ICT4D; Lessons Learned

In today’s world, ever globalizing use  information communication technologies is shaping development across sectors and countries. While many aspects of ICT4D will remain salient, I believe the application of crowd sourcing technologies is what we will see shape the future of international relations, development, and economies. Since the beginning of industrialization, nations have shared and stolen technologies from others. With the practically unlimited access to shared knowledge and ideas we have today, expanding and acting upon the base of shared information seems to be the most inevitable approach to future growth. In class we participated in crowd sourced mapping, in disasters we see the applications of crowd sourcing in emergency aid and relief, and in other sectors of economic development we see crowd sourcing that ranges from knowledge acquisition, market analysis, and social engagements. We see success where multiple minds work towards a collective effort, and this is the practice that has impacted me the most about ICT4D.

For my personal gain and professional development, I believe this class has helped me the most by demonstrating my own ability to learn new technologies and utilize them in a real way, whether it be JOSM, WordPress, or Twitter. I know my generation is supposed to be at the head of the tech game, but I am an anomaly to this rule. However, learning, and gaining proficiency in these areas has showed me my own ability to move forward in the professional world without fear of technological barriers, I at least knows its worth a shot. On the note of crowd sourcing, I do believe I will continue to seek opportunities to utilize crowd sourced information in my future careers and projects, hopefully gain a more complete perspective of the task at hand.

While I appreciate many of the frameworks we have discussed in class I find the capabilities approach to be the most useful. I have always been a member of the “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” school of thought. I believe the capabilities approach builds on this idea. When bringing in different aspect of ICT to a region, bringing in tools that are most applicable to the skills of the people and the infrastructure of the nation seem to be they will be the most sustainable. Just like we can teach a man to fish, we can teach a man to use technology, but doing so in a way that draws on inherent or existing capabilities will allow the technology to dig the deepest roots.

 

Crowdsourcing Law Enforcement

I realize there are have been several posts this week regarding the Boston Marathon tragedy, but I am going to add another to the mix. ICT’s and social media use in emergency situations is still a relatively new phenomenon and it merits some analysis.

The rapid pace of the events in the last 24 hours is astounding. Just to recap: Police release photos of bombing suspects (5pm), FBI began receiving possible suspect names (7pm), violence in Watertown (1am).

An article by Time: Swampland, “FBI Releases Photos of Suspects: Let the Crowdsourcing Begin” describes “what might be the most intense act of crowdsourcing in history”. Within moments of releasing the suspect photos, Time says, the FBI received suggestions from Reddit users. This act of ‘crowdsourcing’-utilizing a large group of people to incrementally complete tasks- is a new trend in the online realm. It allows for unprecedented participation in emergency management, disasters, and other areas of ICT4D.

“Internet amateurs were rushing to collect images and data about the attack, with the goal of harnessing their vast numbers to help police zero in on the culprit…Hundreds of commenters weighed in on the possible origins of the pressure-cooker bombs used in the attacks; some scoured eBay for recent purchases of the devices.More analyzed crime-scene photos of possible bomb components.”

However, the article points out that “what some people derisively call Internet vigilantism can also have a dark side.” Users eager for something- justice, answers, safety-rushed to false conclusions. ”The photos released by the FBI today do not seem to match the individuals who drew the most interest on Reddit”

Recent crowdsourcing projects have had positive effects in emergency situations, but what about crowdsourced law enforcement? Are we inviting too many contributors, too many voices into the debate? Most users are untrained in forensics and surveillance. Could recruiting amateurs have negative consequences for the law enforcement efforts? Are civilians better off feeling useful and valued in an emergency situation, or is this publicity escalating the violence and fear? I think this event will serve as a precedent for future crowdsourcing, and will bring up important questions of  citizen participation in law enforcement.
Read more: http://swampland.time.com/2013/04/18/fbi-releases-photos-of-suspects-let-the-crowdsourcing-begin/#ixzz2QvRjxdJg

Mapping Violence with Plan Benin

In addition to producing the ICT4D project guide, Plan also is running a number of it’s own projects to promote child rights through participation and media in Africa. One interesting example of this is Plan’s program to increase the reporting of child abuse in Benin. In Benin, reporting violence generally goes against the cultural norm and many feel that they either don’t have access to communication with authorities or that the authorities won’t act on the information. To address this issue, plan has partnered with Ushahidi to produce crowdsourced maps on incidences  of violence.

The system allows victims or witnesses to send text messages to a special number through an application called Frontline SMS to report the abuse. The website is carefully monitored and all reported cases are verified. Children can also email their stories or send audio or video testimonials. This allows the project to gain a deeper more personal understanding of the accounts. Once the stories have been verified, they appear on an Ushahidi map. This both allows locals to be aware of incidents of violence and alerts the authorities. Plan can also try to match children and their families to the appropriate support service.

