Tag: global

Africa: problem or opportunity?

In his article “Why does being in Africa make you untrustworthy?“, Erik Hersman points out to the fact that Africans are generally suspects by default to the eyes of global corporations, which often put the continent off their radar.

Africa could be a continent of contrasts, but with lots of potentiality too. If only the world stopped making easy generalizations and looked closer to realize that.

One of the key factors for any business is to assess and be real about the context and the market in which operates. Thus, more accurate solutions can be provided to address specific needs, what improves the chance of success. If the context is problematic, that means there are needs to be fulfilled, and therefore that could be seen as an opportunity.

Tech4Africa_Ushahidi_Conference_Technology_AfricaAn example of this could be Hersman’s own enterprise, Ushahidi, a website that was initially developed to map reports of violence in Kenya after the post-election fallout at the beginning of 2008, and which now it has become a platform with global reach.

Ushahidi is a world-class technology service, but owes its roots to providing a solution to the very African need of transparency, which turns out to be a global issue.
The organization’s technology is open source, and it is often used by Internet writer Clay Shirky as an example of a successful crowdsourcing movement.

Other entrepreneurs and businesses are also working to provide services tied up to specific regional socio-cultural and economic facts, as were seen at Tech4Africa 2010. Services like PesaPal (a mobile payments company in Nairobi, Kenya) or mPedigree (allows consumers to verify with a free text message if their medicines are safe), are proving to be on the right track when addressing local needs via the most used and available technology in their target markets.

Many other startup services in Africa are choosing to use SMS as their trading platform, among other things, due to the scarce Internet connectivity and the broader use of the cell phone in many areas of the continent. And companies are focusing on that too, such is the case of Zain Nigeria, which is offering its customers access to Facebook, Twitter, Yahoo via SMS.

Nevertheless, whether focused on local, regional or global needs, African technology startups and companies must build their products based on the highest standards, and for that it’s important to keep in touch with the world’s latest developments and practices, if the continent wants to get into the world’s radar and export its innovative products or play globally.

All in all, one of the ways to bootstrap Africa to the spotlight might be what the aforementioned African organizations are already doing; which is, as Erik Hersman put it in his article: “to come up with our own business solutions that work here first, and then interact with other global systems.”

Do you agree this could be a solution? Should Africans see the problems or the opportunities?

Photo courtesy of @whiteafrican via Flickr/Creative Commons

Tech4Africa: The PanAfrican Perspective

“Until lions have their own historians, tales of the hunt will always glorify the hunter.” ~ African Proverb

That proverb has been used to sum up the continent’s state (or fate) for a long time. And what’s become more apparent is that in some cases, you need to point out which Africa you are referring to, South Africa or the rest of Africa. Given that we’re now seeing the kind of innovative web & technology startups coming from Nigeria and Kenya, the Tech4Africa conference put a lot into perspective.

South Africa has always been one of the main doors into the continent. A leading economy no doubt with a vibrant entrepreneurial space with the likes of Naspers showing how powerful an emerging market this is. However, even as the crown jewel of the continent, with we’re beginning to see a balance play out with the South, East & West shifting as each develops not on a linear path, one after the other, but each on its own tangent, converging and diverging with time.

Take Kenya for instance, who recently trumped South Africa in broadband thanks to services like Wananchi Online & Cisco’s Zuku which brings fiber-to-the-home and an uncapped service of 1 MBps as well as 100 television channels. Crisis mapping and visualisation platform Ushahidi was the centre of attention at Tech4Africa, from cofounder Erik Hersman sharing their missteps, challenges and shortfalls in “failing spectacularly.” Even to mentions from Clay Shirky at Tech4Africa and his most recent TED Talk where he shares how it began, and how it fits in with his thoughts on collaboration and cognitive surplus. Or in West Africa, where Bright Simons and mPedigree are changing the pharmaceutical landscape by allowing consumers to verify via SMS the authenticity and safety of their medicines.

Leila Janah, keynote speaker at T4A, spoke about her non-profit Samasource, who’ve created a network of 800 women, youth and refugees across the world in developing countries and empowering them with digital work and resources to make better livelihoods. Her keynote showed the scale, reach and impact of Samasource’s efforts as well as their plans and challenges. It’s certainly clear that East and West Africa are learning from South Africa and now more than ever, the continent’s developing three pillars to build on.

