HASH – Page 6 – WhiteAfrican

Author: HASH (page 6 of 106)

The Deepest Watering Hole

We tend to think of success in terms of visible growth. That’s not always how it works, it’s not always what you see that matters, and it can be deceiving to think so.

“The widest watering hole isn’t always the longest lasting. The deepest is.”

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately as I deal with my own organizations (Ushahidi and the iHub), as well as the startups that I come across. What we use to measure success can actually be a deterrent to real strong growth, growth that isn’t seen immediately, but that creates a much stronger organization and a better future.

An Ushahidi Example

For instance, with Ushahidi we set metrics on “deployments” of the software. Tracking this allows us to say things like, “Ushahidi has 40,000+ deployments in 159 countries around the world”, which is a nice marketing line. At first glance, that seems to be a good number to measure, and it is, but it should only be part of the overall definition of success.

A couple weeks ago we started to revisit our metrics, the numbers we track to see how we’re doing. To understand the real value of Ushahidi’s tools, while new deployments are good to track and are part of the overall picture, we find it’s much more telling how “active” each deployment is. This means how often it’s being used, how many new reports are coming in, how many new versus returning users it has, etc. It’s good for us to know if a deployment was “active” for a short time and then not be used anymore, or if it’s long-term. No judgement is made on that, as we know that sometimes Crowdmaps or Ushahidi are setup for spot needs over a short amount of time, and for long-term needs. Most importantly it helps us understand and differentiate between deployments setup for experimentation, with no use, from those that are useful.

In short, we get a better understanding of the value of our software when we measure “activity” than when we use a broad-brush metric like “total deployments’. We’re now in the middle of adjusting these metrics.

Deeper Waters

The largest organizations aren’t always the most profitable, nor the loudest the most impactful.

FrontlineSMS is a small non-profit tech company that makes software for grassroots NGOs around the world. There are thousands of NGOs, in some of the most challenging places in the world, who are now able to use SMS messaging to better communicate internally and/or externally because they exist. They’re small though, with less than 20 people on their team and they’re not the loudest organization either, yet have had a massive impact on the world.

Lifestraw is an NGO that makes a device to clean water by sucking through a straw. They’ve got big money, loud voices and have a solution that seems ingenious and sexy at the same time. They’ve made a lot of noise, and maybe even have figured out a way to make money using carbon offsets (which I think is brilliant), but are fairly useless and don’t have much impact at all.

There are other examples, such as the size of the Wikipedia’s team and budget, and how they’re one of the most influential websites in the world. Or we could talk about how the startup Color raised a whopping $41m and fizzled.

In Kenya’s startup scene I think about how we get caught up in how much money a company has raised, but don’t discuss how much revenue they’ve brought in. We also tend to get sidetracked into thinking about how much something is written about in the papers and not looking at their user numbers or whether or not anyone outside of the Twitterati are using it. There will be discussions on how, “someone got funding, but there’s nothing to show for it”, meanwhile they’ve been building away on a backend for clients that the public doesn’t get to see.

We need to get into more discussions that are nuanced, ones that are beyond one-size-fits-call metrics and more on how we define growth and success.

Poaching, Carbon and Tech in Tsavo

January 19, 2013 / HASH / 7 Comments

I’m disconnected. Off-grid in the usually dusty and dry (though green currently) Tsavo region of Kenya with seven others from the Ushahidi team as we look into whether or not technology can be useful on the Rukinga Sanctuary.

We’re here to see if our technology, or the knowledge of what can be done with tech, is useful in carbon monitoring of deforestation, security operations with rangers and/or better engaging with the surrounding community?

David Kobia talks to Dr Mwangi Gichiru of Wildlife Works carbon project

The Wildlife Works team has an extensive for-profit program around carbon credits, carbon offsets, and small factories in an EPZ where brands like Puma get their “made in Kenya” stamp. It’s maybe the most impressive example of what could be termed a “social enterprise” that I’ve ever seen. Over 300 people have jobs due to their presence, and all in the community monetarily benefit from their activities.

