Vol. IV No.7
July 2006
The first monthly magazine on ICT4D
Towards a healthy Asia Commons Asian Conference on the Digital Commons and iCommons iSummit 2006
Information for development
w w w. i 4 d o n l i n e . n e t
Commons understanding: Supporting research on IPR Asia Commons Conference and PAN Programme, IDRC
Managing paradoxical needs in infotech
ISSN 0972 - 804X
Open Content and Asia Commons Special
Framework for making technology choices in today’s context
knowledge for change
We build
We explore
Documentation We search
We capture We cooperate We advocate
Discussion
We converse We inform
We collaborate
We share
Dissemination
We interact We deliver
We propagate We serve
We reach out to communities
We bring change for progress www.digitalLEARNING.in
Contents
Vol. IV No. 7
Features
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Asia Commons Conference and PAN Asia Networking Programme, IDRC Commons understanding: Supporting
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July 2006
Mail box 37 News 29
society Rico Lie and D. Balasubramaniam
Great leap forward - few steps at a time
Asian Conference on the Digital Commons and iCommons iSummit 2006 Towards a healthy Asia Commons Sarah Kerr and Hempal Shrestha
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Asia-Commons.net Building an online community workspace
13
An exercise in ICT, agriculture and
Laurent Elder
31
FOSSFP, Pakistan The spirit of the FOSS movement
E. R. I. A. Chandrika Kularathna
8
OSCAR Project
research on IPR
Story of Katepola, Sri Lanka
Fouad Riaz Bajwa
Columns
43 44
Event Diary
46
Books received
In defence of Intellectual Commons
33 ICTD Project
Beyond participation: Disruptive conferencing for Asia-commons
Newsletter
Whirlwind in the air Paola Di Maio
18
Framework for making technology choices in today’s context Managing paradoxical needs in
Rendezvous
41
infotech Radesh Balakrishnan
GKP International Forum and Members Meeting, 8-10 May 2006, Colombo, Sri Lanka Creating prosperity through ICT
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innovation
Commons in Latin America Commons: Creative, collective and for all Lena Zúñiga
address by Jamie 27 Keynote Love at Asia Commons Conference Advocating for the Knowledge Commons
Sanjar Qiam Member of Afghanistan Information and Communication Commission Afghanistan sanjarqiam@hotmail.com
i4donline.net
I continue to find your magazine a very valuable medium to obtain information from and share experiences with the international community about ICT topics of all kind. Especially in my field of interest, which is ‘Telemedicine and e-Health’, it is important to have a multi-disciplinary approach, because it needs to bring together a multitude of players and stakeholders such as telecom industry, IT industry, medical and healthcare industry and services, government, researchers, and many others. Frederic Lievens Belgium medetel@skynet.be
Bridging the digital divide is major challenge for development practitioners. It (www.i4donline.net) is an admiring initiative. Naveen Jha Pradhan, India navjha@brandeis.edu
News Search ICT4D news by date in the sectors of governance, health, education, agriculture and so on. E-mail Subscribe to daily, weekly, monthly newsletters online or send request to info@i4donline.net Research e-Learning projects from India www.i4donline.net/elearn.asp Learn more about FLOSS www.i4donline.net/floss/introduction.asp www.csdms.org/floss-portal Print edition The past issues of the magazine are available online www.i4donline.net/archive/archive.htm
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Bytes for All
Why commons is important for Asia?
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ICT and evolution process
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i4d | July 2006
Editorial Information for development
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Open Content: Towards a Healthy Asia Commons
ADVISORY BOARD M P Narayanan, Chairman, i4d Chin Saik Yoon Southbound Publications, Malaysia Karl Harmsen United Nations University Kenneth Keniston Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA Mohammed Yunus Grameen Bank, Bangladesh Nagy Hanna e-Leadership Academy, University of Maryland, USA Richard Fuchs IDRC, Canada Rinalia Abdul Rahim Global Knowledge Partnership, Malaysia Walter Fust Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, Switzerland Wijayananda Jayaweera UNESCO, France EDITORIAL BOARD Akhtar Badshah, Frederick Noronha EDITORIAL TEAM Editor Ravi Gupta Editorial Consultant Jayalakshmi Chittoor Sr Assistant Editor Saswati Paik Assistant Editor Dipanjan Banerjee Research Associates Ajitha Saravanan, Dipsikha Sahoo
In the past few years there has been a polar and distinctive, often disturbing trends in the field of media and communications, especially in the digital world. As more and more consolidation is beginning to happen of erstwhile ‘open spaces’, creative appropriation and diversity is beginning to emerge in the Internet and alternative media space by small, enterprising, and creative individuals and organizations who are creating stupendous amounts of local content. Much has been debated about open source. But not many understand the nuances. Lesser still are able to look at the whole picture. Recently, our centre was involved in documenting the open document format awareness meeting held in India. The interoperability issue is critical not only in mission-mode projects but also in large national programmes, especially those that deal with the governance and administration. The back end architecture must be framed in such a way that when integration of services begins to happen, data flows can happen seamlessly. Whether it is in the sphere of governance, or education, or health, key development sectors across countries must be able to share knowledge freely. Access to knowledge not only deals with the information and knowledge flow aspects, it also deals with building up a collective understanding and context of the commons.
Designer Bishwajeet Kumar Singh Web Programmer Zia Salahuddin Group Directors Maneesh Prasad, Sanjay Kumar i4d G-4 Sector 39, NOIDA, UP, 201 301, India Phone +91 120 250 2180-87 Fax +91 120 250 0060 Email info@i4donline.net Web www.i4donline.net Printed at Yashi Media Works Pvt. Ltd. New Delhi, India i4d is a monthly publication. It is intended for those interested and involved in the use of Information and CommnicationTechnologies for development of underserved communities. It is hoped that it will serve to foster a growing network by keeping the community up to date on many activities in this wide and exciting field. i4d does not necessarily subscribe to the views expressed in this publication. All views expressed in this magazine are those of the contributors. i4d is not responsible or accountable for any loss incurred directly or indirectly as a result of the information provided.
It is in this aspect that CSDMS, along with Bellanet International Secretariat and South Asia Partnership had been engaged in Asia Commons conference held in Bangkok. International Development Research Centre, Canada has been one of the key supporters of the conference helping in crystallizing a research and collaboration agenda for the Asia Commons. We are pleased to share this special issue of i4d magazine, covering a number of important processes and issues that emerged in conceptualising what a healthy Asia Commons would be like. Networks, partnerships and collaborations among the 135 odd participants who met face to face in June has been preceded by almost a year long engagement in developing a conceptual understanding of these issues. New collaborative projects are emerging and we are hopeful to have played a part in facilitating the evolution of the Asia Commons community of practitioners. Long Live Asia Commons!
Centre for Science, Development and Media Studies, 2006 Except where otherwise noted, this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License
i4d is supported by:
July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
Ravi Gupta Ravi.Gupta@csdms.in
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A SIA C OMMONS C ONFERENCE
AND
P AN A SIA N ETWORKING P ROGRAMME , IDRC
Commons understanding: Supporting research on IPR Most of the activity related to Information and Communications Technologies for Development (ICT4D) have focussed on connectivity and ensuring that those that are digitally excluded get access to computers and the Internet. However, having access to telecommunications networks is not enough to fully benefit from information and communications technologies (ICTs). Access to the information conveyed by the networks is also key. However, as much as the Internet and the digital world give one historically unprecedented access to information, digital technologies, such as Digital Rights Management (DRM), also have the potential to curtail people’s access to knowledge. Indeed, rapid technological progress in information technologies, poses new issues for copyright law. Today, a digital file can be copied and instantaneously distributed worldwide through the Internet, thus potentially depriving the copyright holder of revenue from licensed sales. As a result, holders of copyright on creative works in digital format, generally emanating from developed countries, are contesting the right of consumers to make personal copies of copyrighted materials. At the same time, consumers are beginning to chafe at copyright owners’ use of digital technologies to prevent or deter copying and other unauthorised uses of copyrighted works. Possibly even worse, Asia is supposedly home to one of the biggest markets for pirated material in the world. The Business Software Alliance, an industry lobby group, estimates that more than 8 billion USD is “lost” to software piracy in Asia (figures that leave some experts skeptical, it must be said). As digital processing grows more powerful and the high-speed distribution of digital content becomes more pervasive, the debate over copyright issues in particular, whether copyright law has achieved the
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appropriate balance between incentives to engage in creative activity and the social benefits that arise from the widespread use of creative works is likely to intensify. Although most of the questions around access to knowledge revolve around copyright, it should also be said that a longstanding debate as to the relationship between patents and innovation also exists. The question as to whether patents help stimulate innovation (the conventional theory) or whether strict patents actually stifle innovation (for which there is an increasing amount of examples in the software domain) is an important one for policy-makers attempting to ensure their economies are able to be productive and competitive in the information economy. Hence this leads us to a set of important questions for those attempting to better understand how developing and emerging communities in Asia can benefit from the knowledge and opportunities conveyed by the Internet: • What are the impacts of adhering to intellectual property rights (IPR) agreements such as Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), with respect to innovation, access to knowledge, and economic growth in various digital domains (software development, e-commerce, access to digital educational content, etc.)?
• Who are the winners and losers when strict IPR regimes are enforced? • The public domain and open access models of information creation: at odds with the intellectual property system or enabled by it? • Are emerging business models for distributing intellectual property on-line an opportunity or threat to creating livelihoods in Asia? It is in order to help illuminate these questions that the Ottawa headquartered International Development Research Centre’s (IDRC’s) Pan Asia Networking (PAN) programme supported the “Asia Commons” conference. As a participant, I saw that Asia Commons did much more than that: it debated the key issues, gave a platform to share experiences, helped develop a burgeoning community of practice and, most importantly, identified a key set of activities that may help spur on research and activities in this area. IDRC is keen to support some of these activities, especially as they pertain to better understanding the potential benefits of a “Commons approach” in Asia as well as the possible negative implications of current intellectual property regimes. I am therefore quite pleased to see that an Asia Commons community has emerged from the conference, as it will be key to ensuring that these important issues are looked.
The Asia Commons conference logo
Laurent Elder Pan Asia Networking Team Leader IDRC Ottawa, Canada For more details, visit: http://www.idrc.ca/panasia
i4d | July 2006
‘i’ Opener S TORY
OF
K ATEPOLA , S RI L ANKA
Great leap forward few steps at a time Lack of proper roads and access to main electricity grid made Katepola, an already remote village, nestled in the Ayagama divisional secretariat division of Rathnapura district of Sri Lanka, even more isolated from the rest of the country. However, 465 families residing in the village, blissfully ignorant of their plight, continued to grow crops like paddy, tea, rubber and cinnamon, while a few worked in the gem industry. This was the situation of Katepola, when Practical Action (formerly known as ITDG), with an endeavour to ‘start from the community priorities’, with ‘the intention of minimising social exclusion’, approached the community with the simple and easy to maintain technology of micro hydro station. Together, with the active support of the community, the micro hydro plant started generating electricity. This was almost eleven years ago. The small technical intervention changed the life of the community and opened a plethora of opportunities for them. The electricity, thus produced, was chanellised between domestic and commercial requirements. When the issue of utilising the extra energy generated by the micro hydro arose, the community suggested the need for an information cum community centre. In June 2005, the Katepola Education and Economic Development Centre was established with the technical support of Practical Action, and the financial support of the USAID – OTI institute. The centre, on popular demand of the community, included a library, a saloon and a battery charging unit.
From technology to information Today, the ‘Samagi’ library has taken the shape of an information centre for the July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
information starved populace, as earlier; they did not even have access to daily newspapers. What’s more? It has also helped in cultivating reading habits among the school children and rest of the community. So, this library not only helps to take the technology to the area, but also motivates the community to reap the benefits of technology. The library is managed by the ‘Samagi Library Society’, chaired by a president, who gets close assistance from the priests of the village temple. Besides, three young staff members take care of day-to-day work, and work in rotation. They have been trained on basic library management practices. It transformed into a library with 546 books of different categories, selected with the assistance of the village school staff and other key village informants. Daily and weekend newspapers are also available and demand for newspapers is high as this is the only place in the village, where the newspapers are available. Recently, a small collection of development videos has also been added to the ever-growing resource list of the library. The community is closely monitoring the reading pattern of the community. Data is already being collected very regularly about the category of books of high demand, the age group of people using the library frequently, the frequency of their use and also their timings. Currently there are 46 members in the library, who has one computer, which is being used to maintain records, and to surf Internet.
Financial sustainability Currently, almost 3000 LKR (Sri Lankan rupee) per month is required for the maintenance of the library, especially to pay the staff salaries. The money for the maintenance is earned through the saloon, and the battery charging unit is being maintained by the library.
Samagi library is popular among young villagers
What started as a small technical intervention has now translated into a major development, information and community empowerment activity. It is too early to say how things will shape in future. But, as the founder of practical Action, E.F.Schumacher aptly said, “any good practical action, however small, is always significant”, so the efforts are on! J
E.R.I.A. Chandrika Kularathna Project Officer (Communication), Practical Action South Asian office, Sri Lanka Chandrika.Ranasinghe@practicalaction.org.lk
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A SIAN C ONFERENCE
ON THE
D IGITAL C OMMONS
AND
iC OMMONS iS UMMIT 2006
Towards a healthy Asia Commons A resume of emerging ideas and initiatives from Asia Commons: Asian Conference on the Digital Commons and the iCommons iSummit ’06
Photo credit: Suchit Nanda
Asia Commons participants in Bangkok, June 2006
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Photo credit: Suchit Nanda
i4d | July 2006
Photo credit: Hempal Shrestha
Asia Commons: Asian Conference on the Digital Commons (http:/ /www.asia-commons.net and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Asia_Commons) which took place June 6-8, 2006 in Bangkok covered a wide variety of topics through presentations, discussions and topics raised by participants themselves. Half of the conference was devoted to topics which were not pre-planned by organisers. Instead, they were raised by participants in the session ‘Towards a healthy Asia Commons: What are the Ideas and Issues?’. Participants raised topics which were of importance to them, and formed discussion groups with other interested individuals. From these ideas, action plans for further initiatives emerged. A gathering of Creative Commons collaborators in Asia also took place at the iCommons iSummit ’06 under the session entitled ‘Building an Asia Commons Community’. iSummit ’06 (http:// icommons.org/isummit/), took place from June 23-25, 2006 in Rio de Janeiro. Creative Commons is a philosophy, movement and licensing scheme that offers flexible copyright licenses for creative works, through the use of these licenses the digital commons is enriched. The Creative Commons community in Asia therefore has many synergies with the community which emerged during the Asia Commons conference. Many Asia Commons participants expressed that the Asia Commons initiative should not terminate with the conclusion of the conference. The ideas shared in the conference and documented in the Asia Commons wiki (http://wikis.bellanet.org/ asia-commons) should continue to be available online to be taken forward.
Building an Asian Network on Access to Knowledge (A2K) Idea initiator: Dong Calmada Idea discussion summary: Levels of awareness and advocacies on A2K (http://en.wikipedia. org/wiki/A2K) is relatively low – governments are neither aware nor heedful of their mandates to fulfill, respect, and protect their citizens’ rights related to access to knowledge. It is proposed, among other ideas, that an Asian network on A2K should be formed to give support to groups or movements. Full details: http://wikis.bellanet.org/asia-commons/index.php/ Building_an_Asian_Network_on_A2K Countering Intellectual Property (IP) propaganda Idea initiator: Lawrence Liang, Alternative Law Forum Idea discussion summary: There are a variety of IP myths. Some of these include that the creative industries will die without a strong IP regime, that IP is beneficial for developing countries and that there are large losses caused by IP theft. These myths circulate in different forms and are targetted to different people, from enforcing agencies to industry to consumers. What are some of the ways in which we can think of countering the dominant IP myths/ propaganda? Full details: http://wikis.bellanet.org/asia-commons/index.php/ Countering_IP_Propaganda
Open alternatives and open access Idea initiator: Fouad Riaz Bajwa, Free and Open Source Software Foundation of Pakistan (FOSSFP) Emerging ideas from Asia Commons Idea discussion summary: Open Access provides opportunities to The following is a small selection of ideas and initiatives which publish freely accessible peer reviewed or quality research as well as emerged both out of the Asia Commons conference and some ideas access ongoing research. Traditional journals with high subscription shared during the iSummit ’06 session ‘Building an Asia Commons fees reduce access to research taking place in the ‘knowledge world’. One of many suggested actions: Promote open access in public Community’. and private academia, government and research iCommons 06 session ‘Building on Asia Commons community at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil institutes. Full details: http://wikis. bellanet.org/asia-commons/ index.php/Open_Altern atives_and_Open_Access Training module on ‘The Commons for Commoners: Intellectual Property (IP) Rights and Wrongs’ Idea initiator: Al Alegre, Foundation for Media Alternatives Idea discussion summary: A public education campaign to advance the Commons agenda can be initiated through the creation of a one-day July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
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training module and holding training seminars throughout Asian countries. This would be targeted to those with no prior knowledge of the issues of IP (patents, copyright), public domain, etc. Full details: http://wikis.bellanet.org/asiacommons/index.php/Basic_Module_on_ the_Commons
From the iCommons iSummit ‘06 session ‘Building an Asian Commons Community’ For further details on iCommons iSummit ‘06 visit http://www.icommons.org/isummit/
Bellanet supporting collaboration in the development community What is Bellanet?
http://www.bellanet.org
Bellanet is an initiative that promotes and facilitates collaboration within the international development community, especially through innovative and meaningful uses of information and communications technologies (ICTs). Based on strong partnerships, open sharing of ideas and institutional co-operation, effective collaboration maximises the impact of development efforts.