Any pan African approach will present very unique challenges in comparison with what works in South Africa and Tech4Africa’s ability to share between tried and tested practice in the Southern part of Africa, with input from The East and West and an international perspective is what differentiated it for me.

Whether it was debating approaches for the mobile marketing arena shared or the insightful tips and tricks behind the proposed redesign of Payfine.co.za or Andy Budd’s entire session at that. The value in creating simple, relevant user experiences may inadvertently not be at the top of many priority lists across the continent but from what the principles behind it are, what they unlock can be the difference between success and failure. We can expect that with time, these user experience and interaction principles will adapt and be tailored to fit the African context in new ways.

The inspiration and vision to shift perceptions about Africa and those in Africans about the possibilities for great things when it comes to technology are what struck me about Gareth and his remarkable team. Gareth Knight, the man who returned to South Africa bearing the Tech4Africa vision has been the one brave enough to take the first step. And if one African proverb proves true then as Gareth leads this generation to plant the seeds, we’ll wait to how the next generation of Africans use the shade.

It was certainly an honour to witness this beginning.

Mark Kaigwa
http://ukwelii.wordpress.com
@mkaigwa

When Developers Get Antsy

News from the conference room: this is a series of blog posts in which blogging experts briefly review key Tech4Africa 2010 talks and panels from Day 1 and 2.

Day 1

It’s not often in SA that you get to hear a group of developers chew the fat. Well, you get it all the time. But not these developers. Tech4Africa 2010 offered an “Intimate Q&A” panel with Andy Budd (Clear Left), Dustin Diaz (Twitter, previously Google/Gmail), Joe Stump (SimplyGeo, previously Digg), John Resig (Mozilla Foundation (jQuery), Jonathan Snook (Yahoo!). These are guys that are at the coalface of the biggest, most successful Web development projects in the world.

It was a lively, and very funny discussion. First up were some general words of wisdom from Joe Stump, developer extraordinaire (see separate post on his presentation on scaling Web environments to global audience). He’s from the Valley… and he says his greatest asset there is his network. Many great developers, many great companies, many great brains, all sharing information and supporting others. Being commercial competitors doesn’t mean technology people shouldn’t help each other. Developers in Africa should build their networks, build their connections, and don’t be shy to ask for help and to share. Right. Enough serious stuff.

Some great quotable quotes:

* Can we ban the use of the word “Cloud”? Can we maybe use the word “Internet”?

* Question: Are frameworks stopping people investigating the depths of jscript? Answer: No-one wants to investigate the depths of jscript.

* Question: Will Flash be killed by HTML5?
Answer 1: Flash is the Cobol of the Internet.
Answer 2: It won’t go away for a long time, particularly for video.

* There are so many security holes in Flash, and people are driving buses through them.

* We’re getting clients saying, “Can you HTML5 our site?” and I think, “What the hell are you talking about?”

* The website is not the service, its just a gateway to the service.

* In the future, the browser is going to have more direct access to the hardware. The browser will become the OS, with more power and features.
(Ed’s note: What happens when the browser is so powerful and hardware-connected it will replace the OS. Will we then need a small, lightweight browser in the big fat OS-browser?)

* To go global you have to work on a baseline User Interface – don’t just develop for latest browsers, computers and phones.

Roger Hislop
www.sentientbeing.co.za
@d0dja

Last but not least…

A few last things about the conference, before things become totally manic.

We’ve got around 65 speakers over 2 days. I’m really excited about the depth of knowledge and experience that folks like Andy Budd (Clearleft), Alex Hunter, Erin Caton (Apple), Joe Stump (SimpleGeo), Jonathan Snook (Yahoo!) and Dustin Diaz (Twitter), will bring to Tech4Africa. These guys are really amazing at what they do, and are also awesome people, so anyone at the conference is in for a treat. Take 5 minutes to checkout the full line-up if you haven’t done so.

I think you’ll agree it’s a great line-up, which represents a good mix of business and technical people, and offers great content to delegates. More than anything, this is a first in Africa, and it’s largely down to your willingness to be a part of it. For that, I thank you. I hope you can spend the two days of the conference learning, absorbing, and enjoying. There is a team of 19 full time people working on Tech4Africa, to make it the event we’d all want to go to.