The 75,000 acre sanctuary sits just south of Voi, off the Mombasa road. Rukinga was the first place in the world to be VCS (verified carbon standard) verified and REDD (Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation) certified by the UN, and has since grown to encompass the 13 other ranches and 1/2 million acres surrounding them. 60,000 people in the communities surrounding them are financial beneficiaries from the project.

Last year they sold sold 1.4 million tons of carbon credits for around $6-8 per ton. The revenue from that is split into three parts; 1/3 goes to the land owner(s), 1/3 goes to the managing company (Wildlife Works) and 1/3 goes to the community. Interestingly, unlike a lot of NGO work, the team doesn’t decide how the community should benefit. The community decides how to spend the money, through their own local committees, and it’s led to a huge amount of school bursaries (2,000 kids now in secondary and tertiary schools), water catchements and other public works.

It’s impressive.

So, what does Wildlife Works really do at Rukinga?

In short, they try to increase the amount of trees, protect the animals, while balancing that with the local community.

An elephant in Rukinga Sanctuary, Kenya

This is where the problems arise as there are encroachments for wood by charcoal burners and poachers killing the elephants. Due to the community benefiting from the ranches, there has been a decrease in the amount of charcoal burners and even the local poison-arrow elephant poachers and bushmeat hunters have reduced.

However, there’s a much bigger problem, that of commercial poachers (mostly of Somali descent) who come down from NE Kenya, with sophisticated weapons and who are experienced in tactical movement. They come in teams of 2-10, using their mobile phones for coordination, moving fast and anchoring off the Mombasa Highway. Often they have buried caches of guns and ivory on the ranch, so they don’t even carry those in or out with them, and they can blend in easily.

18 rhinos have been killed since the holidays in Kenya alone, and elephant tusks sell for around $300/kilo, so provides a massive incentive for income for anyone.

“Weâ€™ve been working in Kenya for the past 17 yearsâ€¦ We lost 10 elephants to ivory poachers in the first 15 years, and 45 in the last 18 months, and this is despite being a relatively well-funded organization with extraordinary relationships with the local community members who benefit from wildlife,â€ says Wildlife Works founder and CEO Mike Korchinsky.

The rangers have no weapons. They are highly skilled at finding and tracking the poachers, but need the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) to come if they’re going to catch someone. KWS is sometimes slow to respond, and they’re not willing to put their life on the line in order to catch or kill the poachers. When a poacher is caught, the laws are not stiff enough to disincentivize others.

Talking with the Wildlife Works security and operations team

The Tech

So, where can tech help? We don’t know yet, is the answer.

To frame the problem of biodiversity protection, if you get to the animal or tree after it’s dead, then it’s too late. What you really want is prevention. If you can’t get prevention, then you need swift and effective response.

Prevention
We’re wondering if there’s a way to get the community interacting through SMS to pass on information about illegal activities. Beyond informants, we’re thinking that there might be a useful way to connect the local community monitors and make reporting on human-wildlife conflicts more efficient.

Response
The teams of 100+ rangers are on foot a lot, carry a GPS and do have some mobile coverage. They create reports when they come in, and their goal is to be light, hardy and fast. All of them already carry cheap Nokia-type phones, so can send SMS and call, and we’re thinking that a very simple text messaging system as a hub might come in handy for coordination and archived messaging for later assessment (and possibly mapping).

Other Ideas

There is a lack of information on all types of location-based data, especially once you get off the main road. There’s an opportunity to do a community-level mapping exercise, tied to Open Street Map.
The process for getting GPS-related data from the rangers to HQ and then a map takes a couple weeks. Surely there is a way to make this more efficient.
Related to the rangers data is that they rarely see the output of the GPS data and forms that they fill out. Could we create a faster way to visualize it, and let them see their work?
It seems to me that if you were able to gather the phones and SIM cards off caught poachers, then you could start dumping their address books and pattern matching for similarities. We could also see if it is possible to streamline the process for legally getting call log data for those SIM cards from the mobile operators.

The camp we’re staying at is situated has a generator that provides backup power in the evenings for a few hours, where we get our daily recharge-dose for our gadgets. If you stand in just the right place you get one bar of connectivity on your phone and send out text messages.

