Where did World Telecommunication Information Society Day go?

Where did WTIS Day Go?

By E.K.Bensah II

 

So, Tigo won an award for telecommunications company of the year; ONETOUCH launched its mobile tv outfit—BLACKSTAR TV; MTN outdoored its MTN swap kit; and Kasapa was runner-up to the company of the year for the Ghana ICT Awards. Can someone tell me when the promoters of World Telecommunication and Information Society Day can stand up?

 

It was as if it never happened. That Saturday 17 May, I scanned both the local and foreign media to find out whether the day had been celebrated. On the Internet, it seemed like every country was celebrating it—and considering most UN members also belong to the UN's International Telecommunications Union(ITU), it would not have been strange if they were. Instead, I consistently drew a blank. Especially painful was the Ghanaian media, which provided scant coverage of it in the news. Beyond the odd newspaper report, none of our Saturday weeklies had anything about the day on the Saturday itself.

 

The following Monday, I decided to ask some of my ICT journalist colleagues who were also monitoring. They all drew a blank, bar one who said that Ghana Telecom had said something about it on their website.

 

I do not know what it is supposed to say about the country—anyone can make up their own mind—but I believe it is a serious indictment of a country that aspires to be the ICT hub of West Africa. With companies like BusyInternet (reputed to be the biggest Internet Cafe in Africa) in the country that have propelled Ghana towards the image of a Ghana that is ICT-savvy, the lack of celebration of WTIS day puts paid to interesting anecdotal evidence about an emerging silicon valley in Accra.

 

Furthermore, the lack of celebration of the day reflects a lackadaisical attitude to the symbolism of such special days. Although we might be apportioning unnecessary blame to the media, I believe they are the ones that ought to stand up and promote the day for us. After all, the tools that they use—from the mobile phone, radio, satellite and television—represent the quintessential ICT tools that have come to be part and parcel of the work they do. In the same way that a week earlier, the media was able to report to us about the necessity of freedom of the press, so it is incumbent that they remind society how they are able to effectively do the work they do

 

The Future

I can only say that we can do better next time—and I believe we can. We still have one year to prepare—even if it falls on a Sunday! I presume there will be another Ghana ICT Awards next year and possibly other ICT-related events in 2009. I would like to take this opportunity to appeal to policy-makers, industry-watchers, and any emerging bloggers out there to make some big noise about WTIS day next year.

 

First of all, It could be used as an opportunity to bring pressure to bear on our regulators, such as the National Communication Authority, to exercise greater vigilance on the mobile service providers in the country. Issuing threats without implementing them has never been a good way of regulating. Secondly, it could be a moment to evaluate the communication services tax  (CST) or talk-time tax and establish whether it is yielding the desired outcomes it sought to do, and/or whether there needs to be a call for it repeal or not.

 

In short, there are many opportunities that a developing country like ours can maximise on special days that are celebrated globally to make changes that will benefit us all. Each year the information society becomes that more sophisticated and complex; the earlier we begin to recognise this and act accordingly, the better an information society it will be for us all!

 

http://twelvedaysintunis.blogspot.com /  ekbensah@gmail.com / 020.7550845

 

MINUTES OF GHAJICT MEETING on 27 March, 2008 at Busy Internet, Ring Road (Belated)

Many thanks, Nana Appiah!--EKB

MINUTES OF GHAJICT MEETING on 27 March, 2008 at

Busy Internet, Ring Road

 

 

Present:

n               Nana Appiah, EXECUTIVE MEMBER

n               E.K.Bensah, Ag. PRESIDENT

n               Fred Sarpong, Ag.PRO

 

ISSUES

1. state of play:
1. GHAJICT Logo (costs, etc)
2. registration of ghajict
3. contacts pro has collected for launch
2. recommended action for launch
3. aob

 

 

1.

1. GHAJICT Logo (costs, etc)
1. Emmanuel started off first by enquiring from the others whether Veronica has been able to get things going with the Association logo and letterheads. Comments had been made a few months back on the GHAJICT list-serv, but nothing had ensued. It was agreed it was important to pick up.
2. since time is of the essence, Vero should try as much as possible to maintain regular contact with members on what efforts she has made on the logo.
3. Emmanuel said he would hook up with Vero to see how best the logo can be done—and how quickly.

 

2. registration of ghajict
1. Members need to act in order to make the Association a legitimate one
2. Emily Aggrey is in charge of ensuring that members pay their dues promptly so that Association can go ahead and be registered
3. Emily needs to provide feedback on what has happened with the registration, as well as necessary future steps

 

3. contacts pro has collected for launch
1. contacts are ready

 

2. recommended action for launch

a. Delegation of roles to each member towards the setting up of the Association

b. encouraging GHAJICTers to register with Facebook.com to enhance activities of GHAJICT

c. deadline date for all payment dues was set for 1^st week of May

 

3. AOB--RECOMMENDATIONS
1. GHAJICT preparation towards World Telecom and IS Day on 17^th MAY, 2008
2. Nana Appiah was charged to register GHAJICT with ECOBANK. ECOBANK needs the Association registered before it can accept the application
3. Nanna Appiah was appointed as secretary as Listowell Fordjour is studying

 

ENDs

 

 

Fwd: UN'S INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY BODY TO FOCUS ON FOUR MAJOR CONCERNS

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: <UNNews@un.org>
Date: 2008/5/18
Subject: UN'S INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY BODY TO FOCUS ON FOUR MAJOR CONCERNS
To: news2@secint00.un.org


UN'S INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY BODY TO FOCUS ON FOUR MAJOR CONCERNS
New York, May 18 2008  6:00PM
A leading United Nations body working to spread the benefits of information technology should concentrate on the four areas that most concern people around the world, the chair of that body said today.

