways — for example through the growth of information technology (IT) outsourcing capabilities
is good news. I strongly believe that there’s no possibility of having rich digital content and services (actually, the goal of the information society, ain’t it!?) without a strong IT and/or ICT sector.
[read at UN ICT Task Force and Tecnología y Desarrollo]
