If you are thinking about visiting the well known ICTD 2010, which takes place from 13th to 16th December in London, you should consider staying two more days and visit the probably more technology related ACM DEV 2010 as well.

The 1st Annual Symposium on Computing for Development is being planned for December 17-18, 2010 in Royal Holloway, University of London, following the co-located 2010 ICTD Conference. Check out the website fore more information.

At ICTD2010, the biggest ICT4D/ICTD conference this year, just recently the accepted papers and posters have been publicized. The topics cover the most exciting and current topics in ICT4D today, and we are proud to announce that the paper we handed in  - “A Qualitative Study of the Impact of Mobile Phone Usage on the Social Life in East Africa” was also accepted as a poster.

Registration for the conference has also opened already - so make sure you get a ticket before it’s too late. There’s also the possibility to apply for a scholarship for people to participate in the conference who might not otherwise be able to do so. Just as a reminder once again the dates:

What: ICTD2010 conference

Where: Royal Holloway University, London

When: 12. to 16. December 2010

ICT4D.at is partnering with Roayal Holloway for this event. Currently we are working with various other people of ICTD2010 to get the pre-conference platform up soon. We will host it here on our server. Furthermore we are working on a media strategy, as we are providing our video and radio skills to the conference organizers.

A lot is happening - and ICTD2010 promises to be a really exciting event. So make sure you check it out!

This year in December the probably biggest and most important ICT4D / ICTD conference this year will take place in London. Tim Unwin and Dorothea Kleine (both from Royal Holloway University) have gathered people from around the world to help them in pulling in as many opinions and viewpoints as possible from as many individuals and organizations as possible to make the conference a rich and helpful experience for the whole ICT4D / ICTD scene.

It aims to provide a forum for researchers, practitioners and all those with interests in the use of information and communication technologies in development practice to meet to discuss the latest research advances in the field. [from the ICTD2010 page]

Keynote speaker so far announced include Sir Tim Berners Lee (Director of W3C) and Lídia Brito (Director of Science Policy Division, UNESCO), furthermore the who is who of the international ICT4D / ICTD research and practitioner scene will be present there.

We at ICT4D.at are also contributing to the conference - currently by providing technical assistance for the pre-conference activites (to be announced), and at the conference with doing audio, video and web 2.0 coverage of what’s happening there. Furthermore we are advertising the event through our channels - so click the ICTD2010 London web page link here and make sure you attend the conference. Once again the dates:

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What: ICTD2010 conference

Where: Royal Holloway University, London

When: 12. to 16. December 2010

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For everybody interested in ICT4D / ICTD research and networking it’s probably the place to be this year. Registration opens soon, hope to see you there!

Thomas Smyth and others have shared some very valuable compilations of ICT4D-related sessions that will be held at CHI 2010, which starts tomorrow. Below is an edited summary of the events. If you are interested in HCI-related announcements and discussions, join the HCI4D Google group.

MONDAY
11:30-13:00 Panel: Addressing Challenges in Doing International Field Research

TUESDAY
9:00-10:30 HCI and India session, with three HCI4D papers, including one best paper
11:30-13:00 Panel: Computing Technology in International Development
14:30-16:00 Crisis Informatics with papers on Liberia and Iraq
16:30-18:00 HCI for All session with a very interesting paper on Post-colonial computing

WEDNESDAY
9:00-10:30 Storytelling session with some work from Gary Marsden’s group; also the Social Impact Award session
14:30-16:00 Medical data session with a paper on health and persuasion (also a best paper); also Imagine all the people alt.chi session with paper on Rwanda
16:30-18:00 HCI, Communities, and Politics panel, which is not specific to HCI4D, but very relevant

THURSDAY
14:30-16:00 HCI and the Developing World session

FRIDAY
11.30-14.30 GVU research showcase in the Technology Square Research Building, demonstrating work by the Technologies and International Development lab

Notes from the first Lift @ Austria conference from 19. to 20. March 2010 in Vienna, Austria.

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Information on all the groups and speakers can be found at the Lift @ Austria conference program page. Abstracts of all talks can be read at the Lift @ Austria speakers page.

Pictures of the speaker are either shot by myself or taken from the website of the conference.