Craig Barrett, Chair of the UN Global Alliance for Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and Development, told the third annual meeting of the Global Alliance in Kuala Lumpur that people were most interested about: getting software and hardware, connectivity, local content and ICT education.

The Global Alliance "should concentrate on programmes that focus on access," such as public-private partnerships, community centres and ICT for schools, said Mr. Barrett, who is also the Chairman of Intel.

It should concentrate "on the fundamentals of getting connectivity; on local content, which can create huge local economic possibilities; and on educating people on using the technology -- and there are marvellous new education programmes out there that are reaching millions of teachers."

The top UN official for economic and social affairs also called for a more focused scope. "The Global Alliance is at a turning point," said Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs Sha Zukang, whose department hosts the Alliance.

"It has the brand -- it is a big name now. It has the recognition, the platform and the networks," he told some 150 participants of the Alliance's Strategic Council. "It has launched initiatives and partnerships that are already yielding initial results. It is now important to better focus the work of the Alliance on fewer activities of strong impact."

Maximus Ongkili, Malaysia's Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation and co-chair of the meeting, said his country and the Global Alliance had a similar approach on the issue: both were involving all interested parties, mobilizing global partnerships, stressing the importance of human capital and emphasizing knowledge-sharing.

"ICT is gaining importance in addressing climate change and the food crisis," said International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Secretary-General Hamadoun Touré, a member of the 17-person Alliance Steering Committee. "On these issues, ICT is part of the solution, not part of the problem," he said.

The Alliance, which was launched in Kuala Lumpur in June 2006, had already achieved results, Mr. Barrett said, such as "improvements in education, health care and the ability of governments to communicate with their citizens." A health-care project supported by the Alliance had won an award for the best application of ICT in India, he noted.

Global Alliance Executive Coordinator Sarbuland Khan said that in the past year the body had organized or co-organized some 15 events involving over 6,000 participants, including the first-ever meeting bringing together the private sector and the UN on the issue of climate change.

Created by the UN Secretary-General in 2006, the Global Alliance seeks to mobilize the human, financial and technical resources required to bridge major gaps in ICT infrastructure, services and applications across the world. Its main areas of focus are education, health, economic development and online government services. The Alliance is self-funded, and has been able to raise close to $1 million per year from governments, corporations, foundations and other sources.

 2008-05-18 00:00:00.000

________________

For more details go to UN News Centre at http://www.un.org/news

To change your profile or unsubscribe go to:
http://www.un.org/news/dh/latest/subscribe.shtml

AGENDA for 27 March mtg @ Busy Internet

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: E.K. Bensah II <webjournalist@twnafrica.org>
Date: 14 févr. 2008 13:06
Subject: AGENDA for 22 Feb mtg @ Busy Internet
To: GHAJICT EXECUTIVE <ghajict-executive@yahoogroups.com>

1. STATE OF PLAY OF:

 

             a. GHAJICT logo (costs, etc)

             b. Registration

             c. Contacts Fred Sarpong (PRO) has collected for launch

2. Recommended action for launch

3. Exposure of PenplusBytes Conference on Web 2.0 for GHAJICT / how GHAJICT can capitalise on it

4. AOB

 

Hope to see you all at Busyinternet by 6.30pm on 27/3/08

ARTICLE: "No country for Microsoft's Men"

No Country for Microsoft's Men

By E.K.Bensah II

 

There is a stalker loose on the online world. It is going round killing competition and perpetuating monopolies through dirty tactics of vote-rigging. It has a remarkable ability to pay lip-service to development of any standards, whilst consistently reluctant in sharing what it knows. Last week, it became the victim of yet-another fine from no less than the Brussels-based European Commission.

 

It's Microsoft again.

 

Last week, the EU fined the software giant a record 899 million euros ($1.35billion) for using high prices to offset software competition. This fine, the latest sanction in the long-running battle, brings to €1.68bn the total sum that the executive wing of the EU has brought to bear on the software giant.  And it is not without good reason: Microsoft has – for four years since the fine was slapped on it for abusing its 95 percent dominance of PC operating systems through Windows—defied the EU by failing to pay.

 

EC Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes maintains in a statement that "Microsoft was the first company in 50 years of EU competition policy that the Commission has had to fine for failure to comply with an anti-trust decision." She adds: "talk is cheap; flouting the rules is expensive."