It’s a shock to our digitally connected system when we find ourselves without a digital tether. It’s also a wonderful reminder of the constraints that real life problems have, where technology helps and/or hinders and why simple solutions tend to be the best.

While we’d love to just shove an Android phone in every rangers pocket, it’s probably not the answer. Instead, as my battery dies, I sit here thinking that we’ll revert to our simplest messaging solution (aka SMS) for any communications tools. It also reminds me that technology is at it’s best when it’s a small component that makes one thing work better, faster or more efficiently. If all we were to do was take one pain point out of the Wildlife Works people’s lives, then that would be enough.

(Sidenote: Limo rubs it in that his Blackberry gets messages and calls, and much to my shame he’s right, it’s better than any of the Android of iPhone devices for connection on the edge of network connectivity. Maybe there is still a place for RIMâ€¦)

A huge thanks to Taylor Martyn for coming with us and taking some great pictures (seen here)!

Community Connectedness as a Competitive Advantage

November 29, 2012 / HASH / 16 Comments

In the last couple weeks I’ve had the opportunity to be in Nigeria (Maker Faire Africa), followed by South Africa (AfricaCom). Along with Kenya, these countries represent the biggest technology countries on the continent. They are the regional tech hub cities at this point in Africa.

In both places I was struck by how different each country is, and the challenges and opportunities that arise due to the tech community’s connectedness, regulatory stance and local entrepreneurship culture.

Some Theories

South Africa has so much infrastructure, you’re immediately struck by how money isn’t an issue there. The lesson I took away from the DEMO Africa conference is that South Africans are far, far ahead of the rest of the continent in enterprise apps and services. They tend to see themselves as “not African”, and try to identify with Americans or Europeans. This comes out in their tech products, they have a more global focus and tend to fill the gaps that are needed by the many multinational corporates that call South Africa their home in Africa.

Nigeria has so many people, it overwhelms in it’s pure mass. It’s a bit cramped, louder, and more energetic than almost any other country in Africa. Nigerians have a long history in entertainment, with their Nollywood films and music spreading across the continent. It wouldn’t be surprising to find a killer entertainment consumer app coming from Nigeria, that can be exported regionally and internationally.

Kenyan tech companies tend to focus on localized consumer needs, and we have a competitive advantage in anything to do with mobile money. Even in the secondary and tertiary uses, I’m always struck by how much more advanced the Kenyan startups are with local eCommerce products and marketplaces than their other African counterparts.

Kenya is smaller than Nigeria and has less infrastructure than South Africa. Why then are there so many more startups per capita, more innovative products coming from Kenya right now?

A History of Community

Kenya’s technology scene is vibrant and there’s a certain connectedness amongst the community that isn’t found in the other two countries, yet.

I was in Ghana in 2009 for the first Maker Faire Africa. I went around visiting a lot of tech companies and individuals I had gotten to know via blogging over the years. What struck me at the time was that there wasn’t even a tech mailing list that connected the community. We’d had the Skunkworks mailing list in Kenya since 2006. My assumption had been that every country with any type of critical mass in tech had a forum of some sort for connecting tech people to each other.

20+ members in the Ghana tech community came together at Maker Faire Africa and decided to start Ghana tech mailing list. I’m still subscribed to it, and it’s a great resource for both myself and those using it. With that list, and the founding of MEST in 2008 (their tech entrepreneur training center) that Ghana’s tech scene started to get connected and move forward strongly together a couple years ago.

Fast forward to Nigeria a couple weeks ago. As far as I can tell, there are some tech-related forums, though not a mailing list. These have been valuable in connecting people, but it seems that the ccHub, founded last year, is the start of a real connectedness between members of the tech community. I got the feeling that all the energy and entrepreneurialism that makes up the Nigerian culture of business now has a tech heart and that we’ll see an acceleration of growth in the coming years that has been missing until now.

For many years, the tech bloggers of South Africa organized and centralized conversations around tech with events like 27Dinner, BarCamps and more. They have long-standing tech hubs, such as Bandwidth Barn, they have a network of angel investors and greater access to VC funding. There wasn’t a centralized mailing list or forum back in the day (before 2008) that I know of. A few years ago we saw the rise of Silicon Cape, an initiative to bring attention to Cape Town’s startup culture.

