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Internet & technology
RSS FeedAlgeria: Maghreb digital library launched
2011-01-27, Issue 514
Algeria launched the Maghreb Digital Library on 23 January in an effort to expand access to information. The initiative was part of a joint endeavour between the Algerian Ministry of Higher Education and US-based NGO Civilian Research and Development...
Egypt: Government tries to block social media
2011-01-27, Issue 514
The protest movement in Egypt has mobilised the young and the middle classes using the Internet and social networks in a challenge to the authorities that has seen both Twitter and Swedish video-streaming site Bambuser blocked. Mobile phones too were...
Africa: Communication technologies and political change in the Middle East and Africa
2011-01-31, Issue 514
The spread of digital technologies in the Middle East and Africa has generated the view that 'new media' open up political spaces for dissent, activism and emancipation. In October 2010, a conference 'New Media|Alternative Politics' brought together ...
Egypt: On Twitter, the search for Wael Ghonim
2011-01-31, Issue 514
On Twitter, friends express concerns for Egyptian blogger and Google Middle East staffer Wael Ghonim, who has been missing since Thursday. Ghonim, who studied in Cairo and is now Head of Marketing at Google's UAE office, had tweeted his intent to be ...
Kenya: New ICT drivers of the economy
2011-01-19, Issue 513
A significant decline in agriculture, still considered by many to be the economy’s backbone, has seen the emergence of information communication technologies (ICT) and telecommunications as the new pillars of the economy. 'We have been getting reques...
'Next Google and Facebook Have to Come from Africa'
2011-01-20, Issue 513
There are countless opportunities for the IT sector in Africa. This was one of the conclusions drawn by Google Ghana’s Country Manager Estelle Akofio-Sowah and local Kenyan IT entrepreneur Kamal Budhabhatti. Both were speaking in the Netherlands at t...
Uganda: Ban on refurbished computers sparks the law of unintended consequences
2011-01-20, Issue 513
The dirty downside of the ICT industry is that computers have to go somewhere when they die and because they are full of potentially toxic materials they cannot simply be dumped in landfills. Uganda’s Government has sought to tackle part of the probl...
Africa: African culture promoted in award-winning 3D animation
2011-01-20, Issue 513
An African film company is gaining global attention by producing award-winning 3D animation titles made from an African perspective. TransTales Entertainment was started in 2005 on a budget of less than 5 000 dollars by Segun Williams and Obinna Onwu...
Africa: Can WikiLeaks and social media help fuel revolutions?
2011-01-24, Issue 513
On 14 January 2011, Tunisian strongman Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was forced from office, and by some accounts he thereby became the first political casualty of the age of Wikileaks and social media, states this article....
Kenya: Google maps Korogocho slum
2011-01-11, Issue 512
After mapping various key locations and landmarks in the country, Google is now mapping Korogocho, one of Nairobi's informal settlements. The mapping of Korogocho, an area with about 200,000 people, is meant to make it easier to identify streets, key...
Global: Net thinking
2011-01-17, Issue 512
No matter how many times researchers caution about the tendency to exaggerate the impact of information technologies (ITs) as 'magic bullets' to address a host of development challenges, common talk is predictably techno-optimistic, says this article...
Tunisia: Citizens get a taste of internet freedom
2011-01-17, Issue 512
Like many of its neighbours in the region, Tunisia has long approached the internet as a force to be censored. Tunisians are barred from accessing a wide variety of sites, from the seemingly innocuous YouTube to sites providing information on human r...
Sudan: Monitoring Sudan's vote via ICTs
2011-01-05, Issue 511
Sudan VoteMonitor is a pilot project led by the Sudan Institute for Research and Policy (SIRP) and Asmaa Society for Development, in collaboration with other Sudanese civil society organisations, and supported by eMoksha.org and Ushahidi.com (technic...
Zambia: Tina Banda, the Facebook agony aunt
2011-01-05, Issue 511
To many people Facebook is a tool to announce what they are doing or what they have done, yet to some Zambians, it is being used as ‘Agony Aunt’ from which they are seeking advice on many social problems affecting them, reports Global Voices. A socia...
Rwanda: Fibre optic cable rollout complete
2011-01-06, Issue 511
The physical laying of the optic fibre cable in Rwanda, which includes civil works, laying of ducts and installation of the fibre is complete. Patrick Nyirishema,the Deputy Director of Rwanda Development Board (RDB) in charge of Information Technolog...