Programming Photo credit: Earcos
Bellanet organises its programming around two Thematic Areas: Knowledge sharing approaches and Innovative uses of technology. Designed to develop institutional and individual collaboration skills and to take full advantage of ICTs for collaborative work, these thematic areas build on Bellanet’s past successes, collective expertise and respond to emerging needs in the development community.
Support An iCommons session in progress in Brazil
Comparative country-level studies of status of copyright laws in Asia Idea initiator: Hempal Shrestha, Bellanet Asia (“BellaSAP�) Idea discussion summary: The research report ‘Copyright and Access to Knowledge’ by Consumers International (CI) Asia Pacific Office (http://www.ciroap.org/a2k) produced policy recommendations on flexibilities in copyright laws. CI also produced two detailed country-level reports for Indonesia and Thailand. These body of research can be expanded to include additional countries in Asia-Pacific, conducted by interested citizens of these countries, such as members of the Asia Commons network or Asian Creative Commons collaborators. Creative Commons Asia meeting Idea initiator: Yonnie Kim, Creative Commons Korea Idea discussion summary: It is proposed to have an Asian regional-level meeting, taking a format such as a ‘ccSalon’ (http:// wiki.creativecommons.org/Salon). The purpose of this would be to ‘build a community of artists and developers [in Asia] around Creative Commons licenses, standards, and technology’.
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Bellanet’s core funders are: the International Development Research Centre (IDRC); the Royal Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Danida); the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida); and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC).
Operations Through strategic alliances with peer organisations in the South, Bellanet has a number of partners, who share common goals, to deliver locally relevant programming in Africa, Asia and Latin America & Caribbean. Bellanet has host offices in Kampala, Kathmandu, Ottawa, and in San JosĂŠ (Costa Rica). This model makes effective use of resources, while strengthening lateral learning and sharing of experiences among regions, thus building south-north and south-south collaboration. Contact us
Bellanet c/o IDRC- PO Box 8500 Ottawa, ON K1G 3H9, Canada www.bellanet.org Email: info@bellanet.org (+ 613) 236-6163 Fax: (+ 613) 238-7230
i4d | July 2006
Promoting Creative Commons in Asia: Asia-wide art competition Idea initiator: Ng Alina, Creative Commons Malaysia As a means of promoting Creative Commons license adoption and uses in Asia, a competition for art licensed under a Creative Commons license (jurisdiction of an Asian country) could be organised. The same idea has been used with much success in Malaysia.
What is the Asian Digital Commons? One larger question which emerged around the Asia Commons conference was what exactly is the ‘Asian’ digital commons? How is it different from the global digital commons? There was much discussion around this topic. As an idea to a response, the following was collaboratively written by Asia
Commons conference participants in Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Asia_Commons): The concept of an ‘Asian Commons’ There are some theses on why the Commons idea in Asia would be different from those elsewhere. For example: • common village land is still in existence in Asia, not in the West; • the problems of access are more serious in most Asian countries; • piracy (or illegal copying of software, music and audio CDs or DVDs) is stronger than in the West. More specifically, the term ‘Asia Commons’ is the movement to create and sustain the Commons in Asia.” J This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 License. To view a copy of this license, visit http:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 543 Howard Street, 5th Floor, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA.
What is a wiki? A wiki is a collaborative editing platform where we are all free to add, edit and delete content in order to work collectively for a greater degree of correctness and an improved end result. The word ‘wiki’ is Hawaiian for ‘quick’, meaning it is quick editing through an easy syntax. The Asia Commons Wiki has these major uses: 1. Session Documentation: To add and edit notes for conference sessions that the participants have attended. It is also a section to review notes from sessions that participants missed. http://wikis.bellanet.org/asia-commons/ index.php/Conference_ Notes 2. Resources: To collaboratively contribute to a listing of resources on the conference themes. http://wikis.bellanet.org/asia-commons/ index.php/Resources 3. Participant Profiles: Information on each of the conference participants. The section helps the participants to edit or add his/her profile. http://wikis.bellanet.org/asia-commons/ index.php/Category:Participant 4. Methodology: Information and resources on Open Space, Spectrogram and Speed Sharing. The section details the methodology that was applied in this conference and also refers to other resources. http://wikis. bellanet.org/asia-commons/ index.php/Methodology
Meet the authors: Sarah Kerr (skerr@bellanet.org), Technical Officer, Bellanet International Secretariat, Ottawa, Canada and Hempal Shrestha (hshrestha@bellanet.org), Program Officer, Bellanet Asia (“BellaSAP”): a collaborative initiative of SAP International and Bellanet
Do you have ideas of your own to share? Do you want to join the Asia Commons community? Please join us through: http://www.asia-commons.net
July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
5. Follow up: A page for post-conference follow up- projects, lists, initiatives, etc. http://wikis.bellanet.org/asia-commons/ index.php/Followuphttp://wikis. bellanet.org/asia-commons/index.php/ Followup The Asia Commons wiki has been used very actively by the participants in all the above sections and continues to be a valuable tool for using the online workspace to build a healthy Asia Commons. All readers are encouraged to take a virtual visit to the conference community space.
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A SIA -C OMMONS . NET
Building an online community workspace www.asia-commons.net was an active and interactive web space created in Drupal which had several features making it an easy tool for participants to build up their alliances, share notes, blog, add images, share podcasts and follow up on collaborative ideas in a discussion list. The website development was done in Nepal with virtual consultation between India and Canada happening all the time to conceptualise the online community work space for the conference. The Participants discussion list enabled a number of delegates to get a feel of what they were going to experience in the faceto-face meetings. Moderated initially for three weeks prior to the conference, the forum triggered a few questions and prodded the participants to respond. What was most overwhelming was the kind of bonding that it created and the free flow of information and knowledge that built up into an active online discussion list. It is also the space that continues to be used by the participants. Keeping in line with the policy of inclusiveness, the list is open for newcomers to join in, and become part of the Asia Commons community. The discussion list also served to call for ‘speed sharers’ – people who had collaborative projects or project ideas to share to a group of participants that was planned for the conference. Another use of the discussion list before the conference was to invite the participants to a peer reviewing process and to provide inputs to the three commissioned paper writers. This also proved to be a valuable space for participants to actively engage in the preparatory processes. During the conference, a newsroom with about 10 workstations were set up to enable the participants to actively blog, contribute to the chat room, wiki and put in their notes. The conference reports got prepared then
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and there, with several of the participants chipping in. The documentation team was engaged in a number of audio recordings and interviews with key participants. Soon, after the conference, these have been uploaded on the asia-commons.net website, and forms a rich resource to the people to get a feel of the vibrant atmosphere that was created during the interactions at Bangkok.
Online workspace creates a common space for interaction for the Asia Commons conference participants
Besides the official documentation which was being undertaken by the organizing team members, Frederick Noronha, the official blogger, Suchit Nanda, the unofficial photographer, the official video and audio recording unit facilitated by Thai Rural Net and numerous bloggers makes this one of the very active collective content developing experiences. The wiki tool was useful not only for planning and collectively evolving the preparations, but also as a collective authoring tool for the documentation of the ideas and experiences of the participants. The tool was used extensively and continues to be used by participants for learning, sharing and collaborating. New ideas and concepts have flowed in, people have reflected and provided corrections, and their own notes of the various sessions, which were happening in parallel at the conference. Thus, the Asia Commons online workspace facilitates collaboration. J i4d | July 2006
I N D EFENSE
OF I NTELLECTUAL
C OMMONS
Why commons is important for Asia? Lawrence Liang, from the Alternative Law Forum in India, facilitated the keynote presentation session and outlined the difficulty of defining Asia Commons. Stories that we tell each other – favorite story – German, American, Indians collaborate – culture of the copy persists. They include the pervasive, invasive act of copyright, emergence of global alternatives – commons, common heritage. The keynote presented by Peter Drahos would help in answering the question, ‘How do we build a dialogue around Asia Commons?’. See also pages 27-28 forthe keynote discussion of Jamie Love. Peter Drahos presented the keynote address at the Asia Commons Conference and built up the concept of a need for a political philosophy of the commons. He discussed intellectual property rights, their effect over the use of information rights and the importance to citizens globally. There are many economic theories of IPR, but not much empirical data. We have many economic theories of IPR not much empirical data, we have lot of technologies, what is missing is the political philosophy, as citizens of the commons. James Love has stirred the thinking of the ideology of IP. Peter argues that IP is an instrument of coercion. That is what law is. All law is a form of coercion. You can get jailed for breaking IPR. The penalties in countries are getting higher and higher. If a company makes a mistake, they can be subject to hundreds of thousands of dollars in terms of fines; they can go to jail; and for getting it wrong when applying for a generic medicine. This is one example of hundreds. There are questions of politics that are absolutely timeless. How much say have we had in new arrangement of the intellectual property? Should we obey? How much coercion should we tolerate when it comes to our use rights over information? Citizens have asked themselves these questions, and July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
Peter Drahos is Professor of the Law Programme at the Australian National University and this keynote was adapted from a recent paper entitled ‘A defense of the intellectual commons’ published in Consumer Policy Review, May-June 2006, Vol 16, No 3 P 2-5.
Peter Drahos at one of the sessions at Asia Commons Conference
the answers to them have led them to revolt. We need answers to them, and we don’t have the answers. We made a political philosophy of information. This philosophy is derived from that of the western political philosopher, John Steward Mill, for the commons, for the future. Him more than any philosopher, in the western philosophy— opposed coldblooded materialism, defended the freedom, and diversity should flow. This is a profoundly important thing for the commons. Experiments in living in general, supports diversity. Information matters because information is akin to energy. It helps us to arrive at our chosen ends. Whether its about health, or knowledge, information empowers. It is the most important resource and does not deplete, but grows with use. It thus is subject to the law of repletion. In fundamental subjects like mathematics, information is the key resource. And, it is too important to be left to private monopolies or private sovereigns. This is because private sovereignty impedes the law of repletion, and we create private power of taxation thus giving power. The last thing we should do is to create an artificial scarcity. The public domain is defined by reference to a specific legal order. The Public Domain of the Patent Law is not the same as the Public Domain of the Copyright Law.
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The derivative nature of Positive Negative the public domain means community community that information may still be subject to restrictions Inclusive NI and may still allow for PI appropriation. Peter further clarified that all communities can be PE NE classified into four categories, Exclusive viz. positive-inclusive, positiveexclusive, negative-inclusive and negative-exclusive. The characteristic of positive common is a state where things are the subjects of joint ownership and is a mathematics, addition, algorithms, etc. product of consent, and is the most desirable fall under this category. All societies have option for intellectual common. Laws of to make their choices especially to fulfill
the diversity and freedom of choices goals. Depending on how much a society values freedom and diversity the political choices have to be made among the four possibilities.
He drew three key conclusions • Intellectual Common is a political expression of community. Public Domain too closely tied to problems of IP. • We should favour the Positive Common over the Negative because of the Law of Repletion • We should favour the positive intellectual commons because it promotes freedom and allows for a diversity of group life. J
Nominations called for third annual Development Gateway Award 2006 DEVELOPMENT
GATEWAY
The Development Gateway Foundation is calling from nominations around the globe for the third annual Development Gateway Award. This award recognises outstanding achievement in the use of ICTs to improve the lives of people in developing countries. In 2005, the theme was on the overall impact and contribution to development of the nominated initiatives and the winner was ITC’s eChoupal in India. In 2004, the award was received by the Village Phone initiative of Grameen Bank in Bangladesh. This year, the projects that empower or improve the conditions of youth are being highlighted. Sponsored in part by Intel Corporation, this year’s award is focusing on initiatives that empower or improve the conditions of youth. Both individuals and organisations are eligible to apply for the award. The award has been launched on June 19, 2006 at a special reception for youth participants, following the close of World Youth Forum at United Nation’s World Urban Forum III. The $100,000 award will help the winning organisation expand upon its success and it will help the organisation to guide other prospective leaders in the field of ICT for development. The stories of all the finalists will be highlighted on the Development Gateway Foundation website; the stories will also be available to the worldwide membership of online networks of Development Gateway Communities. The projects, to be nominated, must leverage the power of ICT to create new opportunities and also to address development challenges in the fields of health, education, employment or other areas important to social and economic development. The goal is to advance understanding of the role of ICT in development by recognising leaders in the field and to assist in the spread of excellent programmes and ideas across the world. The deadline to receive nominations is August 11, 2006, and the winner will be announced toward the end of 2006. The nomination form, rules and explanation of the award are available on this site http://www.developmentgateway.org/award. This site will provide and update information about the venue, sponsors, etc. For any query, one must send mail to: award@ developmentgateway.org
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i4d | July 2006
B EYOND P ARTICIPATION : D ISRUPTIVE C ONFERENCING FOR A SIA -C OMMONS
Whirlwind in the air The author shares her experiences at Asia Commons which gave so much room for participation, leadership, learning, sharing and building partnerships
Paola Di Maio paola.dimaio@gmail.com Systems Analyst and IT Lecturer Mae Fah Luang University, Thailand
July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
The notion of ‘open structures’ is becoming central to social development, where open indicates ‘perfectly flexible’, extensible, and benefit from adaptive boundaries that dynamically adjust to constantly changing parameters. When it comes to conferences, the format that we have grown most accustomed to over the years has typically been a canonical ‘paper submission, conference committee approval, paper presentation’ format. This has been largely the legacy of a ‘fossil’ style academic blueprint, virtually unevolved over centuries, and propagated to the commercial world through the proliferation of business conferences that have often been the bastion of institutionalised ‘knowledge silos’ especially in western countries which perpetrated their control over the modern intellectual and market capital power worldwide. Conferences have always been relatively ‘closed’ events where knowledge trickled down from luminaries to the common people with a ‘top down’ approach. At most, there would be round tables and panels where speakers would confront their differences and questions and answers sessions to interact with the audience. At the heart of the Asia Commons event www.asia-commons.net held in Bangkok from June 6-8, 2006, as a part of the A2K (access to knowledge), http://research.yale.edu/ isp/eventsa2k.html framework, there was a core desire of most participants to instigate a culture of sharing and of collective ownership, able to leverage technology to promote social innovation. The need to explore conceptual boundaries, create new terms of references and definitions, to be a part of the new social and technological paradigm shift and to relate to each other, was perhaps accompanied by a more subtle intention to create some disruption of the inherited conceptual and economic power structures that are dominant in the world, and responsible for the current economic imbalances.
The indiscriminate enforcement of intellectual property rights being one of them.
For disruptive aims, disruptive methods The more enlightened event organizers have started becoming receptive to the fact that standard, ‘one way’ conference formats may actually have become obsolete, and that they are not fit for the modern, networked, collaborative and knowledge sharing environments that is fuelling much of the growth of new technologies. Allison Hewlitt is a Senior Program Officer at Bellanet, her work is focused on collaborative processes in support of knowledge workers and institutional change. With a team of organizers distributed across different countries, (See picture, include names and affiliations) they pulled together the programme for www.asia-commons.net conference When Allison walked by Sarah Kerr’s office at Bellanet she expressed some concern about adopting a conference methodology that didn’t encourage participants to actually participate. “ Until then, there hadn’t been too much thought on how the conference methodology could be more in line with the conference content. The original thinking was to hold what I would consider a ‘traditional’ conference sessions i.e. Presentation-oriented led by thought leaders (sometimes referred to as talking heads) and inactive participants. I thought that the conference provided a great opportunity to introduce participants to methodologies that would better resonate with them considering our themes related to accessibility, collaboration etc.” she says. Asia-Commons organisers were aware that most of the work done at large international conferences happens in the hallways, at the coffee breaks, lunches and other informal, often unscheduled, sessions. These spaces allow people to connect with
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The organising committee members of Asia Commons
one another to exchange not only business cards but also ideas, experiences and knowledge.
That’s how an innovative – verging with the experimental – plan came into being. A few weeks before the conference was scheduled, a participants’ online mailing list was set up and a few questions were popped around via email about the conference themes, and a few topic resources were shared. The cozy feeling of being invited to participate and make a contribution started warming up the audience was only marginally hinting at the excitement of things to come. Relatively traditional ‘keynotes’ and panel sessions opened the event on day one, but, to everyone’s amazement, the rest of conference schedule was pretty much extempore. Among the less conventional techniques to get people to mix up, the organizers put together a session at the end of the first day called ‘speed dating’, not strictly in the romantic sense.