Notes from the first day and second day afternoon:

• Lift @ Austria - Day 1, part 1
• Lift @ Austria - Day 1, part 2
• Lift @ Austria - Day 2, part 1

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After the workshop before noon on the second day the posters were exhibited and Kerstin Sailer presented the results of an analyze of the conference space which she carried out with the help of all participants during the conference.

Kerstin - Space syntax

Analysis of events that took place in different locations

• statistically, geographically
• configuration of spaces - how do they connect
• creating an alternative design out of that

Categorization works very well on a collective level

At this event

• While discussions took place mostly in formal settings (workshop area), learning and rethinking new ideas took place rather in informal settings (cafe, lounge)
• Learning took place potentially everywhere, whereas new ideas were quite limited to certain spaces

Q & A:

Any optimization ideas how to get more new ideas?

• How many new ideas can you get? maybe there are already a lot of new ideas

Did you do this in a permanent setting?

• Yes, in my PhD - it’s really interesting looking at organizations at different points of time

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Following this, the results of an interesting feedback mechanism were presented. The feedback mechanism allowed participants to give away plasticine balls to people who they thought were interesting. You could give away different coloured balls according to the following categories: [read the whole article]

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Roland Alton - osAlliance

Co-operative Settings that enable IT, Media and Social Businesses

Enabling spaces already created:

• Spaces, materials, tools for students enabling them to build furniture and make exhibitions
• Net Culture Lab - with Telekom Austria
• Enabling a space takes time - process is too complex
• Old Telekom building in Dornbirn

We need common values in these settings

• Ethify
• 8 virtues
• Testing these values in various settings and adapting them
• New value system - one answer to the “crisis”

Internationaler Medienverbund - Co-operative with the possibilities of running micro-co-operatives

• Reduces bureaucracy for small projects
• Splitting financial responsibility
• “Structural enabling space”

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Oliver Marlow - The Hub, Tilt

Talking about ‘enabling’ spaces. How design is being used to transform the way people interact with each and their environment

Enabling is connected to space - but also to the interface between people and space

12 principles for The Hub - constraints which are necessary

Co-design workshop for complex problems

• intuitive responses for questions that pop up
• for all sorts of problems
• individual vs. community

[read the whole article]

Notes from the first Lift @ Austria conference from 19. to 20. March 2010 in Vienna, Austria.

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After the framing talks (LIFT @ Austria, day 1 - part 1) and a delicious lunch, the participants of Lift @ Austria conference split in three groups to discuss certain aspects of “enabling” in depth. I joined the group on Enabling Structures meet Enabling Metamorphoses. The workshops were initiated by two short impulse talks. Information on all the groups and speakers can be found at the Lift @ Austria conference program page. Abstracts of all talks can be read at the Lift @ Austria speakers page.

Pictures of the speaker are either shot by myself or taken from the website of the conference.

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Sava Dalbokov - good.bee holding

Cross-pollinate! Financial and Support Platforms for Social Development

Good.bee holding:

• Banking the unbanked
• Microfinance (act), capacity building (teach & learn), community solution (orchestrate)
• Economic sustainability
• Changemaker initiative together with Ashoka
• Enabling capacity: f(freedom + leverage)

Important attributes for projects which are supported in the social entrepreneurship sector:

• Economically sustainable
• Hard to measure social impact - one approach: is it scalable?
• 20-50k support

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Jean-Henry Morin - University of Geneva, Dept. of Information Systems,
Switzerland

Social-Micro-Innovation : Leveraging the Crowds as co-Innovation Enabler

Wisdom of the tribes - Seth Godin

• self-organizing crowds gathering around a leader

[read the whole article]

Notes from the first Lift @ Austria conference from 19. to 20. March 2010 in Vienna, Austria.

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After a bus tour through various enabling and open spaces in Vienna at the day preceding the conference (detailed program at Lift @ Austria program page), the first day of the regular Lift @ Austria conference started with five framing talks to give impulses for thoughts and discussion about the topic “enable”.

The abstracts of all these talks can be read at the Lift @ Austria speakers page.

Pictures of the speaker are either shot by myself or taken from the website of the conference.