While observers and insiders alike may feel this is nothing more than the European Commission punishing Microsoft for being the market leader, there is a phalanx of committed people emerging from that ever-nebulous online world who argue to the contrary—that though the fine might have been steep, it sure as serves Microsoft right.

 

Delusions

Microsoft may be unpopular, but it's got a certain hold over us. None of us is deluded into thinking that the ability to use Microsoft packages does not make life easier for us. Or is it merely because we have been so used to it? The Free and Open Source Foundation would beg to differ. It, along with many in the open source software community, already have a bone to pick with Microsoft on account of the manner in which it is less than forthcoming on disclosing the codes it uses for its software.

 

Already, as Reuters reports, rival makers of work group servers, which operate printers and sign-ons for small office groups, have seen their markets diminish considerably because Microsoft stopped providing information they would have needed to hook up to Windows office machines.

 

This below-the-belt practice has only gone to consolidate the image of an insensitive giant that needs it wings clipped.

 

It will be re-called that the 2004 case for which non-compliance has landed Microsoft this heavy fine stems from the fact that Microsoft had been tying its Windows Media Player to the then-version of Windows it was using. Norway-based Opera, also another popular browser, complained to the EC that Microsoft had done the same thing with Internet Explorer.

 

Actions, not Words

As Microsoft has painfully realised, reneging on a four-year decision by claiming you will pay is not just setting a bad example for a company of its stature, but it's also terribly expensive. As to whether it will get about paying as quickly as possible is moot. Either way, the above-case has shown that there is something visceral in the company that chooses to do things that make it unpopular. Many people can only deduce this to be manifestations of an unprecedented rapaciousness. They would not be far off the mark.

 

At the time of writing, there is a closed-door meeting hosted by the International Organisation for Standardization (ISO) in Geneva, where the said-organisation was supposed to assist ISO members address serious concerns that prevented them from approving Microsoft's Office OpenXML (OOXML) document format (compatible with Microsoft Office 2003, 2007 and XP file formats) as a standard approved by ISO last September.

 

The genesis of it all is that there already exists a format—the one document format (ODF), which has been approved by ISO. Now this approval is important, because an increasing number of national governments and public authorities worldwide are committing to use only ISO-standard-approved products—which ODF is. Failure for Microsoft to ratify its version of OpenXML would mean that many would wave bye-bye to Microsoft's products, opting naturally for the standard. This would translate into falling profits—something completely anathema to a big-business venture like Microsoft.

 

So if that meant that Microsoft would use unorthodox measures—such as in August 2007, when a good 25 local partners that had not participated in discussions over OOXML paid their admission fee and gave OOXML a resounding corresponding number of votes -- all after Microsoft bussed them to a meeting in Sweden over the ratification of OOXML—it would do so!

 

Despite all this, in September 2007, ISO would fail to approve OOXML as an ISO-standard—much to the delight and glee of Google which promptly praised the move, saying: "our engineers conducted an independent analysis of the OOXML specification and found several areas of concern, which we communicated both to the ISO and to the public." It ended: "technical standards should be arrived at transparently, openly, and based on technical merit." Google has good reason to explain this development away, for it maintains that there is an already-"high degree of interoperability" and "wide support" for the ODF format, which is already operating in Gmail's Google Docs.

 

Investigations

In February this year, Microsoft was, yet again, found wanting by the European Commission over the issue of OOXML.  The anti-trust arm of the Commission has already begun formal probes against the company. In the first case, the EC said it was investigating a complaint filed by the European Committee for Interoperable Systems (ECIS) alleging how Redmond, Microsoft's headquarters in Oregon, had refused to divulge information about interoperability on a gamut of Microsoft's products. Furthermore, the EC said that it would be scrutinising the OpenOXML on the basis that it fails to work with competitors. They say bad things happen in threes—and this drama is no exception for the third and final probe resides on the EC investigating the role of the software giant in this ISO debate.

 

After Geneva

When all is said and done in Geneva, what will matter will be the voting. After the meeting, attending national delegations – as well as fifty others that took part in the vote last year—will have until 29 March to shift their positions, so that the Redmond-based giant might get a look-in towards a two-thirds majority. You can imagine that Google has clamped down hard against any approval—along with the open source community.

 

In the long run, whatever happens in Geneva will matter a great deal to the rest of us consumers, because it will underscore the need to practice the "eternal vigilance" Osagyefo Dr.Kwame Nkrumah talked about in all our dealings. It is frankly ironic that in the so-called information society that we are purported to live in, issues like these assume a Byzantian feel, being further reduced to issues worthy for geeks. For example, had it not been for interested parties who passed much of this information to me, I would have been none the wiser.

 

There will be blood

On more substantive issues, as to whether Microsoft will naturally fall from grace or be proverbially pushed over the edge by steep fines from the European Commission remains to be seen. Ultimately, the impact of these developments would depend on how we, as consumers, here in Ghana and beyond, respond.