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“We adopt the concept of ‘speed dating’ at events to help participants to get know each other a bit better. Participants are invited to stand up, pair up and take 3 minutes to get to know each other. Then the bell sounds (or music plays) and participants pair up with someone new. And so on till the end of the session” explains the team on the methodology web page. (http://wikis.bellanet.org/ asia-commons/index.php/Methodology) The next day, after two more panel presentations and question and answers sessions, it was the time of “Speed sharing”, a variation of the Speed Geek approach accredited to Aspiration, where small group of participants gather around a ‘speed sharer’ and hear about new collaborative models and his or her project in quick five minutes per presentation, giving them an opportunity of having a face-toface meeting with up to eight presenters in forty five minutes. Then the organisers turned around to the audience and said ‘and now you have to develop the programme for the next day and a half ’. Called Open Space Methodology, giving room for participation, leadership, learning, sharing and building partnerships. • Open Space World (www.openspaceworld.org) has lots of resources. See the Resource Section for articles, websites etc. • The Open Space section of Lisa Heft’s website (www.openingspace. net/openSpaceTechnology_method.shtml) - a collection of papers to read, tools to use, thoughts to share; with a subset of additional Resources for OST Facilitators • Mystery of Open Space (www.omidyar.net/group/open spaceresearch/news/7/) - a thread in the Open Space Research group on Omidyar.net • Open Space Community The OSLIST (www.openspaceworld.org/ news/oslist) is an email discussion list started in 1996. It has grown into what can easily be called an Email Community. For many years, the list has been archived and now contains a wealth of practice By getting every participant to write a topic on poster and stick it on a wall to match a flexible schedule – we can always add more slots, the organizers said individuals were given the option to run mini-sessions about topics that they would find interesting, to which other participants would sign up and participate. In itself this is quite revolutionary approach. So, after some minutes of initial disorientation and shyness, dozens of simultaneous mini-talks were set up each one around a flip chart and a few chairs, which generated a series of write ups (see box on the themes and lead persons). Another popular group collaboration tool is the ‘spectrogram’ ,
i4d | July 2006
where colored tape is laid out across an open floor - stretching long enough to fit all participants standing. One end of the tape is marked as “Strongly Agree”, and the opposite end is labeled as “Strongly Disagree”. Cross-marks are made at the 25%, 50%, and 75% points along the line. (Strongly Agree, Agree, Neutral, Disagree, Strongly Disagree. The effects and results of such interactive techniques were immediately evident and very productive. The particular strength of the emotional response caused by first person involvement of each participant becomes a personal bond with other individuals and with the group as a whole. The feeling of sharing a common purpose becomes stronger than cultural, dialectic and language barriers that inevitably separate people who have not other formal relationship to each other than common interests in the conference topic. For many participants this was a first, but for Bellanet International, says Allison, working towards the creation of ‘open’ environments is routine. “Over the past couple of years, Bellanet and partner organisations have been experimenting with technologies such as podcasts, blogs and wikis as standard tools to facilitate the production and participation in the events that they organise, “ But this event has gone beyond others in terms of engaging participants in the production process”. Organisers have a role to play as facilitators especially in the online space ie. on the discussion list and in supporting the site. We have also put aside some post-conference funding which we expect to invest in the growth and future of a project or partnership that results from the conference. And so Asia Commons was born, extending to participating initiatives in Africa, Europe, South America, it is now growing to form a true international community of motivated engaged individuals who have started sharing knowledge and resources. The event has created opportunities, deep discussions and helped in exchanging, energy and enthusiasm. Leaders have emerged. Ideas were generated and plans were hatched and followed up on the mailing list. Long-term partnerships formed. As organisers, says Allison, we see the potential of being a bridge between the various A2K events that are taking place. “We are looking for opportunities to share our experiences related to the Asia Commons conference and our knowledge on issues related to A2K in Asia. I also believe that the Asia Commons conference will be seen as a model for A2K related conferences in the future.” Long live Asia Commons! J
July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
Towards a Healthy Asia Commons Discussion themes from the Asia Commons • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
Asian Commons? National Identity Commons - Norbert Klein Countering IP Propaganda - Lawrence Liang Day Job Volunteer Vs. Full time Contributer - Sam Hui Think Local, Act Global - Supyan Hussin Open Alternatives and Open Access (OA) - Fouad Bajwa Building an Asian Network on A2K - Dong Calmada Internet acess as a tool to knowledge - Paulina Murillo Documenting Asia Commons Practices - Michel Bauwens Common Content Creation - Dissanayake A Common Language for the Asian Commons - George Cho Conceptualizing the Commons - Lawrence Liang Ethics in Knowledge Commons - Shree Krishna Shrestha Training needs assessment - Siddick.A Cultivate the sharing value - Ngeow Chow Ying Research Agenda for the Asian Commons - Dick Kawooya Spectrum Commons - Laurent Elder Online Dispute Resolution - Elad Wieder, Yongkyung Chung Better access to government information - Abd Rahman A2K Campaigning - Indah Suksmaningsih, Yongkyung Chung Implications of long duration/extension of copyrights - Anita Djoble D’Almeida Asia Commons to iCommons - Hempal Shrestha Virtual Open Space - Chinarut Ruangchotvit The Culture of the Commons (Asia) - Natalie Pang Growing the Asia Commons and Communities - Swee Tat and Prasad Value of the commons in health care - Molly Cheah Intellectual Rights/Privilges in the US FTA - Ditesh Kumar Gender - Jac Kee Participatory Journalism - Sasha Costanza-Chock Distributed Cognition and the Role of Artifacts - Jian Yan Wang Source“http://wikis.bellanet.org/asia-commons/index.php/ Towards_a_Healthy_Asia_Commons_-_Discussion_Reports”
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F RAMEWORK FOR M AKING T ECHNOLOGY C HOICES IN T ODAY ’ S C ONTEXT
Managing paradoxical needs in infotech Taking informed decisions on IT spend is vital to sustaining competitive edge in today’s hypercompetitive business environment. The decisions themselves have become complex given the pressure on IT departments to “Do More With Less”. While providing the greatest possible cost effectiveness is a key goal, IT also has the responsibility to make sure that focus on cost effectiveness does not shortchange the essential “abilities” of IT - reliability, manageability, security, and interoperability.
Revisiting the abilities While there has been historically a focus on reliability, security and manageability on the part of IT, it is worth noting that these abilities were defined and metric-ed in the days of largely monolithic IT architectures and in the context of associated vendor solutions. So, it is worth re-examining these abilities in the context of today’s IT realities. Further, given the multitude of choice among platforms and the focus on the part of vendors to drive interoperability, heterogeneity is a reality even in fairly unsophisticated IT shops. In light of this, any IT decision needs to factor in interoperability as it is provided by a vendor as well as a roadmap associated with the same. While Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) has become the “acid criteria” to a large extent in the minds of IT decision makers, some of the fundamentals of this concept are being ignored in practice. For example, a large percentage of IT decision makers admit to taking an IT decision using acquisition cost as the key input when assessing an IT solution’s TCO – without actually estimating the projected TCO in a methodical fashion. The negative impact of such a decision is felt both in the short-term – for example being stuck with a solution which doesn’t offer extensibility - as well as the long term
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– for example implementing a solution only to later discover that the cost of managing and maintaining that solution’s reliability and security is significantly greater than expected. In view of the above, it is a worthwhile exercise to re-examine the meaning and implications of these abilities in today’s context and highlight some key questions to be thought through before making IT decisions.
Reliability Software Reliability is more than just uptime – it is also the capacity to deliver solutions to end-users predictably and consistently, and to make solutions available efficiently when they are needed by the business. This amounts to the probability of failure-free software operation for a specified period of time in a specified environment. Given the desire to reduce the number of moving parts, and thereby reduce the probability of failure, vendors are guilty of defining the environment tightly. This narrow definition limits the associated flexibility of the IT infrastructure. In this scenario, IT Decision Makers need to ask themselves the fundamental question: “How much agility am I willing to trade-off in order to achieve greater reliability?” Specifically, is it possible to add more applications (Independent Software Vendors or Line-of-Business) to the “stack” and how does that affect the reliability of SLA (Service Level Agreement)? Will the boundary conditions around the “operating environment” be violated if there is a new minor upgrade of the product and if there is a desire to gain the benefits associated with it? What is the availability of ISV solutions? Are there certification programmes for these solutions to give IT staff the skills they need to reduce the time-to-solution?
Specific to vendor choice, the critical questions that IT needs to ask of product vendors are: “What is your track record in improving the reliability over versions? What level of ongoing engineering investments are you making to meet the ever-complex demands from my IT infrastructure?” In a nutshell, reliability needs to be viewed across the lifecycle of the system (rather than as a static concept at the time of purchase), during which IT can add/remove capabilities without breaking support contracts etc.
Manageability In terms of a vendor’s scope and portfolio of solutions, it should be needless to stress that any management framework or vision encompasses multitudes of client form factors, such as desktop/laptop, mobile PC etc., - as well as complex server infrastructure – OS, Database, mission critical off-the-shelf applications etc. It is equally important that there is a vibrant partner ecosystem including ISVs and solution providers to add functionality as well as roll out the management solutions. In this context, IT needs to make sure that the vendors have a clearly defined management vision and roadmap that aligns with the needs of the infrastructure today as well as into the future.
Security With the myriad of technologies and interface mechanisms increasing in complexity, security is a journey rather than a destination. Keeping systems secure requires intense focus on three core elements - fundamentals in writing secure code, threat and vulnerability mitigation, and identity and access control. In light of this, IT needs to demand data from vendors on their investment in security – across i4d | July 2006
design, development, product offerings and support policies – and the associated trajectory of results achieved toward improving security. Equally important is the ability of a vendor to provide a portfolio of products/ solutions to meet the diverse needs across client and server as well as across diverse set of potential threats.
Interoperability Since the adoption of disparate systems over time is a reality, increasingly, businesses and governments are looking at interoperability in IT deployments to drive down costs and increase their access to information. Given this, while choosing a solution, IT needs to take into account the ability to connect to other platforms, applications and data easily as well as the roadmap and industry initiatives associated with any given vendor around interoperability.
TCO, the acid metric As noted before, there is an apparent gulf between understanding the TCO model and the practice of performing TCO
analysis. The key aspects that need to be borne in mind are: • TCO needs to be estimated and measured over the useful life of a system, ranging from 3-5 years depending on scenario or workload • It is important to understand the relative shares of the key buckets of cost – Staffing, Downtime, Training, Software, Hardware and Outsourcing • Related to the above, the interplay between these factors should be clearly understood and accounted for. E.g. purely reducing the software acquisition cost might result in increased downtime as well as associated staffing costs due to poor quality, lack of support availability, or absence of cogent roadmap. • Any decision is associated with risk and so, in analysing the TCO, all dimensions of risk associated with the vendor such as roadmap, partner ecosystem, legal indemnification, etc. need be either quantified or at a minimum considered as a qualitative factor impacting the eventual decision.
Implementing the framework In summary, in the paradoxical context of the ongoing pressure to reduce costs and enable more capability, IT has to deliver on the key abilities. Before choosing a solution it is imperative that core IT abilities – reliability, manageability, security and interoperability - and the associated TCO are examined in the right context and with due rigor. This process ensures that the IT infrastructure delivers greater reliability and better security with the lowest total cost of ownership. This gives IT the key role in enabling people to build connections, improve operations, drive innovation, and develop customer relationships that the business thrives on.
Radhesh Balakrishnan Director - Competitive Strategy Microsoft Corporation India Pvt. Ltd.
Rapid Economic Justification (REJ), going beyond TCO IT Managers today are having to show their CIO or CFO in hard numbers what kind of a return they can expect on their IT investment. But determining the bottom line when it comes to IT investments isn’t always an easy thing to do. Traditionally, companies evaluate IT investments on the basis of cost improvements, primarily within IT. Methodologies tend to focus on Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) and the strategic role of IT driving new opportunities for the business is largely ignored. In this light, IT’s benefits to the business can be difficult to quantify, and as a result are often left out of the business case. But though traditional accounting methods make it awkward to absolutely quantify IT’s value, that doesn’t mean the issue of IT’s value should be ignored. This has created a need for a more refined approach to IT investment—an evaluation framework that can identify and quantify the payoffs from IT across functions, departments, and value chain over a period of time. REJ is an economic impact assessment framework to help IT professionals analyse and optimise the economic performance of IT investments, and appropriate optimal resources and capital for IT projects. The core premise of this framework is that it is “business centric” and drives to align business priorities and IT investments. The focus is on business improvement, which may include operational efficiency as an important element, but not the primary focus. In a collaborative process, REJ enables both business and IT stakeholders REJ Steps: The REJ process consists of five individual steps, resulting to understand how technology capabilities can improve the metrics in new optimization opportunities for your IT project. Each step that define success for the business. focuses on a specific dimension of the economic analysis. REJ work starts with understanding the business and ends with the metrics. Each step is articulated in the language of the business, so business executives clearly understand the tangible impact of the IT initiatives and gain a greater understanding and appreciation for the strategic implications of IT investment. This method is faster and more flexible than traditional methods, and produces just enough data to avoid the analysis paralysis that can often occur in developing a business case. For additional information about the Microsoft REJ offering, please visit http://www.microsoft.com/value July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
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C OMMONS
IN
L ATIN A MERICA
Commons: Creative, collective and for all The issue of Commons has two dimensions: the collective creation of knowledge; and the appropriation of this knowledge, either individually or collectively. This article explores the cultural and current trends in the understanding of the ‘Commons’ in Latin America and the Caribbean
Lena Zúñiga lzuniga@bellanet.org Bellanet office for Latin America and the Caribbean San Jose, Costa Rica
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The issue of “Commons” in Latin America is relatively new, but also has a familiarity of thousands of years. There is no doubt that collective knowledge has an undisputable place in our everyday lives. It is in the process of redefinition of the Commons that we start asking ourselves difficult questions about how this knowledge is created, and how it should be appropriated. This is why the Commons discussion involves not only high level debates about intellectual property law, but it concerns the ancient teachings that even lead us to prepare a cure from roots and herbs to calm our sleepless nights. First of all, there is not a word in Spanish (and as far as we know, in Portuguese) that is equivalent to Commons. The translation of the word itself is a discussion in the Spanish-speaking world. 1Cultural common goods have been widely studied and regarded as a key to the development of all cultures. It is on top of these goods that both continuity and innovation are built. However, the dimensions of how they get created and “who” they belong to, had not been addressed as part of the discussion. It is from the arrival of “information society” that the goods that always belonged to the collective should be re-named and redefined, risking to disappear or being taken as any type of property. Before the Internet and all telecommunication tools came to use, we were already sharing. We were already giving away our singing, dancing, writing, cooking and crafting. This is why our culture has always shaped itself.
The two dimensions In our opinion, the issue of Commons has two dimensions: one is the dimension of the collective creation of knowledge, and the other dimension is the appropriation of this knowledge, either individually or collectively.
On the first dimension, about the collective creation of knowledge, we face the challenge to understand the very complex processes of the formation of culture. The dormilona (Sleepy) is a very curious plant that is found in many household gardens in Mexico in Central America. This plant has many medicinal uses. As hard as we have tried to remember, we can’t recall when or where we learned that taking a tisane made from the root of Dormilona would help you beat insomnia and recover sleep. This little piece of information, containing a couple of simple instructions, was passed from hand to hand and from mouth to mouth, possibly through anecdotes and myths, recipe changes and lots of trial and error. None can attribute themselves the authorship of the Dormilona tizane (at last none has dared yet): this is collective knowledge that changes every day and never ends building. Someone must be building over it right now through chemical analysis and botanical experiments. The same chaotic process has led us to have what we have today: Cuban salsa dancing, Mexican recipes using cocoa, Guatemalan fabric design and weaving, Nicaraguan islands painting style, the Colombian way to prepare coffee, Bolivian wind instruments, Brazilian Capoeira, Argentinean meat cutting... it is all the result of hundreds, if not thousands of years of endless, constant and above all, creative learning processes that cannot be claimed as individual creations. The second dimension refers to appropriation (and not exactly property) of the Commons. This might be the dimension that is being explored more thoroughly by the legal initiatives and the civil society alternatives that have come up around the subject. It tries to answer the question of ownership of who is entitled to benefit from i4d | July 2006
the commons and how. This dimension deals with all the legal authority that exists over the commons in the national and international law, and other community and civil society strategies that aim to “protect” the commons while preserving their status through rules of ownership and appropriation. In this case, the Dormilona tizane is probably contemplated as traditional knowledge, and it would be included under the protection of treaties and laws that prevent its appropriation, for example, as exclusive knowledge of a company to produce and distribute. But how about the songs, the stories, the medicines that are created today? What about the knowledge that we create collectively but cannot consider “traditional” or “indigenous”? How do we protect today’s creative work so it can be shared and made part of the ever-growing wealth of our local and global cultures?
A high level discussion with very practical consequences As in many of the new fields arising today with the Information Society, the rules that apply to the commons, both in the Creation perspective and the Appropriation dimension, are neither clear nor defined, and they must be discussed in an environment of constant challenge by the political and economic realities of our region. Most legal systems in Latin America understand author’s rights as moral rights. This has implications about how this discussion differs, for example, from the North American discussion on Copyright law. One of the most important implications in my view is that moral rights were always discussed in Human Rights frameworks, as cultural rights, whereas Copyright is being discussed in commercial frameworks. There is a negotiation of what exactly the author’s rights refer to, and by discussing this issue outside of the cultural rights realm is isolating this issue as a mere discrepancy that stands on the way of free trade and less commercial barriers. At this point in time, the inconsistencies and differences of analysis become more important in the context of many Latin American countries signing Free Trade Agreements with the United States, Canada and the European Union. For example, the Free Trade Agreement between the United States and Central America includes important changes and dispositions about Intellectual Property Law, that could eventually overwrite the local systems and even future advances in legislation. This is not only a concern of the Commons movement. Agricultural producers, public health workers, culture practitioners, educators; they are all getting involved because the consequences of the Trade Agreements have managed to put a more understandable face to an abstract problem, the way we built our local cultures is being displaced by a commercial negotiation.
