A few running notes I took during the conference, not very elaborate, but thought would share them with you.
Ramesh Srinivasan from UCLA
What happens when you give technology to other people, who will use it their own way such as fisherman using mobile phones to alert family in case of natural disaster, or people who generate money with mobile phones in Africa. But what does this mean in our world, in our cultures? There are particular ways things are to be used, but people can use them for other purposes, they are locally meaningful.
Ontologies for different cultures, different topics. Wouldn’t there be a common ontology where different ways of looking at our world (and their cultures, history, etc) could be put together in a single representation? On the same Web? How can the digital world can account for the different views to have a single global village. How do we develop system that take into account conflict. Search. Information from what’s in your mind, to what you can find!
Juliana Rotich from Global voices
Problems with blogs, if you’re looking for Kenyan information, you just find safari photos, but not real meaningful content. In different languages. Egyptian blogger that got fined (lost vs a chemical company) because he posted photos of the company polluting. Flashing (phone but cut just before people answer, meaning I run out of credit, plz call me back). Company make money by sending this message and attaching ad at the end of message that reads “please call me back, thank you”.
She insisted on the mobile web, it’s already big and growing hugely, and not only in developing countries. It’s not enough for people to have access to tools, but they need to be educated to know how to use the tools correctly. Aggregation, Localization, innovation. Future will include People + Mobile+ Cloud.