We’re now working pretty much 24/7 to make this event something that we would aspire to attend.
I’m not saying that lightly. Like you, I’ve been to my fair share of conferences, and in general I find most of them bland and uninteresting, with too many exhibitors.
So, I’ve tried really hard to make this one the conference that I would want to go to. My litmus test is: would I spend my hard earned cash and go to Tech4Africa? Would my friends do the same? I’m happy to say that right now the answer is yes, and I hope that once you’re there and you’ve experienced it for yourselves, the hard work and attention to detail will be apparent, and you’ll feel the same way. Ultimately though, all we can do is provide the right environment for the speakers to shine.

The focus is on interaction, discussion, engagement, debate and learning. The focus is on you.
Unlike a lot of conferences where you go listen to someone stand behind a lectern and run through powerpoint slides, essentially giving a lecture, we’re creating an environment where everyone will either be standing, or sitting on a couch with a bunch of other people. Our focus is 100% around delegate value, and this comes through real discussion and if needs be real arguments. It also comes through the audience feeling like they’re there being engaged with, and not lectured in a one-way environment.

As a quick reminder, online registration and payment for conference tickets closes at 1pm on Tues 10th August. If you would like to register after that, then please do so on site. Registration will be open at the venue from 1pm on the 11th of August (badge collection and/or registration). Please note that we will not accept cash, and that when the venue is full, we’ll have to turn people away. For conference registrations go here.

There is a conference “after party”, which will be on Friday night (August 13th), so please book that in your calendars, get the babysitters in, bring your significant other, and join us for some fun! RSVP on the event’s Facebook page.

And lastly, expect the “unconference”: don’t wear ties, don’t wear suits, bring your sense of humour, and enjoy yourself!

It’s going to be an awesome event, and I can’t wait to see you there 😉

Regards,
Gareth Knight

Tech4Africa organizer
MD, Technovated

7 reasons why you should attend Tech4Africa

Whether you’re an African business person wanting to understand how the Web 2.0 is relevant to the enterprise, an entrepreneur interested in learning more about venture funding or a technologist wanting to learn from the best technical people around, here is how you can benefit from attending Tech4Africa on August 12 and 13, 2010:

#1 – Get global perspective for the African context

Tech4Africa is the first Web, mobile and emerging technology conference of it’s kind in Africa. It will bring together internationally respected speakers and practitioners who are building the Web and technology as we know it, with leading Africans who are themselves paving the way forward.
Speakers will delve into topics like emerging technologies; Web 2.0; mobile, wireless and cloud computing; entrepreneurship; search and marketing.

#2 – Listen to keynote speakers Clay Shirky and Leila Chirayath Janah

Clay Shirky is an experienced speaker on topics related to the Web, social media and the Internet. Shirky has spoken at events such as TED Global, SXSW, the Web 2.0 expo in New York and San Francisco, SES San Jose, the Adobe Learning Summit, New York Tech Meetup and the Aspen Ideas Festival.

Leila Chirayath Janah is the founder and CEO of Samasource, a social business that connects over 800 women, youth, and refugees living in poverty to digital work. Ms. Janah is a frequent speaker on entrepreneurship, technology, and international development at institutions including MIT, Stanford, and Harvard. Her work has been profiled by CBC, CNN, The New York Times, and The New Scientist, and in 2010, she was named one of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Women in Technology.

#3 – Listen to globally respected subject matter experts

Top international technologists at the conference will be, among others, Dustin Diaz, a user interface engineer at Twitter and author of JavaScript Design Patterns; Joe Stump, the former lead architect of social news Web site Digg and co-founder of SimpleGeo; John Resig, creator of the popular Javascript library jQuery, and a Javascript tool developer for Mozilla; and Jonathan Snook, a web designer and developer at Yahoo!.

#4 – Listen to African speakers that are leading the way

African technologists such as Steve Vosloo, the 21st century learning fellow for the Shuttleworth Foundation; Barbara Mallinson, founder of educational collaboration platform Obami; Agosta Liko, founder of mobile payment service PesaPal; Erik Hersman, the co-founder of open source crisis information site Ushahidi; Andy Hadfield, an expert in the design of web strategies and online communities; and Nii Simmonds, speaker, consultant, and sustainable evangelist on African entrepreneurship, sustainable technology, and African innovation.

These are just a few of the outstanding African speakers who are going to be present at the conference. Check out our website to see all of them.