At AfricaCom an interesting discussion ensued around South Africa’s tech community and questions on why it wasn’t getting as much attention or traction as Kenya. Two points were brought up that I think are incredibly important.

First, while Silicon Cape is focused on branding (and doing a good job of it), what is really needed is someone to bring the new tech hubs, startups, angel investors, media, academia, corporations, and even the government together. There’s a lot of activity, each in it’s own silo. It’s a hard job being the trusted bridge between these different parts of what can be a very opinionated and political community. I’d suggest that Silicon Cape’s mission should be to do just this.

Second, In Kenya and Nigeria the founders of startups tend to look a lot like a cross section of the country’s population. The tech community in South Africa doesn’t look a lot like the racial makeup of the country. to put it bluntly, I rarely see a black South African tech entrepreneur. Not being from there, I’m not sure why this is, so it’s just an observation. It’s hard to build a product for a community that you’re not from, nor understand, so I can’t help but think that the South African tech scene would benefit greatly by having more people building companies to solve problems from all parts of that country’s stratified makeup.

A Connected Community

Sitting at 38,000 feet writing this piece, I keep thinking how there seems to be a link between the connectedness of a tech community in a country and it’s vibrancy as an industry. Though I realize there are other variables, this explanation helps me explain why Kenya is further ahead in some areas than other countries.

As I look to Kenya more deeply I’m struck by how important the egoless actions of individuals like Riyaz Bachani and Josiah Mugambi (Skunkworks), Dr. Bitange Ndemo (Government), Joe Mucheru (Google), and others have been in setting us on a trajectory that we all benefit from as the whole becomes greater than the sum of it’s parts.

This theory of a connected tech community doesn’t mean that the everyone always agrees or walks in lock-step with each other. There’s a healthiness in internal critique and desire to find solutions beyond the status quo of the moment. However, I do think it does provide a foundational element for cities and countries trying to grow a more meaningful and vibrant tech community.

The connectedness can come in two ways, digital and analog, and will have a different flavor in each country that mirrors it’s own culture. It helps to have a centralized digital space to throw out questions, opinions and find answers on efficiently. Equally, I think we’re seeing that analog, physical meeting spaces that are represented by the growing number of tech hubs around the continent are another way to accelerate the connectedness needed to grow.

Africa’s tech hubs are the new centralized meeting spaces, the watering holes, for connectivity and connectedness. However, it’s not enough to have a space, without local champions who are willing to make it their mission to grow, connect and bridge the tech ecosystem (gov’t, corporates, startups, academia, investors), then they won’t work.

Style and Swagger With a Renegade Trike Hacker in Nigeria

November 12, 2012 / HASH / 4 Comments

I’m a motorcycle guy, so anytime you put a motor on a chassis with something less than four wheels, then I’m interested. This week I’m at Maker Faire Africa in Lagos, Nigeria. This is the 4th installment, after Ghana 2009, Kenya 2010 and Egypt 2011.

The creation below is by a young man called “STA”, who’s got a lot of swagger and a double teardrop tattoo under his right eye. In many ways STA is a one-of-a-kind character, unlike anyone else I ran into in Lagos.

Let’s put it this way, anyone who rides such an eye-catching bike without a license plate, and who has no worries of the cops hassling him because of it, is certainly cut from a different cloth. When stopped, STA simply points to the Nigerian flag flying on the front and explains that it’s all the license he needs. (I kid you not)

STA spent about 4 years in Holland where he was inspired by custom motorcycles and trikes (tricycles). When he came back to Nigeria he decided he could build his own here. STA International’s first bike is the long-forked trike.

Due to using his own funds, it’s a little underpowered with only a 250cc engine and a 10 liter tank. STA scrounged around and found the different parts, and put it all together himself. All total, he spent 300,000 Naira ($1,600) on it.

The bike has some very comfortable seating, a nice big sound system, 4 big silencers in the rear and drink holders for both driver and passengers. He can carry two passengers in the back, and there’s room under the seats for a little storage.