 

Opera, for example, from this month will start using Google as its default search engine on its ever-popular opera browser for mobile. The release on its website of 27 February reads: "Google has been the default search option on Opera's desktop browser for seven years. This new mobile collaboration covers all global territories except Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States, and includes all of Opera's standard mobile Web browsers". What is perhaps implicit in the news is the fact that despite the erstwhile collaboration on the desktop browser, Opera is choosing to link to Google in response to the Microsoft-Yahoo saga a few weeks ago. By cementing its stance vis-à-vis Microsoft, the yawning gap between itself and the software giant will be clearer.

 

As for the rest of us, the atavistic tendency of Ghanaians to accept all that comes from the West as the best will present challenges on combating the growing menace that is Microsoft. As long as there exists no real online regulator of the virtual world—save the increasing presence of the EC—it is clear there will be battles… and blood. It probably behooves us to become passive resistors, by boycotting Microsoft goods, where necessary.

 

They say you don't kick a dog when it's down. The proverb scribes probably forgot to add "even if it is a multi-billion-dollar one". What is crystal-clear in what appears to be cries of blue murder against Microsoft is this: as long as the European Commission is here to stay and as long as virtual expansionist appetites continue to know no bounds – whether it finds expression in a Microsoft-Yahoo hostile merger, or Microsoft's strategy to extend market dominance through the use of Vista—reputed to be riddled with more holes than a Swiss cheese; or vote-rigging in Geneva to have its Microsoft Office standard passed at an international body—we are quickly and surely being reminded that the online terrain will be no country for Microsoft's greedy men.

 

ENDs. 

ARTICLE: (Pod)Casting Aspersions on Ghana's Media

(Pod)Casting Aspersions on Ghana's Media

By E.K.Bensah II

 

Quite a number of Ghanaian media outlets—both print and otherwise—own websites. Rare is the website that provides the possibility of downloading digitally-recorded material. In the Ghanaian case, it is downright non-existent. I am not quite sure whether it is a technical lacuna within these organisations, or that the Ghanaian media feel there is nothing qualitative from, say, their radio stations for download. For whatever mysterious reason, the state of the Ghanaian media insofar as facilitation of ICT tools and applications, such as podcasts, remain downright execrable.

 

Each time I listen to the BBC, which I know many Ghanaian journalists are wont to listen to, I am both quizzed and mad. I feel quizzed because I cannot for the life of me understand why despite the fact that some journalists enjoy the privilege of being sent out of the country to consolidate their journalism skills, their training fails to translate into dexterity and/or an appreciation for the current ICT tools. I am mad because a number of these tools that are part and parcel of what is considered the "New Media" are free! If any of us are able to become, say, a blogger overnight, you can imagine how a journalist – writing in his capacity as a private person – can maximise the use of blogs. If that journalist works for a radio station, you can imagine how much he/she can benefit from the use of podcasts by the radio or television station.

 

Pleasure of podcasts

Put simply, podcasts are recorded digital media files – usually audio – that can be downloaded onto any device, including mobile phones. It is exclusively distributed over the Internet, often using syndication feeds, for playback on portable media players and personal computers. The term is what online encyclopaedia Wikipedia calls a 'portmanteau' term of "i-pod" and, it is assumed, "broadcast". The Apple I-pod is the brand of portable device for which "scripts" were developed. In turn, these scripts enabled podcasts to be automatically transferred to a mobile device after they were downloaded.

 

Listen to the BBC World Service and within each hour, you are bound to hear remonstrations by both the station's presenters and continuity alike to visit the world broadcaster's podcast page, so that you can enjoy and re-visit the rich experience that the World Service offers. It has been advertised so many times you might get the impression that these podcasts are for sale. In fact, they are absolutely free, and can range from a minimum of 5 minutes to more than 60 minutes.

 

Not just for radio

It would be erroneous to believe, on the strength of the BBC, that only radio can offer podcasts. The truth of the matter is that if you look closely to how the quality Western media is doing it, even newspapers are doing it. Far be it for me to plug London's Guardian newspaper, but you cannot avoid it, especially when it's been, for a long time, dubbed the best online newspaper. The website has a podcast page, where you can obtain audio downloads on Money; Culture; US elections; Travel; Environment, etc. You name it; the site has a podcast for it—even if it's only three minutes long. In my view, this is innovation at its best: taking the print platform and revolutionising it to the extent that it becomes real—without being too in your face. Surely the Ghanaian media is capable of this as well?

 

When UEFA-licensed coach Nana Agyeman suggested on a private radio station (with a "refreshing lifestyle") three weeks ago that sports journalists were generally uneducated in the journalism profession, he incurred the wrath of many. The truth of the matter is that journalism has ironically had bad press for so long –- what with solidarity money, or sole, to write stories; bad pay, and whatnot –- that when journalists are not seen to make the rest of Ghanaian's lives easier by making it pleasurable to read, watch, and listen to practitioners of their profession, they will only go to reinforce an image of their profession that is far from positive.