Global: Google earth engine launched
2010-12-14, Issue 510
A satellite imagery tool that will make an unprecedented amount of environmental data available freely online has been launched at the UN Climate Change Conference (COP 16), in Mexico. Earth Engine, launched by Google on 3 December, aims to enable sc...
Global: New edition of GISWatch examines ICT sustainability
2010-12-14, Issue 510
The latest edition of the Global Information Society Watch questions the assumption that information and communications technologies (ICTs) will automatically be a panacea for climate change while also looking at the potential of ICTs to mitigate and...
Africa: New Africa-focused knowledge portal launched
2010-12-14, Issue 510
The Africa Portal is an online knowledge resource for policy-related issues on Africa. An undertaking by the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI), Makerere University (MAK), and the South African Institute of International Affairs (S...
Uganda: SMS election platform launched
2010-12-14, Issue 510
NGOs, under the Citizens Coalition for Electoral Democracy in Uganda (CCEDU), have launched a short messaging service (SMS) platform to receive complaints regarding the ongoing elections. Godwin Byaruhanga, an official from CCEDU, says the campaign w...
Africa: Social media boom begins
2010-12-20, Issue 510
Africans are coupling their already extensive use of cell phones with a more recent and massive interest in social media — Internet-based tools and platforms that allow people to interact with each other much more than in the past. In the process, Af...
Global: Wouldn't you like to have a low bandwidth version of Skype?
2010-12-13, Issue 509
Recently launched was a 'bespoke, low-bandwidth version of Skype for use in 120 hardship locations served by UNHCR staff members around the world'. Many newspapers and blogs picked up on it, including Guardian Tech, Mashable, and the LA Times. Many f...
Global: Cyber-Con
2010-11-29, Issue 508
What exactly can Twitter do for American imperialism? How is the US State Department deploying social media in their propaganda war? And is the contention that social media is a powerful tool for activists fighting against repressive regimes even tru...
Ghana: Google Trader launch stuns Accra
2010-12-06, Issue 508
Google literally brought Accra - the capital of Ghana in West Africa - to a standstill with the public launch of its new product Google Trader. It is a free online classifieds service that allows Ghanaians to buy and sell products and services, as we...
DRC: Documenting HIV/AIDS stigmatisation
2010-11-23, Issue 507
With the help of a Micro-grant awarded by Rising Voices, AZUR Development organisation trained communication officers of different AIDS organisations in Congo in digital story telling, podcasting, and the creation of blogs. The goal was that these pa...
Tunisia: Launch a blog campaign starts
2010-11-23, Issue 507
The Tunisian blogosphere has witnessed a period of stagnation since April. Indeed, the month was a black one for Tunisian bloggers as more than 100 blogs have been censored by the authorities, discouraging the rest of the bloggers, who have become re...
Tunisia: Five years past WSIS, online activity even more censored
2010-11-23, Issue 507
The International Freedom of Expression Exchange Tunisia Monitoring Group (IFEX-TMG), a coalition of 20 IFEX members, is deeply concerned that five years after hosting the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), Tunisia remains one of the mos...
Uganda: ICT boom not necessarily good for women
2010-11-25, Issue 507
The rapid growth of the ICT market in Uganda has been greeted with optimism over its potential to boost the country’s development. But less attention is being paid to the increase in gender based violence due to the use of information and communicati...
Egypt: Getting harassment on the map
2010-11-25, Issue 507
Less common but perhaps more useful than the tourist map is the ‘harassment map’ that many Cairo women are beginning to refer to. HarassMap, a private initiative run by volunteer activists, allows women who have been subject to harassment to report t...
Ending gender-based violence against women
2010-11-29, Issue 507
November 25 marked the beginning of 16 days of activism for ending gender-based violence against women, and also the Take Back the Tech! (TBTT) campaign. Take Back the Tech! is a collaborative campaign to reclaim information and communication technol...
Tunisia: Youth employment subject of ICT forum
2010-11-18, Issue 505
Maghreb youths should play a key role in developing new technologies in the region, according to participants in a Hammamet forum that wrapped up on 12 November. The three-day event, dubbed 'ICT4 ALL Forum Tunis+5', brought together more than 700 man...
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