The bike is kickstarted, which I wasn’t expecting at first as I’m used to bikes this big having an electrical starter. Makes sense though, as this is a small engine bought off of a used engine reseller. The trike also has a reverse gear, which comes in handy when the bike is as long as this one is, for maneuvering out of difficult spaces.

STA and I hung out a bit over the last few days. He’s got a real passion for modding bikes, and his next big plans include an even bigger trike, though he hasn’t fully fleshed out the design yet. I showed him some of the cool, retro, modded designs on Bike Exif and we talked a while about what a custom bike for African cities might actually look like.

Note: I’ve been blogging most of this on the Maker Faire Africa blog, so go there to find more posts on the stories from Lagos, Nigeria and the innovative and fun products made there.

Ghana’s Saya App Pitches at TechCrunch Disrupt

September 11, 2012 / HASH / 3 Comments

There’s a Ghana email list of tech guys that I’m on. Opening my email this morning, I was pleasantly surprised to see that a Ghanaian team was pitching last night at TechCrunch Disrupt.

Saya is an app for texting. That mixes SMS, Facebook chat and hyperlocal findability to get in conversations with those near you. They’re on Android, Blackberry and waiting for their iPhone app to be approved.

Robert’s pitch revolves around the 5.8 billion NON-smartphones in the world, and how that market has needs that need to be addressed by apps like their own. Ways to communicate via SMS in a much more elegant way.

Saya isn in a tough position, trying to get US and European-based investors to think that anything to do with old tech like SMS can be big is quite difficult. Their paradigm is set in the West’s way of thinking about being intoxicated the newest tech, not understanding how much of the world more fully uses each technology before discarding it.

Without knowing anything about how many users Saya has, I can say that it looks like an app that will really work in Africa and therefore many other parts of the world. Just looking at the app, it seems that they have a strong focus on product, and are paying attention to things like design details that really do matter.

Good job guys, and good luck!

The #Kenya365 Instagram Project

August 29, 2012 / HASH / 59 Comments

[See the pictures at Kenya365.com]

Mutua Matheka and I met up today and hatched an idea to have a little picture fun over the next 12 months. We quickly roped in Eston Whitfield and are looking for a couple more to join up. We’re going to do a picture-a-day on Instagram, and see what happens. Likely others will join in as well, so here are the guidelines:

RULE #1: You can only tag one Instagram photo with #Kenya365 each day.

That is the one and only one rule.

It starts on Sept 1, 2012 (2 days from now) and ends on Aug 31, 2013. To make it more challenging and fun we’re going to ask ourselves to find “interesting” shots each day (however you decide to define that).

Feel free to invite another Instagramer to it, especially if you think they do great stuff, or join in yourself. Just pass on rule #1 to them.

A reminder that this is for fun, and we’ll see what happens. If it’s going well we can create a site to aggregate the images with this tag on it for people to find easily.

You can find us on Instagram with the following handles:

Erik Hersman on Instagram: @White_African and on Twitter at @WhiteAfrican
Mutua Matheka on Instagram: @Truthslinger and on Twitter at @Truthslinger
Eston Whitfield on Instgram: @Eston and on Twitter at @Estoni
Jepchumba on Instagram: @Jepchumba and on Twitter at @DigitalAfrican
Wamathai on Instagram: @Wamathai and on Twitter at @Wamathai
Joseph Were on Instgram: @jaydabliu and on Twitter @jaydabliu
Taylor Martyn on Instagram: @Zulusafari and on Twitter at @zulusafari
Elvis Mutai on Instagram: @mutaielvis
Eve on Instagram: @eveheartsphotog and Twitter at @eveheartsphotog
Wachera on Instagram: @Wacherah and on Twitter at @Wacherah
Musa on Instagram: @moahandpainted and on Twitter at @mole_a
Maggianna Wanjohi on Instagram: @Maggianna and on Twitter at @Maggianna
Steve Kitots on Instagram: @SteveKitots and on Twitter at @SteveKitots
Lema on Instagram: @lemajisa and on Twitter at @jisaslema
William on Instagram: @nguru and on twitter @lilwaim
Wairimu Mwaura on Instagram: @missmwaura and on Twitter at @missmwaura
Ratia on instagram: @ratia_tee and on Twitter at @ratia_tee
Aika on Instagram: @aikawangwe and on on Twitter at @aikawangwe
Pendo la Mama on Instagram: @pendolamama and on Twitter at @pendolamama
Njeri Thande on Instagram: @njerithande and on Twitter @njerithande
Wambui on Instagram: @wambeauty
Shitawa Bah on Instagram: @eatoutkenya and on Twitter @eatoutkenya
Wiselar on Instagram: @wiselar and on Twitter at @wiselar
The Afrohemien Nomad on Instgram: @LAfrohemien and on Twitter at @LAfrohemien
Angela Oduor on Instagram: @angelaoduor and on Twitter @AngieNicoleOD
Leo Patra on Instgram: @c_Leo_patra and on Twitter at @c_Leo_patra
Angela Crandall on Instagram: @honoluluskye and on Twitter at @honoluluskye
Flora Okuku on Instgram: @maflosah and on Twitter at @maflosah
Mark Mwangi on Instagram: @Mwangyzzle and on Twitter @mwangy
eGichomo on Instagram: @eGichomo and on Twitter at @eGichomo
Riyaz Osman on Instagram: @ri_yaz and on Twitter at @ri_yaz

