Our tech posts never stray from tweeting new data on Twitter and Facebook usage on the continent–but now and then–as occasional readers of Gizmodo and Kotaku–we pause.
Today I’ll eat for Belgium
September 23, 2011 By Leave a Comment
Yes, some Europeans, specifically Belgians — who else but “a fine group of web designers, web developers, communication specialists, tech, boys and girls” — came up with this idea. So if someone asks you why you need another piece of cake, just say “I’m eating for Africa.” To help starving “people and children” in East […]
Assumptions about Technology
June 28, 2011 By Leave a Comment
Patrick Meier, Director of Crisis Mapping at Ushahidi (amongst other titles), has some refreshing thoughts about the limits of technology adaptation across different contexts: I’ve spent the past week at the iLab in Liberia and got what I came for: an updated reality check on the limitations of technology adoption in developing countries. Below are some […]
Vanity Fair does Egypt
April 20, 2011 By 3 Comments
Vanity Fair’s May issue features a photographic series of young Egyptians dubbed, at various points in the accompanying article, ‘tech-savvy internet activists.’ The first photograph is of Wael Ghonim, the Google executive who created the Arabic-language Facebook page, “We Are All Khaled Said.” Ghonim (in the photo above) emerged as a hero of sorts (despite […]
‘The Solar Oven Fallacy’
March 23, 2011 By 1 Comment
“There are three myths about technology,” [according to] Harish Hande, founder of SELCO-India, a “social enterprise” that has sold solar lighting systems to 112,000 households in India. “One is that poor people cannot afford sustainable technologies. Another is that poor people cannot maintain sustainable technologies. And a third is that social ventures cannot be run […]
On Technology
December 6, 2010 By Leave a Comment
There’s a new series of articles up over at “The Boston Review” on technophilia and poverty alleviation. I’m in the midst of a paper on the subject and if I can digest my basic thoughts into blog form might follow up with a post on that, but in the meantime check out the articles under […]
What is Ushahidi?
March 26, 2010 By Leave a Comment
Ushahidi, a mobile phone-based system, first used in 2008 to allow Kenyans to report and track post-election violence via mobile phone text messages and that was later used in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Gaza, is in the news in the West for its use to save lives in the aftermath of earthquakes in […]
CELL PHONES APPARENTLY CUT MATERNAL DEATHS
December 2, 2009 By Leave a Comment
Via Dan Moshenberg: “Cell phones have cut dramatically the number of women dying during childbirth in Amensie village in south-central Ghana, according to local health officials….Before cell phone and internet technology were introduced to Amensie, some 20 women died in childbirth each year, according to Owusu. In 2008 none did. On average 560 women die […]
THE MALAWIAN AND HIS WINDMILL
October 8, 2009 By Leave a Comment
William Kamkwamba was 14 when he built a windmill from scratch that supplies his family’s home in rural Malawi with a reliable electricity supply. Then he started thinking about electricity for his neighbors. Then he got invited to study further in South Africa. Then he traveled to the United States. This kid deserves all the […]
