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The model citizen participation process has citizens holding their governments accountable to deliver quality public services in a transparent and responsive manner. At the recent Technology Salon on How Can ICT’s Support Citizen Engagement with Governments? around 30 thought leaders debated the best ways to empower citizens and governments to define what a government should…
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Technology hubs, innovation spaces, hacker centers, incubators, telecenters, libraries, co-working offices, etc., there are many names to call the places where like-minded people come together to focus on a challenge. We do this because we believe in them as a model for facilitating collaboration, yet at the January Technology Salon in DC, we asked Do…
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Let us be honest with ourselves. Most of the shiny, flashy new technology is not designed for the developing world we care about. Technology is designed for the rich Hardware designers in rich countries are turning out super light laptops and tablets of glass to impress their rich peers. Software developers are creating apps for…
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The November 14, 2012, Technology Salon NYC focused on ways that ICTs can support work with children who migrate. Our lead discussants were: Sarah Engebretsen and Kate Barker from Population Council, and Brian Root and Enrique Piraces from Human Rights Watch. This post summarizes discussions that surfaced around the Population Council’s upcoming Girls on the…
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At the October Technology Salon NYC, we focused on ways that ICTs can be used for qualitative monitoring and evaluation (M&E) efforts that aim to listen better to those who are participating in development programs. Our lead discussants were: John Hecklinger, Global Giving; Ian Thorpe, UNDOC and Beyond 2015 Campaign; and Emily Jacobi, Digital Democracy….
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I am Amos Cruz and below are my thoughts around a recent Technology Salon on “How Can We Make ‘Cloud’ Solutions Relevant in the Offline World” with a cohort of though leaders and decision makers in information technology and international development.
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We all know that broadband connectivity is an accelerant for social and economic development. And we know that in the developing world, women are the key investors in family health and education. So shouldn’t we be working towards a world where every African woman can have access to broadband Internet?
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You might think that the topic of collecting data via mobile devices would be a rather dry discussion of data management and statistical methodology. You would be very, very wrong. The Technology Salon all but came to blows as we wrestled with privacy issues, total costs of ownership, and other elephants in the room. When…
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New technologies are changing the nature of monitoring and evaluation, as discussed in our previous Salon on the use of ICTs in M&E. However, the use of new technologies in M&E efforts can seem daunting or irrelevant to those working in low resource settings, especially if there is little experience or low existing capacity with…
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New technologies are opening up all kinds of possibilities for improving monitoring and evaluation. From on-going feedback and crowd-sourced input to more structured digital data collection, to access to large data sets and improved data visualization, the field is changing quickly.
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The recent Technology Salon “Will the new .Africa domain name have development impact?” represented for me an above average collision of minds over the matters of life and learning and the impact that domain ownership and the concerns for development bear on them. The dialogue was so robust that I found myself stepping over the…
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Recently, ICANN, the organization that controls the Internet naming system, made it possible for groups to apply for new gTLDs (names to the right of the dot, like .com, .org and .edu). Nearly 2000 applications were submitted, from business ideas (like .shop and .app) to causes (.green) to the only slightly bizarre .sucks. Still, after…
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Recently, ICANN, the organization that controls the highest levels of the Internet naming system, made it possible for groups to apply for new TLDs – new names to the right of the dot – that would join the likes of .com .org .edu. Along with the many commercial entrants were a number of applications that…
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The Technology Salon* hosted at IREX on Thursday, June 6, focused on what the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) would mean for international development, especially for US-based NGOs and government contractors.
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One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) has been a part of a larger ICT4E discussion, which has included ongoing debate over the effectiveness of the XO and its various deployments. Since its inception, OLPC has relied mainly on aspirations, visions, and projections to support investment from various partners across the globe. Pilots programs were conducted at…
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At the global level, a very small percentage of development funding goes to urban spaces, yet hard-hitting issues impact many of the urban poor: lack of tenure, lack of legality of land, informal settlements, lack of birth registration and civil registration in general, waste disposal, clean water, politicizing of local authorities and more. Can new…
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At a recent Technology Salon, we were discussing the countries that have the best environment for ICT innovation that will accelerate economic and social development. Quickly we listed the following four countries:
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If we are serious about ICT as an accelerant for social and economic development, and we know that a) women are the key to investments in family health and education, and b) broadband connectivity is a major ICT catalyst for both, then we should be working towards a world where every African woman can have…
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In 2007, Peru announced it would distribute tens of thousands of XO laptops from One Laptop Per Child to children in rural schools across the country, and expanded the program every year since. Almost 1 million laptops later, the program is now the largest XO deployment in the world and one of the most faithful…
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Civil society has been working for years on participation, transparency, accountability and governance issues. Plenty of newer initiatives (small and large) look at new technologies as a core tool in this work. But are these groups talking and learning from each other?