If you’re going to take part, leave a comment below with a link to your Twitter handle and your Instagram account and I’ll add you into the list.

Kenya’s Slippery Censorship Slope

August 22, 2012 / HASH / 43 Comments

“I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” – Voltaire

Robert Alai is blogging scum. Make no mistake. The quality of a person is not found in what they say, but in what they do, and Alai has proven time and time again that he is a bad actor.

If you know Robert Alai’s history in the tech scene in Kenya, then you know why he has been banned from the iHub. There’s a reason why the Skunkworks community ejected him multiple times over many years. There’s a reason why Nokia banned him. There’s a reason why Google blacklisted him. He consistently libels individuals for personal gain, to draw traffic and monetize his sites. For him it’s about attention, any way that he can get it.

Yesterday, the newswire said that Robert Alai was wanted. Today’s news is that he has been arrested for tweeting about the Kenyan government’s official spokesman Alfred Mutua. (fuller backstory here)

A lot of Kenyan’s on Twitter are laughing at Alai’s current predicament, after all, it is fun to see someone of his particular uncouth makeup get their comeuppance. The problem is in how and why this is being done. While you laugh today at Alai, tomorrow they will come for you.

However…

This isn’t about Alai, he just happens to be playing the role of a jester, distracting us from the much greater story that is online and media censorship in Kenya. There were many of us who warned against the real danger in 2008 and 2009, this Kenyan Information and Communications Act that allowed for censorship based on fuzzy details and definitions, and how it could all be done at the behest of one man, with little oversight. While everyone wants to laugh and point fingers at Robert Alai, they won’t be laughing when this censorship gets applied to him.

This all stems from the Kenya Informations and Communications Act (PDF Version), which was amended after the post-election violence in 2009 in an effort to curb hate speech. It is a controversial amendment of the Kenya Communications Act, 1998 because it gives the state power to raid media houses and control the distribution of content.

Of course, the media houses only cared because of the fear of it applying to them. However, they’re already mostly muzzled due to in-house nepotism, links with political parties, and more importantly don’t want to upset the hand that feeds them: the millions that they get from corporations, the government and political parties who advertise with them.

It is for this very reason that bloggers are so important, why Twitter and Facebook matter. It’s through these channels that people can speak truth to power.

“SMS, blogs and websites were an essential source of information, opinions and images. Innovative ways of capturing news and events as they unfolded â€“ for instance, by using mobile phone cameras and uploading images onto the internet â€“ increased access to information during those critical months. The downside of this increased access to information, however, was the use of the same media to spread messages of ethnic hatred, intimidation and calls to violence.”

There in lies the issue, that the medium used for so much innovation, democratization of information, and empowering of ordinary people can also be used for misinformation.

Let’s look at the details

I am not a legal expert, so I am quite interested in hearing from someone who understands and knows the real definitions of the terms here.

â€œWe summoned him on Thursday and we hope to see him probably and latest Tuesday (today). He has violated sections 26, 29 and 30 of the Act and we feel he should come and tell us more,â€ said Kamwende.