How two dimensions merge One of our thoughts on this issue, though not very well formulated yet, is that in some cultural and social spaces of Latin America, the concept of collective creation is not separated from the collective appropriation. Creation and appropriation become the same process, in which people give something to the product of the collective process each time that they get in touch with it, and they become instant “owners”. Commercial and legal mediations rarely work, because they are not a practice rooted in a deep tradition. July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
Even if someone attempted to patent the Dormilona tizane, a commercial mediation (paying for it) or legal mediation (having to obtain a license to produce it commercially) would require a major conceptual change about the object of collective knowledge. This change cannot be made just because there’s a law, even if the law imposes sanctions. Hundreds or thousands of years of cultural practice are not going to change from the establishment of a legal framework of reference by the content of a free trade agreement. However, this contradiction of concepts is showing again its consequences: music that was created collectively and used to belong to everybody is now being licensed under strict conditions. File sharing is being discouraged as ‘unlawful’ behaviour, even though it is not so in many countries. Copyright of texts and educational materials that use a local educational tradition is being enforced more and more, creating an access gap between those who can afford it and those who cannot. The richness found in biodiversity and traditional use of plants is being explored, catalogued and appropriated by corporations. Agricultural methods that created high quality crops are all of the sudden, intellectual property of a few. These are just a few examples of what is at stake in this discussion.
In Bellanet LAC we have grown interested in several of these questions: • How applicable are the initiatives such as the Creative Commons licenses (discussed below in this article) to collective creations for collective appropriation? • How are different initiatives and policy making bodies addressing the discrepancies of the discussion in Cultural rights frameworks vs. commercial rights frameworks? How does this affect our discussion? • What are the existing mechanisms to look at collective creation from a legal and technical perspective? • How do the dimension of collective creation can bring greater awareness of the dimension of collective ownership and appropriation? • How can we link existing initiatives around the commons with development initiatives and create stronger links with local communities? So far we have only started exploring this issue with our limited resources and knowledge, but we are committed to create the linkages that are needed to have a greater understanding from the perspective of knowledge workers, committed to local culture and interests. We have started creating links with initiatives such as the Creative Commons. So far we have the idea that licenses are good proposals that have to be transformed to fit the local needs and conditions. They need not only to address the appropriation dimension of the commons, they must understand better how the creation process happens, and how it can flourish under a new model of shared knowledge. For us, licenses should not stand by themselves; they should be feeding on local content and the input from creative projects that are being created around them. In this case, the role of those involved cannot be limited to the protection of commons under existing law, but it has to go beyond that, towards a new model of creation that addresses collective needs.
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Creative Commons (CC) Using text from the article coauthored by Jose Murilo Junior and David Sasaki, “The State of Creative Commons in Latin America”, published by Global Voices Online under a CC license. Civil society and citizens groups are trying to address one or both dimensions of the Commons. In this environment of discovery, continuity, innovation and re-creation, new notions and contradictions are created everyday. One of the most important projects is the regional adaptation and translation of the Creative Commons licenses. These licenses are enabling bloggers, podcasters, musicians, academics, and artists to more easily disseminate their works to a global online audience. The project in Latin America has transcended its online reach and its merging efforts with ICT access initiatives to include also access to “free” knowledge, and the different country initiatives have managed to create important links both from the creative communities and the local governments and policy makers.
From Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_commons The Creative Commons website enables copyright holders to grant some of their rights to the public while retaining others through a variety of licensing and contract schemes including dedication to the public domain or open content licensing terms. The intention is to avoid the problems current copyright laws create for the sharing of information. The project provides several free licenses that copyright holders can use when releasing their works on the Web. They also provide RDF/XML metadata that describes the license and the work that makes it easier to automatically process and locate licensed works. All these efforts, and more, are done to counter the effects of what Creative Commons considers to be, in the words of chairman of the board Lawrence Lessig, a dominant and increasingly restrictive permission culture, “a culture in which creators get to create only with the permission of the powerful, or of creators from the past”. Lessig maintains that modern culture is dominated by traditional content distributors in order to maintain and strengthen their monopolies on cultural products such as popular music and popular cinema, and that Creative Commons can provide alternatives to these restrictions.
Brazil Launched in April 2004, Creative Commons Brazil was the first fully functional regional CC affiliates. Inaugurated with the help of FGV law school’s Center for Technology & Society (CTS), it has Ronaldo Lemos as its most vibrant executive. Free Culture, Open Business, and Overmundo are some of the new initiatives CC-Brazil. The influential role of Brazilian Minister of Culture Gilberto Gil, a great supporter of the new licensing model in Brazil, cannot be denied. A well-known musician, who at the same time is in charge of Brazilian cultural policy guidelines, he’s managed to translate the concepts into actions. He collaborated in the development of the sampling licenses in 2004, participated
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musically in the Wired CD (a CD to rip, sample, mash, and share), and has taken a leadership role behind the CC movement.
Mexico Mexico was the first Latin American country to launch their licenses with a legal workshop called iLaw in which intellectual property scholars spoke to an audience of lawyers, students, and bloggers about the need for CC licenses and how they fit into Mexico’s specific legal framework. Since then, project leaders León Felipe Sánchez and Jorge Ringenbach have been busy spreading the mission to content creators and government institutions. Among the most notable of achievements, Mexico’s Presidency now distributes all of their online content with a no derivatives CC license. Cultural initiatives have also found success such as the Mexicommons Creativity Contest, which awarded musicians, podcasters, photographers, and graphic designers with Creative Commons-licensed works. A showing of the short film Elephants Dream in Mexico City attracted around 30 attendees who discussed how artists could take advantage of the licenses. León Felipe Sánchez observed that most of the inquiries focused on how artists can still make money while also encouraging their works to be widely distributed.
Peru Peru’s launch of Creative Commons will follow the iLaw inauguration model used by Mexico. Project leaders Oscar Montezuma and Pedro Mendizábal Simonetti both attended iSummit 2006, where they described the relationship established with Peru’s blogging community. Blogger and illustrator Javier Prado, for example, designed the CC Peru logo. An essay contest was also put on which gave free iLaw admission to three winning bloggers who answered the question “Why Creative Commons?” Carlos Wertheman, a popular writer and member of the Peruvian blogger community, will moderate two of the iLaw panels. Oscar Montezuma emphasised in the last iSummit that CC Peru needs to convince the national community of lawyers that Creative Commons is not an anti-copyright movement, but rather, tries to give more sense to copyright law.
Others Chile and Argentina have also made available local versions of the license and they are working with local creative projects to disseminate CC Content, and more importantly, making strong links with public policy makers to introduce the Commons in the public agenda. Representatives from Colombia, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, and Guatemala are in the planning stages of releasing Creative Commons licenses in their respective countries. That doesn’t mean, however, that they aren’t already planning ambitious projects. Carlos González Yanes, for example, spoke of his desire to host a central online library of Creative Commons-licensed works, which would show Puerto Rican writers, artists, and musicians how their creations can be distributed widely by embracing CC.
Reference 1 Vercelli, Ariel. Creative Commons como (bienes) Comunes Creativos http://www.arielvercelli.org/blog/index.php?p=88 J i4d | July 2006
23-25 August 2006 Hotel Taj Palace, New Delhi
Vision 2010 Organisers
knowledge for change
Co-organisers
Department of Information Technology Government of India
Media partners
UN DP
ov
Supporting partners
Exhibitors
L CATION
Programme Advisory Board M P Narayanan
R. Chandrashekhar
Subash Khuntia
President
Additional Secretary,
Joint Secretary, Ministry of
CSDMS
Ministry of Communications
Human Resource and
& Information Technology,
Development Government
Government of India
of India
Chairman of the Board
Co-chair of the Board
Aruna Sundararajan
Ashis Sanyal
Aman Singh
G. D. Gautama
CEO, Common Service
Director, MoCIT
CEO, CHiPS
Principal Secretary IT,
Centre Initiatives,
Government of India
Chhattisgarh
Government of West Bengal
N. S. Kalsi
Otem Dai
Secretary, IT
Commissioner (IT and S&T)
Government of Punjab
Government of
Government Representatives
Government of India
K.Ratna Prabha Secretary, IT & Communications Dept. Govt. of Andhra Pradesh
N. Vijayaditya Director General National Informatics Centre
Arunachal Pradesh
Government of India
P. H. Kurian
Prakash Kumar
R. S. Sharma
Renu Budhiraja
Secretary, IT
Joint Secretary, Department
Secretary, IT
Director, e-Governance
Government of Kerala
of Earth Sciences, Ministry
Government of Jharkhand
Division MoCIT, Government of India
of Ocean Development Government of India Sanjeev Chopra
S. Abbasi
Sanjeev Gupta
S.N Tripathy
Secretary, IT
Director, MoCIT
Secretary, IT
Secretary, IT
Government of Uttranchal
Government of India
Government of Himachal
Govt. of Orissa
Pradesh
S.K. Sandhu
S. R. Das
Zohra Chatterji
Finance Secretary -cum-
Sr. Director, MoCIT
Principal Secretary
Secretary, IT, Chandigarh
Government of India
IT & Electronics
Administration, Chandigarh
Govt. of Uttar Pradesh
Industry Representatives Jaijit Bhattacharya
Manas Chakrabarty
Manash Chakraborty
Nivedan Sahani
Country Director, Govt.
Head
CEO
Vice President
Strategy
Hole-in-the-Wall Education
Learnet India Limited
Govt & PSU Business
Sun Microsystems Pvt. Ltd.
Limited (HiWEL), India
Bharti Airtel Limited
India
India
Puneet Gupta
P. Ravindranath
Country Manager- Public
Director- Govt. & Public
Sector
Affairs
IBM India Ltd.
HP India Sales Pvt. Ltd.
Rohit Kumar
R. Ramakrishnan
Country Head, Public Sector
Director, Global Operations
Microsoft, India
& Solutions SAP India Pvt. Ltd.
Rajesh Janey
S. P. S. Grover
Shantanu Prakash
Tarun Malik
Vice President
Senior Director
Managing Director
Head
EMC Data Storage
Oracle India
Educomp Solutions Ltd.
Microsoft - Rural Computing
System, India
India
Strategy
Vijay Kumar
Vivek Aggarwal
Vishal Gupta
Vice President
CEO
Director
NIIT India Ltd.
Liqvid e-Learning Services
Total Learning Sources
Pvt. Ltd.
India
India
India
International Agencies
Academia
Ashish Garg
Basheerhamad Shadrach
Veena Joshi
Country Coordinator
Telecentre.org, IDRC
Swiss Agency for
Department of Management
GeSCI
New Delhi
Development
Studies, IIT Delhi
India
India
and Cooperation New Delhi
Prof. M P Gupta
'egov India 2006' aims to focus mainly on how IT in public sector could be an instrument to increase India's competitiveness for fostering a leadership economy. It will address other important e-Governance issues reflecting present situation and future aspirations. It would also provide a platform to hear case studies and debate on the realities and strategies of e-Governance in India.
Key topics • •
National e-Governance Plan (NeGP) – Present Status and way forward Capacity Building for e-GovernanceSecure e-Government
Indian Telecentre Forum 2006 aims to discuss, and deliberate multi variate issues concerning policy, technology, best practices and business models relating to implementation and sustainability of rural ICT centres and their returns in terms of socio-economic development. The event is expected to follow a consultative mode, with due consideration for making it highly participatory and interactive in nature, bringing together the best of minds, thought leaders, practitioners and stakeholders from government, business and civil society.
The Digital Learning India 2006 conference aims to take stock of the progress made by India in using technologies as an enabler of education. The conference will deliberate on the enabling policies and infrastructure, challenges of resources, identify the critical success factors that build and sustain initiatives in ICT in education, and the role of the school principals/teachers and strategies/ programmes to strengthen their capacities to achieve the goals of education.
Key topics •
National ICT in education policy
•
Asian success stories in ICT in school education
•
Supporting infrastructure for ICT in education connectivity, hardware, content
•
Teachers capacity building for ICT integration in school education challenges and practices
•
State Wide Area Network (SWAN)
Key topics • Common Service Centre (CSC) Initiative in India
•
Workshop on e-Governance in Municipalities
•
International Perspectives on Telecentres
•
Standards and Interoperability
•
Indian Telecentre movement
•
Security
•
Global Cross Cutting Session
•
WiMax
•
Private Sector Initiatives
•
•
Alliances & Linkages for Successful Telecentre Networks
ICT in Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan- leadership reflections in states
•
Distance education for non-formal capacity building opportunities for content, technology and service providers
Important Dates Last date for receipt of abstracts: 15th July 2006 Acceptance Notification: 20th July 2006 Last date for full papers: 4th August 2006
•
Content, Connectivity & Capacity Building
•
Mission 2007
•
Monitoring & Evaluation Methodologies
•
Measuring outcomes in ICTs in education
•
Sustainability Issues & Lessons Learnt
•
Strategies of scaling up ICT in education projects
Final confirmation: 10th August 2006
Important Contacts
Exhibition
For Exhibition Rakesh Tripathie (rakesh@csdms.in) Mo: +91-9899821364
The ICT triple conference will host an exhibition of latest e-solutions, services, initiatives and case studies from across Asia and beyond. Professional service providers, IT vendors, consulting firms, government agencies and national/international development organisations involved in the ICT in Education domain are participating in the exhibition.
For Registration Himanshu Kalra (himanshu@csdms.in) Mo: +91-9818485406
Exhibition Fee (per square meter)
Shell Scheme
INR 9800
Conference Registration Fee Conference
Academics/Institution
Govt.
NGO’s
Private
Overseas
Delegates
INR 3000
INR 4000
INR 5000
INR 7500
USD 300
Spot Registration
INR 4000
INR 5000
INR 7500
INR 10000
USD 400
The Delegate Registration entitles the individual to participate in all technical sessions, workshops, keynotes and plenary sessions and social functions for all three/any Digital Learning India 2006, egov India 2006 & Indian Telecentre Forum 2006 conferences.
Visit the following link to register online:
http://www.egovonline.net/egovindia/del_registration.asp
Organisers profile Organisers
Supporting partners
Centre for Science, Development and knowledge for change Media Studies (CSDMS) is a leading Asian non-governmental institution engaged in advocacy, research and community building in ICT for Development through capacity building and media initiatives. www.csdms.in
Asia-Pacific Educational Research Association (APERA) was launched in Bangkok on Thursday 13 December 2001 at the 2001 UNESCO-ACEID conference with the objectives to support educational research and researchers in the Asia-Pacific region, to promote greater communication between researchers and policy makers, administrators and educational practitioners, to disseminate educational research findings and to support the development of educational research skills in the Asia-Pacific region. http://www.apera.org
GIS Development strives to promote and propagate the usage of geospatial technologies in various areas of development for the community at large. It remains dedicated to foster the growing network of those interested in geo-informatics worldwide and Asia in particular. www.GISdevelopment.net
Co-Organisers Department of Information Technology (DIT) under the Ministry of Information Technology, Department of Information Government of India is Technology Government of India the Central department responsible for all administrative functions relating to formulation, execution and implementation of IT policies in India. www.mit.gov.in UNDP is the United Nation’s global development network, an organization advocating for change and connecting countries to knowledge, experience and resources to help people build a better life. They are presently working in 166 countries, working with them on their own solutions to global and national
UN DP
development challenges. www.undp.org.in.