 

Let's face it: podcasts are not only supposed to educate us; they are supposed to make our lives easier. Issues with internet connectivity notwithstanding, last time I looked, most internet cafes enabled you download from the 'Net and even from and unto your storage devices. Even without a connection at work or in your home, if you knew you could re-listen to your popular breakfast, or lunchtime show, by way of a podcast, I could imagine you would end up feeling both sated and dedicated to your station of choice—knowing they not only care about the kind of programmes they produce, but want you to be further interested in giving you the opportunity to listen again. To boot, your productivity would inevitably be boosted knowing you would not make too much effort to listen to a programme on the hour, especially when you can catch it again—albeit without contributions by text and email you might want to make.

 

 

Future for Media can be Podcasting

Truth be told, the tectonic shifts in technology and the media is spawning not just a whole slew of terminology that was alien to us a decade ago, but a whole phalanx of media practitioners that are forced to become media warriors—armed with new ideas and new skills on top of the traditional ones they know. Despite the fact that organisations like the Ghanaian-based PenPlusBytes—Ghana's only Institute of ICT Journalism—has regularly offered training to Ghanaian journalists, the commitment by these journalists has been this side short of poor. I do not believe for one moment that aspersions should merely be cast on the individuals, for opportunities, in theory, ought to be made by the management of these media institutions. If that is failing, that it can only be incumbent on these media-warriors to grab up their skills and interest and teach themselves within the information society.

 

From my experience, the saturation of information is such that there are little excuses these days to be technologically-illiterate, especially when you are a practitioner of the proverbial Fourth Estate. Journalism, surely, ought to not simply be about re-hashing press releases, and waxing incessantly about issues that are bound to polarize us, but ought, in my view, to be about formatting, or packaging, the information within society by using the information society to inform society in the traditional gate-keeper fashion. Let's be clear: podcasting alone will not do this, but undoubtedly, it can revolutionise the media and, by extension, society into keeping in tune with what the twenty-first century has to offer.

 

 

ENDs. 

 

 

 

Microsoft fights to have its programme (Office Document) standardised!

from: http://www.reuters.com/article/companyNews/idUSL2555696320080225

UPDATE 1-Microsoft gets another shot at Open XML standard

Mon Feb 25, 2008 10:02am EST

(Adds details, analyst quotes paragraphs 9-12)

By Laura MacInnis

GENEVA, Feb 25 (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O: Quote, Profile, Research) ramped up its fight to have its Office Open XML document format made into an international standard on Monday as delegates from 37 countries met to reconsider the proposal.

Their meeting hosted by the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) and International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) in Geneva is meant to help broker consensus after a preliminary vote on the standard failed six months ago.

There will be no ballot during the week-long talks, but the 87 national standards bodies who previously voted will have until March 29 to adjust their positions, giving the world's largest software maker another shot at the two-thirds majority it needs for approval.

"The ISO/IEC members who voted on the draft in September will have 30 days to change their votes if they wish," said Roger Frost, a spokesman for the Geneva-based agency.

Microsoft won only 53 percent support in September.

Standardisation of Open XML, which is the default file-saving format in Microsoft Office 2007, would allow other companies to build products using the file format and simplify file exchange between different software suites.

Opponents of the proposed ISO/IEC standard DIS 29500 argue there is no need for a rival to the widely used Open Document Format (ODF) that is already an international standard.

They say that the Microsoft product's 6,000 pages of code, compared with ODF's 860 pages, make it artificially complicated and untranslatable. The productivity software suite OpenOffice uses ODF, which is supported by International Business Machines Corp (IBM.N: Quote, Profile, Research). (IBM) and Sun Microsystems Inc. (JAVA.O: Quote, Profile, Research).

"Microsoft could easily provide full support for ODF," said Rishab Ghosh, senior researcher at the United Nations University in Maastricht.

Ghosh said Microsoft's drive for a competing standard was part of its broader strategy to encourage consumers to use only Microsoft products, as has been alleged in anti-trust cases in Europe and elsewhere.

"Because their software is used by so many people, you don't switch to anyone else's software because you are worried that your files are going to be lost," he told Reuters by telephone.

"If you can save by default in ODF using a Microsoft product, that means your documents will be easily readable by users of a competing software. And when your documents are easily readable by others, maybe you can consider switching to a different software," he said.

Microsoft says multiple standards are normal in software and other industries, that competition makes for better products, and that its format has higher specifications and is more useful than ODF.

The company has collaborated with Novell (NOVL.O: Quote, Profile, Research) to develop a tool to translate Open XML documents into ODF and vice versa, though critics believe the tool cannot provide a complete translation due to the complexity of the Microsoft product.

XML, short for Extensible Markup Language, is a standard for describing data in a way that allows it to be shared across various systems and applications. Microsoft has handed over control of Open XML to the standards-making body Ecma, which would make it available even in the event of its demise.

Delegates submitted about 4,200 suggested modifications to the Microsoft documents in the lead-up to last year's ballot. Those have been whittled down to 1,100 comments for consideration during this week's meeting, the ISO said. (Editing by Jonathan Lynn and Jason Neely)

© Reuters 2007. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by caching, framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world

I Facebook, Therefore I Am (comments much appreciated!)