So, let’s take a look at this.

Section 26
Deleted, it doesn’t even exist in the law…

Section 29

29. A person who by means of a licensed telecommunication
systemâ€”
(a) sends a message or other matter that is grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character; or
(b) sends a message that he knows to be false for the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety to another person commits an offence and shall be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding fifty thousand shillings, or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months, or to both.

Section 30

30. A person engaged in the running of a licensed telecommunication system who, otherwise than in the course of his duty, intentionally modifies or interferes with the contents of a message sent by means of that system, commits an offence and shall be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding three hundred thousand shillings, or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years, or to both.

Now, Section 26 doesn’t exist and Section 30 seems a stretch, because as far as I know Robert Alai doesn’t run, own or license any telcoms system. Instead, let’s focus on Section 29, which seems to be more relevant.

Alai is likely being held for Section 29(b). He’s well known for libel and defamation, and someone is finally penalizing him to the full extent of the law. People need to be held to account for what they say, freedom of speech comes with responsibility. This fine line is where and why the law actually matters. It’s about what the law is, who defines it and how it is followed through on.

The real issue 4 years ago, and why this act was opposed by many, is that the act contained controversial provisions that sought to allow security agencies to seize property without due process, arrest and indefinitely detain suspects.

What the question should be for all of us with Robert Alai, is whether that is being tested on him. Was/is there due process? Who decides which media company gets raided? Who gets to say which blogger gets arrested, or which person on Twitter said the wrong thing?

Quick Hits Around African Tech: July 2012

August 2, 2012 / HASH / 2 Comments

Africa’s Mobile Stats and Facts 2012

Few organizations do as good of a job as Praekelt in creating well-designed applications that are used by millions of people in the continent. A couple times a year, they take that same level of quality and create new videos and resources to better showcase Africa’s tech statistics. Here’s their newest video.

Game Creators: an Interview of Maliyo Games in Nigeria

Good interview of Maliyo Games founder and the opportunity in Africa’s gaming space.

Why do you think the African audience is looking for African games instead of Farmville or Mafia Wars?

â€œItâ€™s not so much what they are looking for, more what is being pushed to them. Our games â€˜Okada Rideâ€™, â€˜Mosquito Smasherâ€™ and â€˜Adanmaâ€™ have far more local relevance than Mafia Wars. Nigerian music and Nollywood movies have a strong appeal to the local and diasporan consumers. We are riding this trend and thus far we are seeing traction.â€

Check out Maliyo’s website to get their games.

Opera’s “State of the Mobile Web” for Africa 2012

Opera puts together a great resource of user-based statistics [PDF link]. It’s a country-by-country breakdown of mobile penetration, user growth, top domains and top handsets used. Here are a few of the interesting tidbits:

Across Africa, data growth seems to outpace page-view growth. This fact suggests that Africans are browsing larger pages and most likely, using richer, more advanced websites.
Facebook is the top domain in every country except for these six, where Google leads: Egypt, Guinea, Djibouti, Comoros, Central African Republic, and Algeria.

Mobile Reporting Field Guide

UC Berkeley has created a mobile reporting field guide, useful for people doing data collection and research as well as activist types.

Upcoming Tech Events in 2012

PyCon South Africa – Cape Town, Oct 4-5
DEMO Africa – Nairobi, Oct 24-26
Tech4Africa – Joburg, Oct 31-Nov 1
AfricaCom – Cape Town, Nov 13-15
Mobile Web Africa – Joburg, Nov 28-29

(If you know of other tech events coming up before the end of the year that you think belong here, put it in the comments and I’ll add it later.)

Some Self-Serving Links:

My BBC article on Africa’s tech hub growth
Ushahidi v2.5 “Cairo” launched yesterday, really big upgrades and fixes here.
We’ve open sourced the SwiftRiver code base, thanks to @69mb, @bytebandit and @brosage for the hard work.
I’m excited that we’re having a Fireside Chat with Isis Nyong’o, MD Africa of InMobi, at the iHub on Aug 16.
Keep an eye on the iHub Blog as it’s really coming alive with new stories from around the Kenyan tech community.