CONFERENCE SECRETARIAT
Centre for Science, Development and Media Studies (CSDMS) G-4, Sector 39 Noida - 201301, India Tel. : +91-120-2502181- 87 Fax: +91-120-2500060 Web: www.i4donline.net/indiantelecentreforum Email: info@i4donline.net
Bellanet promotes and facilitates effective collaboration within the international community, especially through the use of ICTs. Bellanet aims to support effective development practice by sharing its expertise in information and communication technologies as well as its skills in facilitating organizational learning and knowledge sharing. Bellanet delivers its program through three main Program Lines - Online Communities, Knowledge Sharing and Open Development. Together they represent key approaches to building institutional and individual collaboration skills and maximizing the potential of ICTs to support collaborative development work. In addition to this, three important crosscutting areas are also considered and woven into all aspects of Bellanet’s work: Gender Equality, Capacity Development, and Monitoring and Evaluation.
www.bellanet.org global e-schools and communities initiative (gesci) is an initiative of the UN ® ICT Task Force that aims to improve education as a cornerstone of sustainable socio-economic development and a key mechanism for enabling people to share a country’s prosperity. The organisation is working towards providing ICT platform for schools, support for training and capacity building and monitoring/reporting of various educational ICT projects. www.gesci.org. Internet Service Providers Association of India (ISPAI) was set up in 1998 with a mission to ‘Promote Internet for the benefit of all’. With the formal announcement of Internet privatization in India, ISPAI had taken a leading role in monitoring the process in the country. ISPAI seeks opportunities to encourage and promote the use of Internet and
IT enabled services, such as E-commerce, eGovernance, Health Care and Distance Learning www.ispai.com. Korean Agency for Digital Opportunity & Promotion (KADO) was founded in 1984 as Information Communication Training Center and in 2005, it is Designated as the Specialized National Agency for Knowledge Information Resource Management in Korea with a vision of systematic and comprehensive digital gap reduction among social class, region, age and nation groups and improvement of information welfare for the deprived in particular and the public in general. www.kado.or.kr Plan International, a child-centred development organisation works with 1.3 million children, their families and communities in developing countries all over the world, implementing projects at the grassroots level in education, health, water and sanitation, incomegeneration and cross-cultural communication. Plan works across Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, in communities where many struggle to meet their basic needs. www.plan-internatinal.org Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) is Switzerland’s international cooperation agency within the Swiss Foreign Ministry. Together with other federal offices, SDC is responsible for overall coordination of development activities and cooperation with Eastern Europe, as well as humanitarian aid. www.sdc.admin.ch The telecentre.org is an initiative developed by the information and communication technologies for development (ICT4D) program of International Development Research Centre (IDRC) and Microsoft Unlimited Potential Program to support community telecentres across the world. www.telecentre.org USAID-India under the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), is an independent government agency of United States working in India with the objective of providing economic development and humanitarian assistance. USAID-India is working closely with the Indian Government on key areas of development pertaining to Disaster Management, Economic Growth, Energy and Environment, Equity and Health. http://www.usaid.gov/in
K EYNOTE A DDRESS
BY
J AMIE L OVE AT A SIA C OMMONS C ONFERENCE
Advocating for the Knowledge Commons Lawrence Liang, from the Alternative Law Forum in India, facilitated the keynote presentation session and outlined the difficulty of defining Asia Commons. Stories that we tell each other – favorite story – German, American, Indians collaborate – culture of the copy persists. They include the pervasive, invasive act of copyright, emergence of global alternatives – commons, common heritage. The keynote presented by Jamie Love would help in answering the question, ‘How do we build a dialogue around Asia Commons?’. See also pages 13-14 forthe keynote discussion of Peter Drahos. James Love, an activist economist, in his keynote address at the Asia Commons conference, argued for the development and protection of the knowledge commons. Describing the knowledge commons, he said, ‘it is the combination of knowledge and information that is not owned by anyone (the public domain), or which is made available to the public by its owners, for free, or which can be freely accessed and used by the public, in areas where rights are limited by legal rules or by custom’. The Knowledge Commons is partly shaped by intellectual property policies, such as the degree to which the public domain is eliminated and privatized, the relative freedom that is given for certain exceptions to private IPR, or the degree to which IP rules are actually enforced in practice. The knowledge commons also depends upon the actions of parties who voluntarily make privately owned knowledge or information goods available for free, such as persons who make millions of web pages freely accessible, license their works under creative commons licenses, or write and distribute millions of lines of free software code.
James Love is the Director of the Consumer Project on Technology, a non-government organization with offices in Washington, DC, London and Geneva. It is one of key NGOs articulating public interest discourse of access of knowledge, etc. Information about CPTech is on the web at http:// www.cptech.org
Why is the knowledge commons important? Knowledge is empowerment in many different areas: in the fields of development, economic development, innovation, July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
Jamie Love at one of the speed share sessions at Asia Commons Conference
political power, dignity, freedom, participation in cultural life, etc. Knowledge that is freely available is more intensively used. It can lead to a more egalitarian and fair society. Being a part of information commons movement, it is evident that there are many contradictions in the real world. Copyrighted works are constantly violated in the list serves. That is the example of custom (of sharing freely) being important. People freely disobey copyright laws. Even in the US State Department, they freely make copies, without permission. That is what helps the State Department function. This is the custom. What happens commonly contrary to the law is important. The action of the www billions of web pages, information – not to restrict access is important. It is a combination of what the government does and the people do. Information equals energy. Access to knowledge, information, etc. is so fundamental to things that we do. The rules are important. Companies like the IBM or the Internet Engineering Task Force believe that investing in technologies…and price it as zero. The value of a protocol of a technology whose price is zero is higher than a protocol, which is priced. When such information is available freely, a child in Ecuador or India, if can be provided access to Internet, it gives them an
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Photo Credit: Suchit Nanda
Lawrence Liang, Jamie Love and Peter Drahos in dialogue at the keynote session Asia Commons on June 6, 2006 at Bangkok
opportunity to grow, to connect with people, and we want to protect that. Fairness of universal access is an important idea. In order to build these ideas it is important to reform the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO). WIPO needs to change, to make it more balanced, more equitable. It is an UN Agency. They have helped write copyright and patents laws for many countries. There is need to change the technical assistance provided and to stop modification of bad treaties like broadcast/ webcast, etc. Access to Knowledge, medicine, etc. is now incorporated by exceptions in the WIPO rules. It needs to be less monopolistic in their approach. Starting with the bad treaties. And work in introducing the development agenda. There is a need to evaluate the entire work programme, and Chile has proposed the changes in the treaty, to create treaties that enhance the knowledge commons, and promote access to knowledge. Focus is needed in the following three areas: • treaties on limitations and exceptions • treaty of A2K • agreements to protect open standards The purpose is to emphasise on modes of production of knowledge goods. The next agenda is to reform the World Trade Organisation. One is defining the three-step test and rights to use copyrights. Implementing the Article 40 under the TRIPS. What does it mean? What are the opportunities? And, strive to have a general agreement on Public Goods. Modeled after the WTO services agreement, make offers to support provision of public knowledge goods, such as databases, free software, access to government funded R&D, etc. There must also be in incentives to promote public goods. Further, advocacy is required in other for a like the World Health Organisation, Internet Governance Forum, APEC, ASEAN, etc. There is need for new ways of thinking of biomedical R&D. The
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need to make TRIPS akin to WIPO, though not a coercion framework, but an access framework. By changing national laws, and expanding the scope of access to knowledge (A2K), especially in dealing with robust limitations and exceptions of copyright and other IP regimes, dealing with orphaned works, compulsory licensing, access to government funded research, and support for new modes of production of knowledge goods. Civil society norm setting entails creating norms for fair/ acceptable use of copyrighted goods, for derivative works, for use in education, and for use in noncommercial spaces like list serves, web pages, etc. and for personal use.
New Business Models • • • • • • •
Creative Commons New P2P distributing/ remuneration schemes Open Access Publishing Procurement and Free Software Prize Fund approaches (medicine, agriculture, journals, software) Competitive intermediaries Matching funds Jamie advocates a positive language of access to knowledge, to protect and enhance the knowledge common, promote the types new business models described above, and that stimulates development and innovation. He calls for making A2K and knowledge commons more political and less technical. He also calls for openly examining ideological basis for intellectual property, to build new alliances between consumers and creative communities, and insist the political, business, academic and civil leaders to provide an optimistic future for A2K and the knowledge commons. By asking everyone to do something positive, and defining everyone as a positive ally, one is bound to achieve success, James strongly believes. J i4d | July 2006
OSCAR P ROJECT
An exercise in ICT, agriculture and society This article discusses OSCAR project’s aim of integration of user & technical perspective on the development and use of an open source based weed identification software programme.
Rico Lie Media Anthropologist, Department of Communication Science, Wageningen University, The Netherlands Rico.Lie@wur.nl
D. Balasubramaniam Manager-Information Systems, French Institute of Pondicherry (IFP), India balu.d@ifpindia.org
July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
FLOSS (Free/Libre Open Source Software) has opened democratic spaces for the participation of civil society, thus creating potential for developing ICT tools to address problems at local level. The OSCAR-project (Open Source Simple Computer for Agriculture in Rural Areas) is an initiative from European and South Asian Institutions to develop Open Source ICT solutions to assist decision making in agriculture. OSCAR is a collaborative effort, initiated by IFP (French Institute of Pondicherry) with the Rice-Wheat Consortium for IndoGangetic Plains from India, CIRAD (Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement) from France and the Communication and Innovation Studies Group from Wageningen University in The Netherlands as partners in the action. The project is cofinanced by the European Commission’s Asia ICT programme under the ‘get-in-touch and keep-in-touch’ activities in the focus areas of agriculture and society. The project aims at building an open source based weed identification system for the major weed species for rice-wheat cropping systems of the Indo-Gangetic plains, covering Pakistan, India, Nepal and Bangladesh. Conceived as a decision support system for the target groups, the OSCAR prototype application contains 50 major weeds, considering their economic impact, invasiveness and commonality in different cropping systems in rabi/kharif seasons in all the four countries of the Indo-Gangetic Plains. The OSCAR-project integrates a technical perspective and a user perspective.
Need for technical perspective The difficulty encountered when identifying weeds using standard flora is centred on three major constraints, namely:
• ability to identify the species without its flowers or before it flowers; • use of a dichotomous key, which cannot tolerate any error and imposes the choice as well as the order of questions; • use of technical terms not understood by the non-specialists. To overcome these constraints, the OSCAR-project developed a software programme that uses a graphic interface based on the identity kit system, which reconstitutes the plants, using images. It is designed to remove the main difficulties encountered by non-botanists, when identifying species, using standard flora as it uses only drawings instead of technical jargon and provides users the freedom to choose the character that needs to be described. Missing information or data are permitted, thus allowing for the identification of incomplete samples. The users can access the photos, the description, and the botanical illustrations of the species at any moment. In case, users encounter doubt in the choice of characters (for description), they could ask the program for the most pertinent one. If the probability of a species identified is less than 100 %, the programme indicates the characters that contain observation errors by the user. The descriptions of the species are available through the Internet website. The programme is multilingual and caters to wider section of people. All the technical terms used are highlighted as a hypertext, and an illustrated definition is accessible. Once the correct weed species is identified, the description page is displayed which contains the weed control measures for it. These control measures include botanical, mechanical and cultural control measures. These species description pages are made available in English, Hindi, Urdu and Bangla to cater to the language needs of the IGP.
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The OSCAR application is available in four different versions, MS Windows version, linux version, PDA (Simputer) version and web-based version, all of which are available online at www.oscarasia.org. The software is offered free of charge. Apart from the MS Windows version, OSCAR is developed using FOSS tools and is an open source product.
Need for user perspective An integral part of the OSCAR-project is to look at three different potential users - farmers, extension officers and scientists and students in agricultural sciences. The project learned about perception and appropriateness of the tool through extensive interactions with farmer groups, extension personnel, IT specialists, NGO and UN staff, government officials, scientific researchers and Ph.D. students in various disciplines and M.Sc. students in all the four IGP countries. A summary for the findings reads as follows: Farmers in the Indo-Gangetic Plains: • The current communication systems in place seem to work well as far as problems with weed identification are concerned; • Priority issues for farmers, as far as weeds are concerned, lie with management and control and have an economic nature. Extension workers (at different levels): • There seems to be no major problem in weed identification among extension officers. In a rare case, when an extension officer cannot identify a certain species, he turns to the scientists at national or university level for help. It seems therefore more logical to offer the software and database at this level. • Computers are, in most countries, available from the regional/ district level upwards. In most rural areas, there are no computers used in extensions services. • The software and the database could be of relevance to in-service trainings. Students and scientists: • The software seems to be primarily an educational tool. It could find its relevance in school education, higher academic (agricultural), education (B.Sc, M.Sc and Ph.D levels) and in professional education in agriculture. It could also be relevant for in-service trainings at the level of ‘teaching the teachers’. In all countries, there was a lot of interest among scientists and students to use the software.
Advantages of the software The software was demonstrated and tested in India, Nepal, Pakistan, Bangladesh and The Netherlands. Basically, the students and scientists, farmers and extension officers were very enthusiastic in working with the software and no major problem was observed. Some of the findings in this area are as follow: • Visual interface: Provision of a visual interface to the identification process is a major advantage in the tool. This eliminates any prerequisite botanical knowledge about weed species. The interface design was easy to use and to identify weed species. Though there were issues with their first exercises, subsequently everyone was able to navigate through the software with ease. • Specialised versus general information in the database: The farmers and extension people have an occasional problem with weed identification. If they have a problem with a specific species
30
•
•
•
•
that they do not know, the farmer turns to the extension officer and if the extension officer doesn’t know, he or she turns to the specialist at the National Agricultural Research Centre. Putting general information in the database would only make sense if the focus were on the general public or on lower level students, like those in a high school biology class. Weed management and control: Many people felt that if the software would be useful for extension people and farmers, issues on weed management and control should be emphasised in the database. Weed specialists in the different countries can help to provide this information. Difficulties are that if management and control are socio-economically determined and differ accordingly between the many regions in the IGPs, standard use of pesticides and herbicides could be included. Language issues: Language issues relate to the type of end user. To use local languages, software is only necessary if the end-user does not read English. Having the names of the species in all the local languages and dialects is of interest to all end-users. To have the control and management descriptions in the database available in the local languages is of interest to the farmers/extension officers. However, to translate the descriptions in the local languages will not be necessary. If the software be used as an educational tool for students at higher levels of education in the different countries of the IGPs, to have the description only in English will be enough. There is no immediate need to translate the descriptions into other languages. Updating and maintaining the software and the database: If people want to add additional information, they can do so in their personal copy of the software. The fact that they can enhance or customise the current version according to their own specificities was seen as a positive aspect. If they think the additions are relevant for everybody, the info could be sent to CIRAD/IFP for verification and publication. It is recommended to let people register before downloading the software. Open source aspect: The free/open source nature of OSCAR seems to kindle some interest among target groups, particularly among scientists and students.
Conclusion Processes of technical and social integrations are difficult, but needed. It seems necessary to try and combine technical perspectives with user and social perspectives. These kinds of interdisciplinary processes incorporate understanding, respect and negotiation. It is important to realise that crossing disciplinary borders lies in more than one field and that it is important to identify these fields for each particular socio-ICT project. It is often not one border that needs to be crossed, but many. Topics and questions that were learned from OSCAR in the field of ‘ICTs for agricultural development’ relate among other things, to using appropriate ICTs, ICT applications and crossing knowledge borders. For appropriate ICT applications and realistic opportunities in the field of development and social change, we need to think about combining situations from inside and outside agriculture. ICTs give the potential of integrating information in a cross-sectorial way, e.g. through ‘mobile databases’. Participatory Information and Communication Technology Development (PICTD) can play an important role in this regard. i4d | July 2006
F OSSFP , P AKISTAN
The spirit of the FOSS movement This article shares perspectives from the ‘Spirit of FOSS’, an understanding that the FOSS movement members share globally
There has been significant discussions and research on issues regarding how software developers collaborate and contribute under the Free and Open Source Software Model. This article shares perspectives from the ‘Spirit of FOSS’, an understanding that the FOSS movement members share globally. At one point in time, software developers were just considered to be geeky computer scientists, hiding behind machines developing tonnes of codes to create robots and programmes that helped to revolutionise the business and industry. Because of all the programming, computers, robotics and technology related activities, the world hardly looked upon them as normal human beings sometimes considered them to be some sort of misfits for society or rebellions. Today, their role has evolved into something far much bigger and stronger; their contributions have shifted from scientific research, benefiting business and industry only towards developing freely accessible, modifiable, researchable, distributable contributions for humanitarian benefit. This has led towards formulation of the FOSS movement, not governed or owned by a single body, but by various FOSS communities, worldwide residing in civil society organs, academia and research, public and private sectors of society.
What brings and binds the FOSS community together?