I Facebook, Therefore I Am

By E.K.Bensah II

 

There are many happy people swimming in the information society here in Ghana who are totally oblivious to the phenomenon that is Facebook. There are many satisfied with doing the occasional searches in Google; checking their electronic mail, and surfing the Internet on anything and everything. That you can go to any internet café around town that has a working connection and access such-things might not only underscore the 24/7 access that we so (unwittingly) crave and want, but remind us that the virtual world can serve as a substitute for what many call the "global village."

 

Whatever you might think about this village, if ever we wanted to de-bunk the platitude of living in one, the mere muttering of "Facebook" would disgrace us.

 

Facebook is a social networking site that has become a phenomenon almost overnight. I say "almost", because though it was set up in February 2004, it would be 2005, and only in 2007 before many people I know using Facebook would be heightened to the sensitivity of what the service offers, and add me as "a friend" to join the network. That the term "social networking" existed before Facebook suggests that they were not the pioneers of the service.

 

In fact, it would be MySpace—now owned by media mogul Rupert Murdoch's New Times Corporation -- that would be launched in 1999 to blaze the trail for what we have now come to know as social networking sites. Suffice-to-say, however, Facebook has blazed the trail in terms of user-friendliness and easy registration. Online encyclopaedia Wikipedia reports that there are 64 million active users.

 

An Unearthly Experience

If we forget about the numbers for a second and think about the experience it offers, it is fair to say that there are no surprises why Facebook is as successful as it is. For a service that was started by Harvard students, and meant to be US-centric, it has risen so exponentially it's no longer funny—to become a keen competitor to MySpace that started it all before Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg came down from Harvard to rain on MySpace's parade.

 

I first started using it around June 2007, because I was invited by "friends", who turned out to be classmates from secondary school. It has taken a while for those from primary school to begin getting in touch. I can tell you that the speed with which I added "friends"—both classmates and otherwise was truly an unearthly experience, for being able  to read their profile and find out what they were up to did really feel like you were in some "global village".

 

One cannot under-estimate the voyeuristic power of being privy to the lives of people you went to school with several years ago. That you can follow their marriages and the trials and tribulations of their lives all make for an experience that you can only put down to as being one of the benefits of being connected 24/7. Especially so, when one day, you wake up to see that you can even edit your Facebook profile by way of your mobile phone!

 

 

Priviledged glimpses

It meant that you could let those checking your profile (which is difficult, in fact to tell, unless they write on your "wall") know what you were doing hour-by-hour or minute-by-minute if you wanted. For a nano-second, you felt that the world was, as F.Scott Fitzgerald's character Nick Carroway describes the "Great Gatsby" in the eponymous novel, "at a uniform attention forever." Uniform because everyone was speaking Facebook – a language those connected could understand. It didn't require manuals or constant emailing to the manufacturers; everything was self-evident. The fact that any change on your profile meant that Facebook would send you an email was telling, because it meant that you could go about your business and still follow up on who was sending you a message.

 

These priviledged glimpses into the life of one's friends has elicited short-winded elations only the information society can produce. More seriously, it has given vent to what many feel is a significant loss of time. Small wonder, therefore, that a 23-yr-old Catholic student has given it up for Lent. The Independent Catholic News reports that Ellie Harrison sometimes logs onto the site even before she has breakfast! Determined to go on a "Facebook Fast", the MA Russian studies student has publicly declared what a lot of Facebook users would probably be in denial over—their addiction to the site.

 

Facebook Groupies

In another kind of digital exuberance, which can only go to underscore the time-loss associated with the site, I started joining all kind of Facebook groups—just because I could. The Facebook neophyte that I was in June 2007 believed that it was important to join and continuously connect with others. Still, I was also a key part of some of the groups: one particular Ghanaian Facebooker created a group to Stop the Sale of the Agricultural Development Bank; I joined, but realised I was unable to participate as much as I had wanted to, resigning myself to merely forwarding useful articles on the proposed sale to the group.

 

Then one day, it all changed.

 

Work got seriously intense for a couple of weeks, and by the time I actually logged into my profile, I was more-than-inundated by friends sending me "free drinks"; throwing virtual sheep at me; tickling me artificially; smiling at me virtually and whatnot that I opted for a break. My secret, though, was not to tell anyone. In between the messages and the sheep came a degree of self-regulation. At the time of writing, I have some 50-odd requests to join something or other I have not yet honoured, and a friend has just invited me to an event across the other side of the world I cannot possibly participate!

 

Facebook Fantasies, Digital Elations

We all are cognisant of the pitfalls inherent in a 24/7 information society, yet because we cannot escape it, we strike a fine balance—for that is as much as you can do. It's when you read about a Facebooker mobilising Colombians to stage a mass demonstration for revolutionary Marxist army forces using Facebook that you begin to wonder about the possibilities these social networking sites truly can offer. Or the fact that pedagogical/academic debates are being started around  the privacy – or lack thereof – of Facebook and its ability to offer comprehensive deleting of data, and what that means for innovation and ideas on the internet that you think that Facebook could be onto something big.