Growing AfriLabs: 14 Labs, a Director, Research and Support

July 19, 2012 / HASH / 1 Comment

AfriLabs is a network of the tech hubs and labs across Africa. The labs serve as an accessible platform for bringing together technologists, investors, tech companies and hackers in their city. Each lab shares a focus on entrepreneurs, Web and mobile-phone programmers and designers.

Bill has put together an excellent blog post on how we’re growing the AfriLabs network. We’ve moved from the original 5 to 14 labs and hubs across the continent.

iHub – Kenya
Hive Colab – Uganda
ActivSpaces – Cameroon
BantaLabs – Senegal
NaiLab – Kenya
MEST – Ghana
iceAddis – Ethiopia
Co-Creation Hub – Nigeria
iLab – Liberia
RLabs – South Africa
BongoHive – Zambia
Malagasy i-Hub – Madagascar
m:Lab East Africa – Kenya
Wennovation Hub – Nigeria

Applications are open, and we hope to induct more African tech hubs into the AfriLabs Association in the coming months. I hope to see Kinu (Tanzania), OutBox (Uganda) and Jumpstart (Zimbabwe) apply.

An AfriLabs Director

We’re looking for AfriLabs first director, someone who understands the tech hub models and is able to help build the network, connections to it from media and investors and be a general connector for everyone. It’s a challenging position that requires someone who is good at community building, and can speak well with international corporates, foundations and media.

The AfriLabs Director can come from any country in Africa, and the HQ for AfriLabs is wherever the AfriLabs Director resides.

Funding for this position has been provided by our partners at Hivos. We’re seeking further funding and partners as the AfriLabs network grows, so if your company or foundation is interested in working with (or promoting) technology spaces across Africa, do get in touch.

Research on Africa’s Tech Hubs

Since we started the AfriLabs network, tech communities in many countries in Africa have started their own spaces. These range in model and makeup, from incubation and training spaces like MEST Ghana to co-working environments such as ActivSpaces in Cameroon, and community spaces like the Co-Creation Hub in Nigeria. Governments have gotten involved with places like the Botswana Innovation Hub here in Gaberone, and some academic institutions are jumping in as well like we see with the Strathmore iLab in Nairobi.

The iHub Research team has started doing case studies on the labs, and have started a research paper on the Impact of ICT Hubs (PDF) (this first one on the iHub). They’ll need further funding in order to take this to some of the other tech hubs across Africa.

This is estimated to be a 3-year-long study on 15 selected ICT Hubs across Africa. The main objectives of the study are to:

Short-term objectives:

Investigate what factors make up the ICT Hubs model;
Understand the entrepreneurs/start-ups and the value of the ICT Hubs to their business ideas through a representative sample size representing the different membership tiers;
Assess the impact of the Hub to an individual member based on the different memberships categories;
Survey the factors that make the members to continue to use the space.

Long-term objective:

Compare the different Hubs/Labs and the unique factors in each that make it to work;
Study the Impact of the ICT Hubs on the economyâ€™s development that is adoption of new technologies and innovations of employment leading to improvement in the living standards.

Supporting Organizations

Initial funding to get AfriLabs off the ground was through Hivos, who also supported the iHub back in 2009 before anyone believed that a tech hub in Africa could really work. They continue to support the ecosystem through funding the AfriLabs Director position (mentioned above).

One of the organizations that has really stepped forward to help give seed funding to the new tech hubs is Indigo Trust. They recently convened a meeting in London where they flew in a number of the managers from these facilities to meet and talk about what would be needed. This was the same type of discussion that was had in Nairobi with another group of tech hub leaders at the Open Innovation Africa Summit.

Google, Omidyar Network and infoDev have also been strong supporters (monetarily as well as other resources), with multiple hubs and labs. We seem to have reached the point where there is enough critical mass in the number of tech spaces, and enough support for them from corporates and foundations.

AfriLabs serves as a great vector for all of this to come together, applying resources to help liase and coordinate the communications and events between the tech hubs, and at the same time providing that larger target for media, investors, corporate and funding partners to find the initiatives in each country.

Where Africa and Technology Collide!