Fouad Riaz Bajwa General Secretary and Co-Founder, Free and Open Source Software Foundation of Pakistan (FOSSFP), Pakistan bajwa@fossfp.org
July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
The FOSS community formulates together around the concept of community contributions. Most FOSS developers get together because they believe in making the world a better place, treating each other with respect and that everyone in the community has something to contribute. These principles evolve into the basis of a commons, a community of sharing, where everyone equally shares resources and contributes more resources back to help retain the common
grazing grounds continuing to make them sustainable and useful for future generations. While contributing to a FOSS community, it is not necessary that all members should be writing pseudocode or programming software code, using the various available open source software development languages and platforms. Instead they can also contribute in terms of using the software for their own and their community’s benefit, inform problems that occur while its usage, carry out documentation, promotion of the software online as well as offline, conduct trainings including seminars and conferences for wide-spread adoption by end-users, distribute the software freely or even charge fees for services built around using the software. The opportunities available for contributing in one form or the other are immense and the scale at which these activities may rise to is sometimes unimaginable. An effective example is that of Linux that has evolved into a globally renowned Operating System in competition to other proprietary (closed source licensed programmes or where programmes are not available with their source code) platforms. A Linux distribution enshrined on the principle of the commons is Ubuntu-Linux, derived from the Debian Linux distribution. Ubuntu has grown into the most widely used desktop Linux globally. Moreover, it is available with various FOSS applications including tools like, Open Office, FireFox Internet browser, Evolution e-Mail Manager, GAIM Instant Manager etc. The current distribution widely supports servers as well as standalone server for managing LAMP (Linux-Apache-Mysql/ PostgreSQL-Php/Perl) software development. Apart from Operating Systems and general applications, the FOSS movement has immensely contributed to human and social development through applications that
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support human rights, gender empowerment, microfinance development, employment creation, news sharing, information and knowledge dissemination etc. At times, the FOSS development model including the economics of how the community sustains itself in light of monetary and binding capacities becomes quite confusing for people, who are interested in becoming involved with the movement or with its contributions. Usually the issues that come to mind are that a FOSS community of practice or learning may give away its contributions either at no-cost offer or at a minimal cost that includes that source code of the contributed application or system. The basis of confusion is that the world only perceived the source code part of the software to be the actual high-revenue generating commodity in the software development model itself. The source code normally would cost more than the license or the compiled programme distribution under proprietary software models and if the source code is being contributed to end-users either free or at more than the cost of the distribution of the software itself, how will the communities generate revenue directly from their products and contributions? This perception tends to be misperceived regarding how FOSS communities generate stable and scalable revenue streams in order to sustain their existence and growth. Revenues tend to be an output of post-development activities, undertaken by the FOSS community either evolved due to demand from the end-users to extend customised services or as strategies to continue the sustainability and growth of the project. This can also be termed as value addition to services extended around the FOSS development model. Related models have been used by a large number of commercial organisations that have extended business activities developed around delivering FOSS related services throughout the world. The FOSS model disrupts the traditional product retail oriented business model by extending the software product with its source code, sometimes free or for a nominal fees (without proprietary licensing) and further generating revenues through providing supplementary services including consultancy for system integration, documentation, end-user training or service and system maintenance contracts generating more value, not from the product, but around the product with continued generation of community support around the system with continuous updates and feature additions. The objective here is not to entail that FOSS provides a compelling business opportunity but the fact that FOSS through this model reduces the associated research and development costs as well as the time to bring more innovative products to the market and speeding up competition to a new level. The FOSS model gives competitive advantage to its development community that itself is very much innovative and productive due to its globally disbursed nature. This community brings to the project crossdisciplinary research from all corners of the globe as well as continuous security enhancements that produce a product of superior quality and very secured. Further adding to the project are internationalisation and localisation capabilities and thus a product is developed that can be freely extended to end users all around the world. The FOSS model develops a community around the project that continuously provides new solutions, features, and ideas. The FOSS community or the development team benefits from the output,
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highly skilled software developers from around the world, creating a knowledge product of unimaginable economic and social value without paying huge sums of salaries and production overheads while benefiting from supplementary services models, built around the project in terms of learning and monetary values. FOSS model has the ability to multiply itself like a nuclear reaction. It spreads from one region to the other by word of mouth, project and community mailing lists and newsletters and other promotional activities until it hits mainstream media and is picked up by the commercial corporate media world and thus, becomes a hot usable and sellable product. The model has also proved to promote and market itself wildly like the examples of the Linux, Apache, the FireFox browser and many other successful FOSS projects. This, in return, generates excellent reputation that further gains larger portions of market share as compared to proprietary software. Where it took proprietary models decades to market and gain global dominance, FOSS movement has quietly built up, spreading its wings to all corners of the globe, becoming a preference for all innovative and human development oriented projects whatever it may be, education, health or poverty alleviation. FOSS movement is a whole new ecosystem that has emerged from ‘open standards’ and ‘alternative software development techniques’.
Freedoms in FOSSFP The intention here is not to explain the four freedoms of the Free Software Foundation and the principles of the Open Source Initiative. The focus, instead, is the underlying human motivation of developing social or community oriented software for human benefit at large. • We all want to make a positive difference to the people in the world around us. They can belong anywhere from the ‘developed’ or from the ‘developing’ world irrespective of age, colour, race, religion, ethnicity or economic status. • Our motivation to develop such software comes from the inner urge on how we can add rather than subtract to the spirit of life. • Since we have the knowledge and resources to do so, and that leaders of the movement have made resources available globally, we can utilise this power to change the world around us through software, built under the umbrella of Open Standards and FOSS. • We are all well aware of this ability and, thus, we will never underestimate or neglect this power of software development, sharing that we have acquired through the contributions and struggle of many heroes of the FOSS movement. • We will always nurture it and help others benefit from the true spirit of the FOSS movement. It’s our choice and, not Microsoft’s, regarding what software we should use! Above ideology helps to understand that FOSS is a result of freedom. We have a choice for adopting software for every situation in our life without restrictions, and that choice should be supported with the fact that whenever we want and whenever we feel it necessary to make changes or modifications, we should have access to its source code. We should be free to choose software just like our actions and attitudes. With knowledge and zeal to achieve the unachievable, by developing and sharing knowledge for the benefit of humanity, the FOSS movement will continue to disrupt the dictatorship of the proprietary software world and progress towards an information society that embodies the principles of sharing and open society.J i4d | July 2006
July 2006
ICTD Project Newsletter
Results Based needed to improve their performance, management and accountability in order to increase the confidence of donors and other partners, and reverse the past decline follow that the larger objectives have in development assistance. been met. MBO evolved into Logical Over the years there was a Framework, which was first develperceptible shift to the larger picture. oped by Practical Concepts Inc. in Organisations began to focus on 1969 for the U.S. Agency for Internaoutcomes and impacts. They had to tional Development (USAID). It has ensure that their processes, products since been widely adopted and and services were contributing to the adapted by both business organisaachievement of results. This applied tions as well as the development as much to national governments as sector. The development sector used to social development organisations. the Logical Framework as a manageGovernments of UK, US, Canada, ment tool to improve the design of and The Netherlands were the interventions, most often at the pioneers in this field in demonstrat- project level. Logical Framework ing results and in ensuring that the involves identifying strategic resources were being used in the elements (inputs, outputs, outcomes most efficient manner in achieving and impact) and their causal relationthose results. Back home in his last ships, indicators, and the assumpbudget speech the Finance Minister, tions/risks that may influence Mr. P. Chidambaram, spoke of an success and failure. It is, thus, a tool outcome-oriented budget. that facilitates planning, execution, monitoring and evaluation of Agencies like the World Bank, development intervention. UNDP, UNFPA, USAID, CIDA, GTZ, etc realised that adopting RBM and Logical Framework results-based programming and In order to implement RBM it is management is particularly important for development agencies since crucial to first define the inputs (or social development is a ‘soft’ sector resources available), activities, where it is very difficult to demon- outputs and outcomes (See Glossary strate that resources are being used for definition of terms). A Logical efficiently and programmes are Framework (logframe for short) having the intended impact. Agencies helps us do that. A logframe is a
Management
T
he concept of Results Based Management (RBM) comes to the social sector from the world of management. It was a gradual evolution from Management by Objectives (MBO) to Values Based Management (VBM) to Results Based Management (RBM). MBO was first conceptualised by Peter Drucker and outlined in his book The Practice of Management published in 1954. In that seminal book Drucker cautioned managers from falling into the ‘activity trap’ and getting so involved in their day-to-day activities that they forget the main purpose or objective of their business.
Traditionally org anisations focused on managing activities and outputs. An activity and its associated output is only the ‘means’ to an ‘end’. An activity is not an end in itself. The end is the objective of the programme or business. India has achieved a growth rate of 8 percent, but 53 percent of our children under 5 years of age are malnourished. Achieving a high growth rate is necessary but not sufficient. The end is ensuring healthy and productive lives for our citizens. An output may be achieved but it does not necessarily
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matrix that summarises what a situation during project preparation; project intends to do and how, what g · Establish a logical hierarchy of the key assumptions are, and how means by which objectives will outputs and outcomes will be be reached; monitored and evaluated. Thus a ·g Identify some of the potential logframe defines a project in terms risks; of goal - purpose - outputs - activi- g · Establish how outputs and ties. These are logically linked, given outcomes might best be certain defined assumptions, so that monitored and evaluated; if [activities] then [outputs], if Once the logframe is established, [outputs] then [outcome]. For ease of RBM builds on the logframe. reference the framework is presented Broadly RBM involves: as a 4x4 matrix as shown below: A logframe is a systematic and structured way of thinking, as well as a discipline, that helps planners and managers to: ·g Analyse the existing
1
2
Identifying clear and measurable results aided by logical frameworks, based on appropriate problem analyses; Selecting indicators that will be
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4
5
6
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used to measure progress towards indicators; Setting explicit targets for each indicator, used to judge indicators; Developing perfor mance monitoring systems to regularly collect data on actual results; Reviewing, analysing and reporting actual results vis-à-vis the targets; Integrating evaluations to provide complementar y performance information, not readily available from performance monitoring systems; Using performance information for internal management accountability, learning and
Logical Framework Matrix Objectively verifiable Sources and means of indicators of achievement verification
Intervention logic
Impact
What is the overall impact of the project? 13
Outcomes
What specific outcomes is the action intended to achieve?
9
Outputs
Outputs are the results envisaged to achieve the specific objective. Enumerate the outputs. 5
Activities
What are the key activities to be carried out and in what sequence in order to produce the expected results?(group the activities by result) 1
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Assumptions
What are the key indicators related to the impact?
What are the sources of information for these indicators?
14
15
Which indicators clearly show that the outcome has been achieved?
What are the sources of information that exist or can be collected? What are the methods required to get this information? 11
Which risks should be taken into consideration?
What are the sources of information for these indicators?
What external conditions must be met to obtain the expected outputs on schedule?
10
What are the indicators to measure whether and to what extent the action achieves the expected outputs?
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Means: What are the means required to implement these activities, e.g. personnel, equipment, training, studies, supplies, operational facilities, etc. 2
What are the sources of information about action progress?
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12
8
What pre-conditions are required before the action starts? What conditions outside the beneficiary's direct control have to be met for the implementation of the planned activities? 4
decision making processes, and also for external performance reporting to stakeholders and partners.
Results Based Monitoring & Evaluation
Results
Long-term,widespread improvement
Outcomes Intermediate effects of outputs
Outputs Products and services produced
Implementation
The first four phases generally relate to a results-oriented planning approach, also referred to as Strategic Planning. The first five steps, together, are included in the concept of Performance Measurement. All seven phases combined are essential for an effective Results Based Management System.
Impacts
Activities
Results Based Monitoring and Evaluation is a continuous process aimed at tracking actual performance Inputs against expected results. It is an information management process that helps the organisation to learn from experience, identify strengths generate lessons learned. The essential actions involved in and shortcomings, and recommend building a monitoring and evaluation corrective measures. It is a continual and systematic process of collecting system are: and analyzing data to measure the g Formulation of outcomes performance of interventions g S e l e c t i o n o f o u t c o m e towards the achievement of results. indicators to monitor The system will accumulate informa- g Gathering baseline information on an ongoing basis regarding tion on the current condition. g Setting of specific targets and progress towards a result and then dates for reaching them will periodically compare the current g Regular collection of data to situation against the baseline for assess whether the targets are results indicators to assess and being met and analyze the situation. It will keep an g Analyzing and reporting the eye on key outputs because they can results indicate whether a strategy is relevant and efficient or not. Hence for managing a project adopting a RBM approach moves Results Based Evaluation assesses agencies away from budget driven how and why results are or are not being achieved. They help to clarify operations and focuses on tangible underlying factors affecting the results to be delivered. It provides a situation, highlight unintended framework for strategic planning and and promotes consequences (positive and nega- management benchmarking and performance tive), recommend actions to improve performance in future planning, and analysis. RBM helps to ensure that
Tasks undertaken to transform inputs to outputs
Financial, human & material resources
processes, products and services contribute to the achievement of clearly stated objectives and promotes learning and accountability within the organization. RBM and ICTD In order to ensure that pilot projects are having the intended impact, NISG has implemented RBM based monitoring and evaluation for all ICTD pilot projects. A t h r e e - d a y wo r k s h o p w a s conducted on 10-12 July 2006, to acquaint partner agencies with the theoretical concepts of RBM and also to provide hands-on training for the MIS. The MIS has been developed by Accounts Training Institute (ATI), Bangalore, and in collaboration with NISG, ATI will carry out RBM based monitoring and evaluation of all ICTD pilot projects. ATI has been
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given the responsibility of (a) developing the project logframe in consultation with the partner agencies (b) helping partner agencies to collect and input data into the MIS (c) helping the partner agencies to move towards an output and outcome based project (d) carry out
monitoring and evaluation of all pilot projects. This is a pioneering effort at implementing RBM for multiple ICTD projects at a programme management level in ICTD for Development projects and will show the way for the future. ICTD
NISG and i4d jointly hold the copyright to the articles printed in the ICTD section of the i4d magazine and website. For permission to reprint the articles please write to the Editor, i4d.
Glossary of RBM Terms Activity Action taken or work performed through which inputs, such as funds, technical assistance and other types of resources are mobilised to produce specific outputs.
most often at the project level. It involves identifying strategic elements (inputs, outputs, outcomes and impact) and their causal relationships, indicators, and the assumptions and risks that may influence success and failure.
Benchmark Reference point or standard against which progress or achievements can be assessed. A benchmark refers to the performance that has been achieved in the recent past by other comparable organisations, or what can be reasonably inferred to have been achieved in similar circumstances.
Outcome The likely or achieved short-term and medium-term effects of an intervention’s outputs.
Assumptions Hypotheses about factors or risks which could affect the progress or success of a development intervention. Development Intervention An instrument for partner (donor and non-donor) support aimed to promote development. A development intervention usually refers to a country programme (CP) or a thematic component within a CP or a project. Goal The higher-order objective to which a development intervention is intended to contribute. Impact Positive and negative long-term effects on identifiable population groups produced by a development intervention, directly or indirectly, intended or unintended. These effects can be economic, socio-cultural, institutional, environmental, technological or of other types. Indicator Quantitative or qualitative factor or variable that provides a simple and reliable means to measure achievement, to reflect the changes connected to an intervention, or to help assess the performance of a development actor. Inputs The financial, human, material, technological and information resources used for the development intervention. Logical Framework (Logframe) Management tool used to improve the design of interventions,
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Outputs The products, capital goods and services which result from a development intervention; may also include changes resulting from the intervention which are relevant to the achievement of outcomes. Performance The degree to which a development intervention or a development partner operates according to specific criteria/standard/guidelines or achieves results in accordance with stated plans. Performance indicator A quantitative or qualitative variable that allows the verification of changes produced by a development intervention relative to what was planned. Performance measurement A system for assessing the performance of development interventions relative to what was planned, in terms of the achievement of outputs and outcomes. Results The output, outcome or impact (intended or unintended, positive and/or negative) of a development intervention. Results Based Management (RBM) A management strategy by which an organization ensures that its processes, products and services contribute to the achievement of desired results (outputs, outcomes and impacts). RBM rests on clearly defined accountability for results, and requires monitoring and self-assessment of progress towards results, and reporting on performance Source: OECD DAC (Development Assistance Committee) Working Party on Aid Evaluation
Vol. IV No. 7
July 2006
Information for development www.i4donline.net rce me om e-C
Agriculture
Community Radio
e-Commerce
ICT to expand the market for horticulture crops
Pilot run of ‘Alakal’ for fisherfolks starts in Kerala
eBay India reaching the global market
Information Communication Technology (ICT) has the potential to expand the market for horticulture crops, said Bangalore Agriculture University Extension Director Dr. G. Eshwarappa. ICT is helpful to gather information about available market network. Horticulture farmers need not depend only on limited market network. They must look at market analysis, which is essential to judge future trends and variations. Showing concern for the small-scale farmers, he warned that coming days would be harsh for them, if they don’t take advantages of ICT. To get rid of those problems, they should take the advantage of ICT as early as possible.
Radio Alakal, the first community radio for fisherfolk, commenced on a trial basis in 15 coastal villages of Kerala, India, through a network of radio kiosks. The recorded programmes were played through loudspeaker set up at three listening centres at Valiathura, Veli and Poonthura. The kiosks are located near fish landing centres and in common spaces where fishermen congregate for work or leisure activities. The pilot project is promoted by a group of organisations, the Kerala Swathantra Matsya Thozhilali Federation, South Indian Federations of Fishermen Societies (SIFFS), MJM Centre and Loyola College, Thiruvananthapuram. Apart from weather fore-cast, tidal height, conditions at sea and disaster warning, the content includes discussions and expert opinions on livelihood options, market information and interviews.
eBay India, one of the country’s leading online markets, recently organised an eBay Academy at Jaipur. The eBay Academy highlighted the entrepreneurship platform for local sellers to reach out to millions of buyers both nationally and across the globe. The academy offers seller-training programmes, which inform the participants about the opportunities, benefits and the pitfalls of selling on eBay India. Over 21,000 potential sellers have been trained on the online opportunity at over 80 eBay academy sessions till date. Through an excellent Internet trading infrastructure, eBay India has created the largest online bazaar (market) that is free of middlemen.
Recent developments in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) field support agricultural and rural development in African countries. ICT promote food security and sustainable development in Africa by establishing information systems for monitoring market performance and measuring market failures; developing information systems to address food security issues such as agricultural production, government subsidies for food security, monitoring water and land resources, disease problems, food transportation and storage; marketing agricultural products through information and telecommu-nication networks and reducing food storage losses through more efficient distribution. www.uneca.org July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
www.keralafishworkers.org
Education ICT centre of excellence in Riyadh, proposed by India A delegation of top academicians, led by UGC Chairman Sukhdev Thorat will meet a group of Saudi businessmen in Riyadh to explore the possibility of setting up an ICT centre. In a meeting with education Minister Abdullah Al-Obaid, Union HRD minister Arjun Singh, who was visiting the country, offered India’s support in setting up an ICT centre of excellence in Riyadh. The President of the Riyadh Chamber of Commerce and Industry Abdu Rahman AlJeraisy had shown keen interest in the Indian proposal. www.newkerala.com
On the Flipside! Sebastian Luetgert, Copy South Research Group
ICT in support of food security in Africa
www.business-standard.com
WHY IS COPYING CALLED STEALING EVEN THOUGH THE ORIGINAL DOES NOT DISAPPEAR?