 

And something big it has been onto for a while. Its dalliance with Microsoft has been no secret. In October 2007, Microsoft invested a vertiginous $240million in Facebook. Microsoft has been instrumental in providing significant revenue for Facebook's advertising, just because it has been selling the Facebook's internet ads. The most important development through this dalliance is that Microsoft has been able to acquire a 1.6 per cent stake of the popular social networking site, now valued at $15bn.

 

Even though the Microsoft-Yahoo! saga might have bitten the dust after two weeks, possibilities are real for mergers, especially because of keen competition offered by MySpace, which, in my view, is to Facebook what Yahoo! is to Google.

 

The Future is Facebook

The online terrain is well and truly ripe for adventure – and you can bet your bottom dollar that Facebook is going to be in the thick of it. Last two weeks, it launched a Spanish version of its site, prompting reminisces of Yahoo!'s multilingual platform. The significance ought not be under-estimated, because one can very well imagine that with Facebook in the working six languages of the UN some day, we will not just be speaking its language, we will well and truly be thinking it.

 

 

ENDs

Bank of Ghana, Cedi Re-Denomination Wins UN Award

from: http://allafrica.com/stories/printable/200802200696.html

 

Bank of Ghana, Cedi Re-Denomination Wins UN Award

Ghanaian Chronicle (Accra)

NEWS
20 February 2008
Posted to the web 20 February 2008

By Stephen Odoi-Larbi

The Bank of Ghana and the Ghana Cedi Re-denomination websites have jointly won the 2007 World Summit Awards Special Mention from the Continent of Africa for the best in e-content and creativity in the e-Government category. This is the first time that Ghana has participated in the competition since the WSA started in 2003 as an initiative from Austria in the framework of the United Nations' World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS).

Following a selection of winners, an international conference was organized in Venice, Italy during which the winners from all over the world presented their awarded projects and shared their visions on the topic of "ICT & Creativity". At the 2007 conference, Mr. Derrick-Hope Gidzi, Chief Executive Officer and George Kofi Hagan, Chief Technology Officer of Con-Imedia, designers of the Bank of Ghana and Ghana Cedi Re-denomination websites, received the award for WSA Special Mention for the best in e-government in Africa and made a presentation on the Bank of Ghana/Ghana Cedi Re-denomination websites. Dignitaries present were delighted and full of praise for the outstanding technologies implemented, which has helped to empower government, citizens and the financial sector with the tools needed to access and capture information for everyday use.

The World Summit Awards (WSA) is the world's premier contest for excellence in e-content and creativity. They honour producers of interactive multimedia and innovative ICT applications and are the only awards supported by a Public Private Partnership between professional organisations, industry, governments and UN organisations.

The winners were selected following an evaluation by the World Summit Award Grand Jury 2007, which consisted of eminent multimedia and e-Content experts from 32 countries. A total of 24,000 products were presented for consideration. The Jury evaluated 650 entries which were nominated from 160 UN countries to the Global WSA. The Jury selected the five most outstanding products in each of the eight WSA Categories as winners.

The categories for the awards are: e-Culture e-Government e-Health e-Learning e-Business e-Entertainment e-Science e-Inclusion

WSA identifies high-quality e-Content products and promotes the most outstanding achievements worldwide in collaboration with the UN Secretary-General's Global Alliance for ICT and Development, UNESCO and UNIDO. It is a global not-for-profit activity governed by a Board of world-leading multimedia experts and supported by an office at the International Center for New Media in Salzburg, Austria.

"The contest increases the market awareness for excellence in e-Content, ingenious ideas and novel solutions, thus assisting in the market-making of high-quality multimedia products. And for some producers of excellence it is the breakthrough they needed to make it both locally and internationally" says Professor Peter A. Bruck, Chairman of the WSA Board of Directors.

The participation of the Bank of Ghana/Ghana Cedi Re-denomination websites in the competition was initiated by Ms. Dorothy Gordon, the Director-General of the Ghana-India Kofi Annan Centre of Excellence in ICT, who is an Eminent Expert for the WSA for Ghana and the African Spokesperson for the WSA, following a national contest in which the Bank of Ghana/Ghana Cedi Websites was adjudged the national best in e-government and creativity.

It would be recalled that the Bank of Ghana developed a website on the re-denomination exercise which was launched in April 2007. The Cedi Re-denomination website, which had a link from a re-designed Bank of Ghana website, had the various features including currency converters for converting the cedi to the Ghana Cedi and vice versa and also converting the cedi or Ghana Cedi to foreign currencies and vice versa. Another feature that was very widely patronized by the general public was the text messaging system on Areeba (now MTN), One Touch and Tigo which enabled the public to request for conversions.

The Bank of Ghana website was re-designed for better interactivity and accessibility by the general public.

The Information Society and Threats Thereof

The Information Society and Threats Thereof

By E.K.Bensah II

 

To the Guardian newspaper, it is "Discgate". To the rest of us, it is the loss of data of 25 million people—which included the name and date of every child; along with parent's national insurance numbers and bank details— by the UK's HM Revenue early last week, which is a serious wake-up call to aficionados of the information society who have come to believe that moving to an increasingly IT-related world is the way forward.