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Marcus F. Peschl - University of Vienna

Enabling - introduction

Trends to mechanise innovation and the desire to create new knowledge end up in a contradiction - as this just makes the implicit rules visible

Alternatives: enabling

• facilitating framework
• leave behind the “regime of control”
• only moderation - give up the control

Important for such an approach

• openness & the ability to reflect
• listening and observing (weak signals & details)
• wait & let come

Overall, a new humbleness and alternative attitudes and values with an application and mening for various contexts, domains and disciplines are required

The conference itself is an enabling space

• location
• design
• frame (bus tour, talks)
• concepts (workshops)
• documentation

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Stefan Wiltschnig - Copenhagen Business School, Denmark

Enabling creative processes as framing between openness and rigidity

Concept of enabling in the context of creative processes / profound innovation

• “insight” - seeing something and acting on it, new viewpoint
• European / Greek vs. Chinese perspective of innovation: forcing vs. non-interventionist

[read the whole article]

Just a quick note on the conferences we will attend in the near future:

mLife 2009 Barcelona - “A Platform for Socially Responsible Organizations in the Mobile Value Chain”, taking place September 2-4 in Barcelona. Confirmed speakers here are

• Mr. Serge Ferre, NOKIA, Vice President Corporate and Head of EU Representation
• Ms. Evelyn Rys, CISCO, Sales and Business Development Manager, EMEA Public Sector Vertical, Cisco Systems
• Dr. Bruno Jacobfeuerborn, Deutsche Telekom  - Board Member of T-Mobile Germany and T-Home.
• Mr. Ken Banks, Kiwanja Net

Africa Gathering - taking place October 10-11 in London. After the first Africa Gathering this April we decided to attend the upcoming second instance of this event this October as well. So far only one speaker has been confirmed - Ken Banks (kiwanja.net & FrontlineSMS) - but more are to come and judging from April it will be a great event again.

Image CC by Fumero

Today was the first day of e-STAS Symposium on Technologies for Social Action. I arrived yesterday here in Malaga and was picked up from the airport and brought to the hotel where all the speakers are staying. In the evening we started socializing and I was introduced (in the real world) to Ken Banks, Christian Kreutz, Jack Dorsey just to name a few of all the interesting people. We had kind of an informal dinner and discussed the actions and topics for day 1 of e-STAS. Today we got up quite early and a bus took us to the venue. We got our name tags and the publication where a saw our article “ICTs for the empowerment of citizens” printed on paper. Very nice.

As Adrian Mangin promised, the event is highly interactive and everybodies voice is heard. As usual, Ismael Peña-López started taking notes and publish them in real time. It was very fascinating sitting next to him and watching him “power-blogging”. Here is his outcome chonologically:

• Interview to Carlos Argüello
• Empowerment for Social Innovation
• Battle of experiences between Ken Banks and Christian Kreutz
• Round Table: Luis Millán Vázquez, Bárbara Navarro, Fernando Bothelo & Martin Konzett
• Round Table: Jorge de la Hidalga, Millán Berzosa, Jorge Pascua, Óscar Espritusanto, Pedro Cluster
• Workshop: The hurdle track from ICT to Human Development

The only missing piece was a workshop, where all the people split into groups and were trying to find a definition for the term “Empowerment”. I was apointed to be the moderator of the bunch of all English speaking guys and we brought up a lot of issues. This will be covered by a separate blog post ASAP.

I was also participating in a round table on Empowerment (see Ismaels link above and the picture) with Bárbara Navarro, Google.es, Luis Millán Vázquez, FUNDECYT and expert at UN-GAID and Fernando Bothelo, Literacy Bridge which was moderated by Idelfonso Mayorgas. Everybody was introduced and had a 2 minutes pitch before we got into medias res. I was the only one speaking English, so I had to stick to my headset with the transation. We brought up our visions and sights on empowerment and I tried to put the focus on the developing world and proposed that we have to educate the people there and let them empower themself. A second topic was cloud computing, where I brought up the lack of computing power and storage capability of mobile devices which are so much growing and cloud computing as a natural result of this. I said that there is open source software for building a cloud system and everybody is able to build it’s own cloud and sticking to e.g. Google is in the long run just a matter of cost (big clouds shoud be cheaper). Another argument we had was on the “information / knowledge / innovation society” which was put into the spotlight by Luis. I said: The problem with this is, that all the information and knowledge is mostly available in written form and in English, so all the illiterate people are not part of it, so it is matter of accessibility. But I insisted later, that this is just a matter of time and the problem should be solved sooner or later.

I will get the video of the round table tomorrow and will push it on youtube.