GOOD QUESTION.
www.newindpress.com
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The i4d News
e-Business in China China’s B2C (business to customer) e-Commerce market reached RMB 854 million in the first quarter of 2006, increasing 12.79 percent quarter-over-quarter, which is lower than the growth rate of 19.92 percent for the fourth quarter of 2005. ‘China B2C e-Commerce Market Quarterly Tracker Q1 2006,’ released by Internet based technology business information, media and telecom industries provider, Analysys International, states that in the first quarter of 2006, B2C users in China reached 68.53 million. China’s e-Commerce market is developing very well. The manufacturers are pushing up their efforts in Internet-based sales and marketing campaigns. www.cheaphostingdirectory.com
e-Governance
egov
Macedonia: e-Gov Project in an upswing An exhibition entitled ‘e-Gov for a Modern Macedonia’, emphasised Macedonia’s progress in using IT to improve efficiency and transparency organised by the USAID-funded e-Gov Project, which is implemented by Internews Network. The exhibition was organised in partnership with Hewlett-Packard and Microsoft. Through e-Government, public administration can become more open and transparent, and reinforce democratic participation in the Republic of Macedonia. Some of the solutions developed as part of the consolidated package of assistance,
ARE WE REALLY LIVING IN AN INFORMATION SOCIETY WHEN MOST INFORMATION HAS BEEN PRIVATIZED?
including the Apply On-Line system for state jobs, the e-Procurement system, e-Tax Services, the e-Health system, and e-Budgeting were displayed at the exhibition. www.internews.org
Health A major leap forward in telemedicine A mobile healthcare systems developer, Global Care Quest (GCQ),California, unveiled Integrated Clinical Information System (ICIS), a system that allows physicians to connect virtually to any hosp-ital video conference or telemedicine system with little more than a laptop computer and high speed mobile Internet connection. ICIS Live is the newest addition to GCQ’s ICIS, a suite of solutions that pull patient data from hospital systems and send it to physician’s computers, handheld devices and mobile phones. With ICIS doctors have realtime access to diverse patient information sources such as X-rays, CT scans, lab results, patient notes, and bedside monitoring equipment whether they are in the hospital, across town or halfway around the globe. The system was developed in response to the large number of regional hospital networks who already have a telemedicine solution, but needed to make it accessible to doctors in their offices, clinics and remote locations. www.wirelesshealthcare.co.uk
GOOD QUESTION.
Sebastian Luetgert, Copy South Research Group
On the Flipside!
http://en.chinabroadcast.cn/2600/2005-2-2/116
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Italian technology for Tibetan heart care The Italian-based Health R&S and e-Heart
donated an advanced Italian telemedicine technology to the Tibetan Delek Hospital, Dharamshala. During the press conference, Italian delegates explained about the use of this technology and how it diagnoses heart patients and transmitted the data to heart specialists in Italy for the examinations on basis of the layout and available data. They have named the project as United Italian Mind to the Tibetan Heart. www.phayul.com
Open Source A web based BioDirectory for scientific community Oxford Informatics Limited, an open content company, has come out with a unique directory of web resources focused upon scientists. BioDirectory (www.biodirectory.com) exclusively an ‘open content’ database of tools, databases and resources are of value to both in academia and industry of bio-medical sciences. The directory contains compilation of reliable information aggregated from several sources, creating a substantive stuff of more than 8000 categories containing 35000 entries. Each month over 1000 new links are aided and reviewed by the scholars regularly. Along with scientists, general public can also contribute, learn, share and research freely. There is a particular focus on hot topics including genomics, microarrays, proteomics, PCR, molecular biology, protocols and dry laboratory skills like sequence analysis. BioDirectory has found a sizeable niche of audience. www.prweb.com
UK charity Migrant Helpline opted for open source UK charity Migrant Helpline, established as a charity more than 40 years ago to assist migrants and passengers through the port of Dover, is now one of six agencies providing assistance and support for asylum seekers and refugees entering and living in the UK. Migrant Helpline’s head office is still in Dover. Migrant Helpline has opted for open source software which saves money and cuts down on time-consuming red tape. The charity wanted to move to a straightforward open source-based administrative system that would be easy for its users to run. www.computerweekly.com i4d | July 2006
The i4d News
www.business-standard.com
Livelihood ICT in employment generation for youth
About 60-70 percent of the land area of India could be officially available on the Internet based on several wide parameters including latitude, longitude, altitude, water bodies and forest cover in about a year’s time. Till today, policy did not permit publishing Indian map details on the Internet. Even now, the exact level of access has to be decided based on National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI) policy that would address issues like costing, copyright and licences and value addition. However, some broad details of map should now be available with the recent approval of National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI) by Union Cabinet. http://maps.locateindia.com/ This is likely to generate a huge business opportunity for the Geographical Information System (GIS) firms from various government agencies during the next few years. www.thehindubusinessline.com The move marks Motorola’s further expansion into the sub-continent. The company already has six research and development centres in India, which developed more than 40 percent of the software used by the company’s iconic Razr V3 cellphone. Motorola expects its new plant to be operational by next year, to produce a range of handsets, as well as network base stations. www.zdnetasia.com
The President of Kenya, Mwai Kibaki said that the government has liberalised the ICT sector to promote service provision to create employment for the youth. Kenyans now expect to see a lowering in the cost of communication in the country. President Kibaki pointed out that the sector is providing investment and employment opportunities to a large number of Kenyan. The growth of ICT is encouraged because of its enormous potential to absorb young people into gainful employment. President Kibaki added that an enabling environment to ensure the expansion of the ICT sector is being created to stimulate further economic growth and to improve tele density in rural and urban areas. www.kbc.co.ke
Telecommunication Motorola cellphones to be made in India Motorola, world’s second largest cellphone maker, has made a plan to invest US$100 million to manufacture cellphones and telecommunication equipment in India. It will build a plant in Chennai’s Sriperumbadur Hi-tech Special Economic Zone, which is jointly developed by Motorola and the Indian government. July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
India map details on Net
Tata Teleservices to invest on rural India Tata Teleservices is planning to invest one third of the total investment on the rural areas of India for the market expansion and enterprise solution. The telecom venture of the Tata group, has charted an investment of Rs 4,000 crore for the current year for expansion. The company is looking at a rural expansion strategy for the current year, which would run simultaneously with the plan to bring new corporate customers through enterprise solutions. Out of the total investments of Rs 4,000 crore, one third would go for rural expansion. www.economictimes.indiatimes.com
Technology Microsoft launched retail solutions Microsoft, the software giant, is working on a software for an auto ancillary unit and the pharmaceutical industry. The software would empower store managers to make fast, accurate decisions on inventory as well as forecast the retail trends. The solution is tightly integrated
with features of Microsoft Office 2003 such as MS Excel, MS Word, PowerPoint and Outlook. Office for retail is powered with special retail tools that serve as a guide to develop and improve retail management functions of budgeting, forecasting and reporting. The features of the Office for retail solution will include graphical consumer trend reports and buying patterns, linear and style grid inventory management, master creation, using MS Excel, yearly/quarterly sales forecasting inventory and budget forecasting, and cash flow forecasting. The software would be available for purchase from retail stores, and through the 3,000 channel partners in the next few weeks. www.business-standard.com
On the Flipside!
IF INTELLECTUAL PROPERITY IS JUST BORROWED FROM THE PUBLIC DOMAIN THEN WHY CAN’T THE PUBLIC CLAIM IT BACK?
Sebastian Luetgert, Copy South Research Group
The world’s largest computer services company, IBM announced its plans to invest $6 billion in India over three years, underscoring the country’s growing importance as a global hub for IT expertise and a growing market in its own right. The investments enable IBM to fulfill its vision to become a globally integrated company, said Sam J Palmisano, chairman and CEO of IBM Corporation. Coming on top of the $2 billion invested by IBM in the last three years, making IBM one of the largest overseas investors in India, being higher than the $3.9 billion of combined investment announced for India last year by Microsoft, Intel and Cisco Systems. Investments would be made to develop the ‘Great Mind Challenge’, which is designed to improve the software development skills of Indian students.
GOOD QUESTION.
IBM to invest $6 bn in India
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The i4d News
Submarine cable for Bangladesh This is a rare opportunity for Bangladesh to connect with the United States of America as seven leading Asean telecoms operators officially joined hands to deploy a transpacific undersea link to USA. If Bangladesh joins the newly formed consortium SEAME-WE4, the country’s telecoms and ICT industries will enjoy seamless overseas connection even if one of the two cables gets accidentally snapped underneath the sea. The Telekom Malaysia (TM) led the official formation of an initial seven- http://www.thedailystar.net/ country consortium to build the Asia-America Gateway (AAG), an international undersea cable system, linking Southeast Asia with the US. Responding to TM’s invitation, key officials of AiTi (Brunei), CAT Telekom (Thailand), PLDT (Philippines), REACH (Hong Kong), StarHub (Singapore) and VNPT (Vietnam) gathered in Hong Kong and signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to jointly develop a 20,000 kilometres long AAG submarine cable system. www.thedailystar.net
A challenging task for IBM: Tablet PC @ $150 The President of India, Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam asked IBM to join the global knowledge platform by developing low cost tablet PCs and computers based on nano technology. Addressing the IBM Employees’, he pointed out that multinational companies, through collaborative efforts, could design, develop and manufacture a tablet PC with multilingual capability and open source operating system. In a bid to make tablet PCs affordable to students, teachers and researchers in developing countries, the president advised IBM to collaborate with the Indian tech industry to develop integrated hardware and software system to configure and produce them for selling at $150 per PC. According to Kalam, this is a
WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN DIGITAL RIGHTS MANAGEMENT AND CENSORSHIP?
GOOD QUESTION.
Sebastian Luetgert, Copy South Research Group
On the Flipside!
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challenging task for IBM to configure, develop, produce and market the tablet PC at a cost of $150. Similarly, the President emphasised the need for developing nanotech computers. www.business-standard.com
Telecentres Hughes to establish 1,000 broadband kiosks in India Hughes Communication, US-based communication firm, plans to establish 1,000 broadband kiosks across India. The broadband kiosks will be linked using satellite technology and will offer high speed Internet at the rate of 25 paise a minute. Apart from Internet, the kiosks will also offer telephony services using the Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) technology. The Hughes kiosks are expected to give tough competition to the likes of Sify and Reliance, which have an extensive network of Internet cafes. The company already has 250 such kiosks across 95 towns in India. www.thehindubusinessline.com
Wireless Four more railway stations in India to go Wi-Fi Intel India, in partnership with Videsh Sanchar Nigam (VSNL) and RailTel Corporation, will provide wireless Internet access at 4 rail stations of Gujarat. The service will be available to laptop users through Wi-Fi at Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Surat and Valsad railway stations. Intel will provide services to
stations between Ahmedabad and Mumbai, informed sources from VSNL. Users can access Internet through Internet cards that will be available at the hotspots at the stations, but denied to comment on the price of the Internet cards. These hotspots will help passengers who can use Internet services while waiting for their train. www.business-standard.com
Wireless Tracking Systems for mine safety The new U.S. legislation sent to the Senate floor would require all mines to have two-way wireless communications and tracking systems in place within the next three years. The Mine Improvement and New Emergency Response Act of 2006, created in wake of the 18 miners killed in the Sago and Alma mining tragedies in West Virginia, calls for substantial increases in oxygen supplies for miners, improved emergency responses and enhanced training for rescue teams. The wireless technology would provide real-time monitoring and physical location tracking of miners. This is a big improvement in the current mine safety. Already, state legislators including those from West Virginia and Illinois have incorporated into their mine-safety laws the need for such technology in emergency communication. This bill will usher in a new era of safety for mines. www.govtech.net
General 33 percent software growth in India Software and services exports from India grew 33 percent year on year in 2005-06 to 23.6 billion dollars, according to industry body NASSCOM. NASSCOM said the overall Indian software and IT enabled services industry grew 31 percent in last fiscal to 29.6 billion dollars. NASSCOM predicted that the overall software and services industry would grow by 25-28 percent in 2006-07 to 36-38 billion dollars. IT and ITES exports are likely to grow by 27-30 percent in 2006-07 to 29-31 billion dollars. The number of employees in the IT and ITES sector grew to 1.29 million in 2005-06 from 1.05 million in 2004-05. www.infotech.indiatimes.com i4d | July 2006
RENDEZVOUS GKP I NTERNATIONAL F ORUM
AND
M EMBERS M EETING , 8-10 M AY 2006, COLOMBO , S RI L ANKA
Creating prosperity through ICT innovation GKP International Forum on Cross-Sector Partnerships 2006 was held in Hotel Hilton, Colombo, Sri Lanka from 8-9th May 2006, followed by GKP Annual meeting. Global Knowledge Partnership (GKP) is a unique and leading international multi-stakeholder network, committed to harnessing the potential of ICTs for sustainable and equitable development. Through working together, GKP members increase their organisational influence and visibility.
Cooperation (SDC), V. K. Samaranayake, Chairman, Information and Communication Technology Agency (ICTA), Sri Lanka and Renalia Abdul Rahim, Executive Director, GKP. It was followed by the opening address by Walter Fust and special remarks by the honourable guests. After the press conference for invited media representatives, hosted by Walter Fust and Prof Tissa Vitarana, the plenary sessions started.