#5 – Go to workshops where you can dive into detail with industry leaders

Learn from the best at our workshops on August 10 and 11, 2010. Sessions include “A masterclass in Usability and Accessibility”; “A deep dive into Google Analytics and Adwords”; “A Masterclass in Architecting applications and Advanced Javascript” and “Successful digital projects”.

#6 – Technology networking on steroids

Learn, discuss and share experiences and thoughts with the African technology community during the conference and at the cocktail party. Tech4Africa will be a great place to broaden your knowledge and business network. Checkout the companies that have already bought tickets for the conference.

#7 – Be inspired

Our simple goal is that delegates walk away both informed and inspired. Placing greatest emphasis on learning, interaction, engagement and discussion, we want the conference to be a place for new ideas and to encourage people to make and change things.

Global experts to share knowledge at Tech4Africa workshops

Some of the world’s leading minds in the fields of technology architecture, user-interface and product development will be sharing their experience and skills in four full-day workshops ahead of the Tech4Africa conference, on the 10th and 11th of August.

The professionals in charge of the workshops have extensive experience of working on products or systems that enable them to compete globally. These intensive workshops therefore aim to impart practical skills that the delegates can apply in their own products and projects.

* Andy Budd, will be presenting ‘A masterclass in Usability and Accessibility’ to help delegates understand the requirements in planning, organising and moderating usability tests. As MD and User Experience Director of UK-based ClearLeft web design agency, Andy is a regular speaker at international design events such as SXSW, has helped judge several international design awards, is on the advisory board for .Net magazine, and is the author of the best selling book, CSS Mastery.

* Jonathan Snook and John Resig, will be leading the workshop on architecting applications for the web. The former is a widely-recognised expert in his field, He is currently working at Yahoo! as a front-end engineer on the company’s web interface. The latter is a JavaScript Tool Developer for the Mozilla and the creator and lead developer of the jQuery JavaScript library.
They will be sharing their knowledge on best practices for developing applications and how to do so while letting developers work faster and with greater agility without sacrificing robustness or security.

* Erin Caton, a Senior Engineering Project Manager at Apple, will be presenting a strategic look at the digital project implementation lifecycle. The focus will be on acquiring project management skills and methodologies, effective use of different software and platforms and client and development team communications and management.

* Sarah Blake, head of optimisation at Quirk eMarketing, a local Internet marketing consultancy, will be dissecting the proper and effective use of Google Analytics and how to gain maximum benefit from this service.

Delegates can expect to gain essential knowledge that they can apply in their own environment, and that the workshops are designed not only for developers, but also for business users who wish to improve their knowledge.

Registration for each workshop is now open. Be quick! Don’t miss the discounted tickets for early birds, or get R500 off if you buy a conference and workshop ticket together.

Cloud Computing in Africa

A few years ago large companies were faced with the dilemma of having to upgrade servers and mainframes and ensure their online businesses didn’t collapse as demand rose. This would often lead to increased expenditure, and downtime to existing platforms. Today, as the web grows, online businesses are starting to  worry less and less about this with the concept of “Cloud Computing”.

The concept of “Cloud Computing” is a relatively new one in African terms, and at Tech4Africa, we will share our insights with a couple of experts who will be taking a look at how you can ensure that your business and online presence is “always on” and available.

First up, ex Digg Lead architect, Joe Stump, will take show us that scaling in any online business is crucial to it’s success, in his talk titled “Every Cloud has a Silver lining. Scaling to infinity and beyond”.
Joe, who now holds the title of CTO at SimpleGeo, a web based GIS data provider, will take us through the process of scaling your servers to ensure minimal downtime, and ensuring your business has robust & scalable infrastructure in place.

Also taking a look at cloud computing from an African perspective is Fred Baumhardt from Microsoft South Africa. His talk, “A contrarian view to cloud computing and virtualisation”, takes a reality check and looks at the issues of the African relevance of the virtualisation and cloud computing phenomenon currently sweeping the world. He will offer advice on how businesses can take advantage of these relatively new solutions.

South African tech journalist and host of the popular ZA Tech Show podcast, Simon Dingle, will also chair a panel of local & international experts on the topic, in a panel discussion called “Is Cloud Computing Relevant?”. The panel will discuss how “The Cloud” is relevant to businesses as well as the average consumer in Africa. The discussion will also focus on what mistakes to avoid when taking the plunge into “Cloud Computing”

If your company needs to start implementing these solutions,be sure to register for Tech4Africa now. Places are running out, so be sure to register soon.