 

That the data was not encrypted and that a junior clerk is alleged to have botched his work brings into sharp relief two things: the need to fine-tune measures to protect important data, and a sensitisation of staff working with IT to the pitfalls inherent in the information society. Let's face it, sacking the clerk was to be expected, but it certainly does not bring back that data of 25 million people! What it does do, in my view, is remind us about the potential perils and pitfalls inherent in an information society.

 

The so-called Information Society, understandably, may represent yet another nebulous concept coined by the perceived behemoth of the UN. What it is, in effect, in my view, is a global society, where ICT tools--not just computers, but mobile phones; radios and whatnot –- serve as critical roles in our "development" --irrespective of where you may be.

 

This means, for example, that it is a society where mobile internet is a reality; where there is an always-on internet (broadband); where it is not just accessible, but relatively affordable for all; where Internet cafes are within the environs of major cities, hang-outs, and even the country-side, where life is that much quieter; and where blogging facilitates an openness unparalleled in the facilitation of the work of the fourth estate.

Given that Ghanaians are wont to over-do things, I believe in the same manner should Ghanaians pause to reflect over their role and responsibility in an ever-evolving information society.

 

Whether we like it or not, the information society is here to stay –and that necessarily is not a bad thing. It means that our access to information is increased and, better still, that access is to a plethora of information. To the degree that it makes or mars us is what we must grapple with, for the rapid explosion of mobile phones – both in urban and rural areas – while a positive development, calls for important safeguards of our privacy.

 

Already, we have become accustomed to going everywhere with a mobile phone—when we don't take it, most of us feel something is missing—and as we increasingly move towards a more sophisticated information society, where WAP-enabled mobile phones, PDAs, and smartphones become cheaper—and the norm, it behooves us to further pause and question not just the impact of such changes on our lives, work, and families, but how exposed it leaves us to attack by miscreants who can—and will—exploit our 24/7 access to our phones.

 

Without adequate regulation, we will see an information society running amuck, and where with our already-jammed and over-subscribed phone networks, personal information we input over our wap-enabled phones to access the Internet becomes cross-linked with other user's data.

 

A few months ago, I accessed my Yahoo mail through my mobile phone, only to see someone else's username, password, and email. I refreshed the page, but the person's username and password was all I saw. Rather naively, I selected "sign in", knowing that no-one else had been using my mobile –let alone access my Yahoo account online. In I went—to see that person's emails. I had to reset my phone before I was able to access my own account again. I failed to report it to my provider, believing it to be a one-off thing. What if it wasn't?

 

This, in my view, calls into question a need for, say, wap-enabled firewalls to prevent any personal data on our mobile phone getting out there. That one can even write a text message, and send it as an email, not only reflects how mobile phones have enhanced our convenience, but how we ought to be more responsible in how we comport ourselves online. We must all by now be familiar with the 419 emails, yet time and again, we hear stories of people having fallen foul of it. It's all about their choice and their responsibility—or lack thereof.

 

Mind your data

An attempt at a rules-based information society is one of the reasons why the first-ever Internet Governance Forum took place in Greece from 30 October to 2 November 2006. It might have gone unreported in mainstream media, but it certainly was an impactful event in the sense that it set the tone for how the information society could begin to be crafted and regulated.
In the UK, they have gone one concrete step further.

 

Recent data from the UK's data privacy watchdog – the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) – indicates that 4.5 million web users aged between 14 and 21 years of age are cavalier in the way they give up information on the Internet, especially when visiting social networking sites, such as the very-popular Facebook, or Rupert Murdoch-owned MySpace.

 

Even search engines, such as Google, are receiving complaints that information associated with web searches made under an individual's name brings up expressions that these individuals made in their youth but, which could be detrimental to their career. To this end, the ICO has recently issued new guidance for young people using the Internet that they have made available on a website: http://www.ico.gov.uk/youngpeople.

 

Furthermore, in the light of the monumental blunder at HM Revenue and Customs, the British government has agreed to conduct what it calls "data security spot checks" across government departments, which is to be spearheaded by the Information Commissioner's Office; furthermore, data breaches of the magnitude of this loss will be made a criminal offence.

 

According to silicom.com, a UK-based site on IT that informs the business world on enhancing its work through technology, the Information Commissioner Richard Thomas who welcomed these new powers said in a statement that by making this data breach a criminal offence, it would "serve as a strong deterrent and would send a very strong signal that it is completely unacceptable to be cavalier with people's information."

 

Much closer to home, from West African Examination Council (WAEC) results to National Service placements online, Ghanaian data is already computerized and automatically made part of the information society, with attendant qualms over what happens with the data, notwithstanding.

 

With the imminent introduction of the National Identification Authority and its consequent issuance of ID cards for Ghanaians, the possibility of exposure and loss of our personal details will be more real than it is now where it is hidden among a maelstrom of papers at, say, the passport office.

 

Our reliance on ICT and its tools may be inevitable, but might we remember to complement it with traditional methods, which are deemed more reliable—lest we end up with a Ghanaian version of "Discgate"!