Founded in 1997, GKP, which is governed by an elected Executive Committee and supported by a Secretariat based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, continues to grow and now comprises more than 90 members from over 40 countries, covering all continents. In the opening ceremony on 8th May, the lighting of the traditional Sri Lankan oil lamps was done by Prof Tissa Vitarana, Hon. Minister for Science and Technology, Sri Lanka in the presence of other honourable guests such as Walter Fust, Chair, GKP Executive Committee and Director General, Swiss Agency for Development and
The first plenary session was on ‘Spotlight on Innovations’. The speakers were Mr. Walter Fust, Daan Boom (Principal Knowledge Management Specialist, Asian Development Bank), Sridhar Y. Ramaswamy (Director, South Asia, Marketing, Intel Cooperation) and Ashok Khosla (Chairman, Development Alternatives, India). The moderator was Renalia Abdul Rahim. There were three panels on three different topics: ‘ICT in Sri Lanka’, ‘Redefining context’ and ‘ICT for peace’. Thematic open space sessions were held in two rounds. Each open space group
July 2006 | www.i4d.csdms.in
discussion consisted of six to ten participants. These sessions were facilitated by the open space specialist Allen Gunn. Each of the open space sessions consisted of a facilitator and one member of each group was given the task to take notes on the discussions. In the first round, the topics covered were as follows: (1) Innovative uses of ICT in educational initiatives and learning, (2) Telecentres in remote and rural areas, (3) Community and innovation – developing intelligent ICT solutions with and for millions of poor (4) What makes telecentres work – success factors and sustainability models (5) Multi-stakeholder partnerships – leveraging IT and private sector partnerships by civil society organisations for development projects (6) e-Leadership in the South (7) Community development via open source community (8) Policy and regulatory framework for ICT – what can governments do to minimise digital inequality (9) ICT as business enabler (10) The role of voice communications and media in ICT for development (11) Knowledge sharing – knowledge management systems and applications (12) Creating support systems for young and aspiring social entrepreneurs. The second round of the ‘Open Space’ session nearly resembled the rapid fire round of a quiz. With a little over three minutes of time, each presenter had to give a concise briefing of the project or initiative he/she is working on. With almost ten presenters participating in this session, the audience was divided into groups of six to eight persons who took turns to hear each of the presenters, one after another. Some of the presenters of the session included representatives from Sarvodaya (Sri Lanka), Practical Action (Sri Lanka), MSSRF (India), Development Alternatives (India), BNNRC (Bangladesh) and telecentre.org (IDRC,
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Canada) to name a few. The time-bound design of the session gave a unique opportunity to participants to expose themselves to a wide array of ICT projects within a short span of time. With different models, approaches and outcomes, these project presentations made for a good hearing and fast-track learning. While a few of the presenters struggled to bundle all their information within the short time, there were others who delivered crisp and concise presentations while satisfying the listeners. Nevertheless, all of them provided one or more valuable lessons and experiences. The themes covered in the session are as follows: (1) Issues around the sustainability of ICT for education partnerships (2) Transforming the digital exclusion into digital opportunities for populations in remote and rural areas (3) Community and innovation (4) What makes telecentres work – success factors and sustainability models (5) Multistakeholder partnerships – how do companies and NGOs come together to create opportunities for people through ICT (6) Indicators for success for ICT4D initiatives (7) Innovative approaches to affordable access, such as an open access sharing network backbone (8) Knowledge
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aggregation and knowledge networks for grassroots practices (9) ICT for village planning and development (10) Internet governance: Building policy capacity (11) Women and innovation (12) Local content creation: challenges and opportunities in developing local language content for ICT4D initiatives. On May 9, in the second plenary session, the value of ICT was discussed by Dr. A.T. Ariyaratne, founder of the Sarvodaya Shramadana movement of Sri Lanka and Prof. M. S. Swaminathan, the architect of the Green Revolution in India who holds the UNESCO Chair in Eco-technology at the M. S. Swaminathan Research Foundation in Chennai, India. The third plenary session was on ‘Funding innovations’, followed by three parallel panel discussions on ‘Pioneering new partnerships’, ‘Social enterprise’ and ‘Innovating government’. In the post lunch session, four more parallel panel discussions took place focusing on the themes as follows: (a) Cultivating youth social entrepreneurs, (b) Novel content, (c) Tech devices for development and (d) Telecentres across south Asia: An interactive learning session. The fourth plenary session titled ‘Post Tsunami: the day after yesterday’ initiated a thought provoking discussion on innovative uses of ICTs for Tsunami alarm system and post-disaster recovery, rehabilitation and information service delivery. The evening concluded over a lively performance by a local cultural group of Colombo who presented a colourful musical extravaganza on traditional Sri Lankan folk music. After the brain storming sessions of two days, the Annual General Meeting of GKP members was held on May 10 2006 at the premises of Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement, Sri Lanka. The
meeting was Chaired by Mr. Walter Fust, Chair-GKP Executive Committee and Director General, Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation and conducted by Rinalia Abdul Rahim, Executive Director, Global Knowledge Partnership. Some of the major highlights of the meeting were as follows - eight new members were inducted in GKP; Amendments to the GKP Governance document were endorsed by GKP members; Members resolved to be more involved in member outreach activities and promotion of the ‘GKP brand; Members also endorsed the GKP Strategy 2010 Programme Framework as the basis for its programmes and activities for the next 5 years to 2010; Announcement of 3rd Global Knowledge Conference themed ‘An Event On The Future: Emerging People, Emerging Markets, Emerging Technologies’ in
December 2007 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; Announcement for next year’s Annual Members’ Meeting (2007), which will be held in conjunction with the 3rd Global Knowledge Conference. However, there will be a virtual Annual Members’ Meeting in May 2007. The GKP annual meeting followed up with an exciting field visit programme on two days of 11th and 12th May. This provided a unique opportunity for the delegates to visit some interesting ICT4D project sites in and around Colombo and also some of the popular tourist destinations and heritage sites. J Dipanjan Banerjee, Saswati Paik, Jayalakshmi Chittoor and Ravi Gupta from Centre for Science, Development and Media Studies (CSDMS) participated in conference and members meeting. For further details log on to www.globalknowledge.org
i4d | July 2006
Events Diary Australia 2-4 August, 2006 VoIP World Australia 2006 Grand Hyatt, Melbourne http://www.terrapinn.com/2006/voip%5Fau/
27-29 September, 2006 Interactive Computer Aided Learning (ICL), Villach http://www.icl-conference.org/
27-30 September, 2006 Internet Research 7.0: Internet Convergences Brisbane, Qld http://conferences.aoir.org/index.php?cf=5
2-4 October, 2006 The Australian Computers in Education Conference 2006 (ACEC 2006) Cairns, North Queensland http://www.acec2006.info
China 17-20 September, 2006 CeBIT Asia 2006 Shanghai New International Expo Centre, China
CSDMS EVENTS 23-25 August, 2006 The Taj Palace, New Delhi
http://www.itu.int/WORLD2006/
Denmark 21-23 August, 2006 WikiSym 2006 Odense, Denmark http://www.wikisym.org/ws2006/
Germany 15-19 July, 2006 Euroscience Open Forum 2006, Munich http://www.esof2006.org/
http://www.echallenges.org/e2006/
Turkey 6-24 November, 2006 The ITU Plenipotentiary Conference Antalya http://www.itu.int/plenipotentiary/2006/index.html
http://www.i4donline.net/indiantelecentreforum
United States
Digital Learning India 2006
20-23 July, 2006 The 4th International Conference on Education and Information Systems, Technologies & Applications: EISTA’06 Orlando, Florida
http://digitalLEARNING.in/dlindia/
e-Gov India 2006 http://www.egovonline.net/egovindia/
http://www.conf-info.org/eista06/website/default.asp
Italy 25-27 October, 2006 1st World Congress on Communication for Development, Rome
24-26 July, 2006 World Congress on Computers in Agriculture (WCCA 2006), Orlando, Florida http://www.wcca2006.org/index.htm
http://www.devcomm-congress.org/worldbank/
Mozambique 9-10 August, 2006 The Mozambique National ICT Convention Maputo http://new.aitecafrica.com/node/125
Rwanda 19-21 July, 2006 The Second Rwanda National ICT Convention Kigali http://new.aitecafrica.com/node/116
South Africa 31August-2 September, 2006 Community informatics for developing countries (CIDC2006) Cape Town http://www.tisi.za.org/cidc2006/
5-8 December, 2006 International Conference on Digital Libraries, 2006, India Habitat Centre, New Delhi
4-8 September, 2006 Innovation and strategy for 21st century telcos, Cape Town International Convention Centre Cape Town
http://static.teriin.org/events/icdl/index.htm
http://www.terrapinn.com/2006/telecomza/
India
25-27 October, 2006 eChallenges e-2006 Conference, Barcelona
Indian Telecentre Forum 2006
http://www.cebit-asia.com/en/default.htm
4-8 December, 2006 ITU TelecomWorld 2006, Hong Kong
Spain
26-28 July, 2006 Interoperability and Institutional Repository Symposium, Albuquerque, New Mexico http://www.aisti.org/events/IR2006/index.php
19-22 August, 2006 The Second International Conference on Environmental Science and Technology (IC EST 2006), Houston, Texas http://www.aasci.org/conference/env/2006/
27-29 September, 2006 Open Education 2006: Community, Culture, and Content Logan, Utah http://cosl.usu.edu/conferences/opened2006/
5–9 November, 2006 The 5th International Semantic Web Athens, GA http://iswc2006.semanticweb.org/
Vietnam 13-16 September, 2006 Vietnam Telecomp 2006 The 11th International Exhibition in Vietnam on Telecommunications and Information Technology, Ho Chi Minh city, Tan Binh District http://www.2456.com/eng/showsinfo/info/ info1.asp?eid=3592&order=120
Get your event listed here: www.i4donline.net/events July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
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or or or or or or
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Bytes for All... Open Source/Open Access FOSS localisation consortium at Bytesforall launched A network to link Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FLOSS, or FOSS) advocates in South Asia, with an intention of building regional links and especially encouraging localisation efforts in this populous part of the planet.
to help migrate the organisations to open source software. It is a welcome chance for all those who are running pirated software in companies, schools, colleges, universities, departments, shops. It will save them from legal litigation by the BSA and the government for loading and running pirated software in businesses and organisations. http://www.pcmag.co.uk/vnunet/news/2156665/software-piracy-costing-34bn
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bytesforall_floss/
Are you a South Asian FOSS Hero? Bytesforall, FOSSFP Pakistan and Sarai India including a number of partner organisations at the ‘South Asian FLOSS Consortium’ are in the process of compiling information about people from South Asia who have made a significant effort to promote FOSS in their regions. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bytesforall_floss/ Urdu L10N to be reinitiated FOSS Localisation Consortium at Bytesforall requests developers to join the forces regarding computing in leading south Asian languages. The consortium is in process to bring pan South Asian localisation efforts on one platform. Already Sarai India, FOSSFP Pakistan, Bytesforall Pan-South Asia, Nepalinux Nepal and various other groups have teamed up. http://urduweb.org/ and http://groups.yahoo.com/urdu_computing http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bytesforall_floss/
Open access journals Over 80 Indian journals are open access journals. These include 11 journals published by the Indian Academy of Sciences, four published by the Indian National Science Academy, Indian Journal of Medical Research (ICMR), three journals published by the Calicut Medical College, and 38 journals whose OA version is brought out by NIC and thirty journals whose OA versions are published by MedKnow Publications, Bombay. All the content is accessible at http://www.doaj.org
SanskritaPradipika - a Sanskrit e-Tutor SanskritaPradipika [a little lamp for Sanskrit], a freely downloadable e-Tutor for the Sanskrit language, is intended to help Englishspeaking people learn Sanskrit, as well as the Devanagari script in which the language is written today. http://www.sanskrit-lamp.org/
India lays down ‘open’ challenge It was heartening to know that more and more south Asians, particularly Indian programmes, are writing open source code and customising it for their needs. After his first trip to India, regular columnist Bill Thompson looks forward to the end of western domination of the free software community.
e-Governance e-Survey - development of Bangladesh’s Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) The survey is a one way to include the civil society in the process. The research will help the development of PRSP and properly address wide ranging issues. BNNRC calls for civil society organisations to actively participate in the survey and have their say in the process. http://www.liv.ac.uk/sspsw/research/survey.htm
Parliamentarian’s caucus on ICTs in Bangladesh With a vision of promoting the use of ICTs in activities related to economic development and social well-being of the people of Bangladesh, particularly with respect to Millennium Development Goals, an ICT caucus has been formed in Bangladesh Parliament with the participation of twenty four elected constituency representatives with different political background. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bytesforall_readers/message/8068
Governments go online - without Windows e-Governance promises to cut corruption and improve transparency. Open source software offers a way to break South Asia’s technological dependence on industrialised countries, experts say. http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/HeXgwNu1U64Bbc/Governments-GoOnline-Without-Windows.xhtml
Internet Governance Global Alliance for ICT and Development’ (GAID) We are pleased to inform that two of our ‘Bytesforall’ family members have been nominated to the strategy council and champions network of GAID due to their untiring efforts for the cause of ICT and Development and is in recognition to their experience and background for working on ICT4D issues. We particularly congratulate A H M Bazlur Rahman of BNNRC in Bangladesh who has been nominated to Strategy Council and Frederick Noronha, Co-founder Bytesforall who has been nominated as member to the Champions Network. http://www.un-gaid.org/
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4764565.stm
ICTs for Development
Software piracy After a recent campaign launched by BSA and the Government of Pakistan against software piracy, FOSSFP Pakistan has announced
US$20 Million Knowledge and ICT Fund at ADB
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The Government of the Republic of Korea has set up a US$20 million e-Asia and Knowledge Partnership Fund at ADB. The fund aims to bridge the digital divide and promote improved access to i4d | July 2006
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Bytes for All... information and creating and sharing of knowledge through ICT in the Asia and Pacific region. http://www.adb.org/Media/Articles/2006/9999-Korea-ICT-Fund/default.asp
SMS campaign to save water A sweet shop owner in Indore has launched a Short Message Service (SMS) campaign to save water, being concerned about scarcity of water in Madhya Pradesh, India. ‘Sir, kindly save water for a safe future,’ says the SMS doing the rounds. http://www.digitalopportunity.org/link/gotoarticle/addhit/134402/7755/85867
Software for rain forecast A large volume of rainfall data from various locations and Australian Rainman software package enabled scientists at the Department of Agricultural Meteorology at the Directorate of Soil and Crop Management Studies at the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University to to create the seasonal rainfall forecast for the South West Monsoon. http://www.thehindu.com/edu/2006/06/05/stories/2006060500371200.htm
China steps up efforts to bring Internet to rural areas As per a news item, China steps up efforts to bring Internet to outlying rural areas. Farmer now can use a computer to get help about rice planting from an agronomist several hundred kilometers away. Statistics from the Ministry of Information Industry show that only 15 percent of the rural population has access to telephones and that 2.6 percent of them are Internet users. http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2006-05/17/content_4562821.htm
Students to get special rate for Internet use The post and telecommunications ministry in Bangladesh has decided to provide special facilities to the students on Internet use at a rate as low as 3 paisa per minute. The students, however, will be entitled to enjoy these facilities only in their respective institutions. http://www.thedailystar.net/2006/06/01/d60601012817.htm
The AirJaldi summit, Dhasa, India The AirJaldi summit will address some of the ways that wireless communication can be used to provide affordable Internet access in rural communities. Special emphasis will be placed on identifying best practices for rapidly increasing connectivity for regions most in need. The conference will be held from 22-25 October, 2006 in Dharamsala, India. http://summit.airjaldi.com/ The International convention of Asia Scholars (ICAS) The International convention of Asia Scholars (ICAS) is listed among the largest gatherings of research scholars from Centres on Asia and Asians studies, especially in the humanities and social science fields. The convention is being held at Convention Centre, Kualalumpur, Malaysia on 2-5 August 2007. www.icassecretariat.org
Publications July 2006 | www.i4donline.net
APC news APCNews, the monthly newsletter of the Association for Progressive Communications (APC) is published and was shared electronically. http://www.apc.org/english/news/apcnews/
ICTs for poverty alleviation This report reviews the evidence on how (or if ) ICTs should be used in support of poverty reduction exercises. http://peacejournalism.com ReadArticle.asp?ArticleID=8919
Wikipedia - Indian states The goal of the Wikiproject Indian states is to create comprehensive articles on India’s states and union territories. The final goal is to have as many articles on India’s states as a featured article, one of Wikipedia’s best. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Indian_states
ITU and infoDev launch new module of online ICT regulation toolkit The International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the United Nations specialised agency for telecommunications, and infoDev, a multi-donor programme focusing on ICT for development, launched the second module of their collaborative online ICT regulation toolkit, the legal and institutional framework. www.itu.int and www.infodev.org
Bytes for All: www.bytesforall.net Bytes For All Readers Discussion: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ bytesforall_readers Bytes for All RSS syndication: http://www.bytesforall.net/ index_html/RSS Bytes for All Readers Forum RSS syndication: http://rss.groups.yahoo.com/group/bytesforall_readers/rss Bytes for All Summary Archive: http://www.bytesforall.net/Summary/ Bytes for All discussion summary compiled by: Shahzad Ahmad, Bytes for All, Pakistan
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Books received The African Digital Commons A Participant’s Guide 2005 (available in English and French) Downloadable from: http://www.commons-sense.org/ Lead Writers: Chirs Armstong and Heather Ford Published by: Commons Sense Project and Links Centre of Wits University, Joburg, South Africa Pages: 74 This report is a result of the Commons Sense project (http://www.commons-sense.org) and the Links Centre, Wits University, Johannesburg, South Africa (http:// link.wits.ac.za). The report is a broad mapping of the people, issues, processes, policies and projects that would help African activists to develop a collective understanding of intellectual property laws and policies. The report is an evolving document with inputs from a number of people, who have helped in conceptualising it. “The Digital Information Commons” as a concept can be understood by reflecting on the opportunities and challenges thrown up with the advent of digitisation and convergence.
Copyright and Access to Knowledge Policy Recommendations on Flexibilities in Copyright Laws Downloadable from: http://www.ciroap.org/a2k Published by: Consumers International, Kuala Lumpur ISBN 1-902391-55-1 Pages: 84 At a point when access to knowledge is found critical for developing countries who seek to educate their masses, the international copyright regime at the same time is developed in a manner to curtail that access to knowledge. Consumers International has come out with this research report that examines the existing international instruments on copyright in order to identify the provisions for national lawmakers to improve access to educational materials in their respective countries. The report examines the copyright laws of eleven countries of Asia Pacific region, namely Bhutan, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Mongolia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines and Thailand. The study makes an interpretation
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of the copyright legislation of these countries only, keeping out the other related rights like rights given to the performers or producer of broadcasting organizations. The reference is made only to the Berne Convention for the protection of Literary and Artistic works, TRIPS (Agreement on trade related aspects of Intellectual Property Rights) and WCT (World Intellectual Property Organisation Copyright Treaty) in the whole study. The report also presents a comparative price survey of book prices in some countries. Researched by Wang Min Yen and edited by Rajeswari Kanniah of Consumers International Asia Pacific Office, the report will be a good reference piece for the researchers and will be able to develop evidence based policy recommendations in the areas of copyright practices and access to knowledge.
The Copy/South Dossier Issues in the economics, politics, and ideology of copyright in the global South, May 2006 Downloadable from: http://www.copysouth.org/ Edited by: Alan Story, Colin Darch and Debora Halbert Researched and published by :The Copy/South Research Group ISBN 978-0-9553140-0-1 (downloadable online edition) 978-0-9553140-1-8 (printed edition) Pages: 210 Not restricted by copyright the collection of over 50 very well researched essays on the impact – social, political and economic, of restrictive copyright laws especially in developing countries is worth examining. The intense research and analysis in this dossier is open to debate, critiques and comments. This book helps the readers to get an understanding of the impacts, and mostly negative of restrictive laws on the global south. The dossier is divided into six sections. The first section prepares the ground for review of the issues, and is called the global intellectual property system is privatising humanity’s common cultural knowledge. The second section covers the economics of global copyright: the net capital flow from the global periphery to the centre. The third section covers the privatizing the public domain and western/northern assumptions about cultural productions. The fourth section address the serious and damaging barriers to the use of copyrighted materials in the countries of the South. The fifth section deals with the resistance from the south to the global copyright system. The concluding chapter provides definitions and ideas for future action. Support for the Copy/South research was provided by Open Society Institute, Budapest, Hungary; Hivos, The Hague, The Netherlands and The Research Fund of Kent Law School, Canterbury, Kent UK. i4d | July 2006
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