While mapping cases of violence is a valuable tool for raising awareness and changing the culture against silence, privacy is still a top concern. Linda Raftree, one of the project coordinators, describes the challenge in the Plan report as such, “‘“Can we capture all the information that comes in, yet scrub it before publication on Ushahidi so that it doesn’t identify the victim or alleged perpetrators, yet keep it in a file for the local authorities to follow up and respond? And a second challenge: If everyone knows everything that happens in the community,how can we ensure privacy and confidentiality for those who report?”’ These are all quite important to consider since the backlash from perpetrators can be severe. However, I think that crowdsourced mapping is a great wait to begin to expose acts of violence without revealing too much about the victim.

As with most ICT4D projects, this technology presents a number of other challenges and limitations that have to do with the digital divide. Of course, if a person doesn’t have access to a cell phone or computer, than this technology is useless. There are also issues with illiteracy. Many people who are illiterate would prefer to call instead of text or email but the system is not set up for this. This would require phone operators and make the system more like a hotline. Also, sending text messages is not free so some people don’t have enough phone credit to text in a report. PlanBenin says that they are working with the government to try to set up a charge free number.

Because of all of these problems, this project is not the ultimate solution to child abuse. However, it is beginning a discussion and working to change a culture of silence and abuse. I’m not sure how effective this technology will be right now for bringing individuals to justice but it does work at the root of the problem so I think it definitely has merit and is worth expanding.

Que No Te Roben

Crowdsourcing can be very useful in disaster response, as we have learned from our OpenStreetMap project. It provides humanitarian actors such as the Red Cross to obtain accurate information on affected areas in times of need, when traditional mapping is insufficient. However, crowdsourced maps have other uses as well. In Lima, Peru, a site entitled Que No Te Roben maps the location and manner of crimes throughout the city. It pinpoints successful robberies, escaped robberies, crime warnings, and car robberies. The map also has the locations of police offices where crimes can be reported.  This map can serve as a fast and simple avenue for communication between citizens and the city police. By looking at the pins, citizens know where is safe, as well as where to report crimes. Police can also benefit from the map by identifying problem areas with high robbery rates.

The makers of this website not only use crowdsourced mapping to educate on crime in Lima, but also social media. They also run a youtube channel, a Facebook page, and a twitter account that all disseminate information on how to avoid becoming a victim of crime. The Facebook page has garnered about 3200 likes since it joined in March of 2010, and its Twitter has about 1500 followers since the same date. Considering that the population of Lima comes in at about 7 million people, the initiative has a long ways to go before these social media initiatives truly benefit the city as a whole. This initiative demonstrates another angle in which crowdsourced material and social media can be used to spread useful information to members of society, but also shows the challenges of becoming well known enough to effectively get the message out.

Pros and Cons of Mapping

In this article by “Web 2 for Dev”, the author discusses pros and cons of the kind of mapping we are about to engage in in our class. The author cites issues such as climate change and crisis situations as some of the positives. We have, of course, talked about this in class before and have analyzed how companies like Ushahidi work. The authors presents Google and Openstreet Maps as the front runners in mapping for developing countries and suggests that collaborative mapmaking would benefit the countries, and the users much more. The author raises concerns including privacy issues with the policies that Google sets out and “tension over indiscriminate online mapping over land ownership and resource use and control.” This is a very similar concern that the Homeland Security Professor presented: where do we draw the line between mapping to help those who can use these technologies, and breaching privacy?

Digital Volunteers and Micro-volunteering

We’re familiar with the case study of the Red Cross utilizing digital volunteers during natural disasters. However, digital volunteers aren’t just limited to emergencies, and Red Cross isn’t the only organization that’s utilizing international volunteers. ‘Virtual’ volunteers are contributing to development projects around the world. The advent of widespread ICT usage means that volunteers can contribute to a project that’s happening in a different country (or even continent!) just as easily as a project in their own.

Several websites, such as VolunteerMatch, have been used the concept of digital volunteers to drawn attention to projects that require assistance. Users can find projects that interest them and determine what type of activities they can fit into their schedule. Typical volunteer opportunities include translating documents, research, writing blog entries/newsletter articles, doing grant research etc.

This is an extremely useful tool for NGOs in developing nations, since it increases their access to support. For example, international development projects can be a challenge because of the language barrier.  If there isn’t a local volunteer who can assist with translation, then the organization may be able to find someone with the desired skillset through one of these websites.

Virtual volunteering has also spawned the idea of ‘micro-volunteering’, which applies crowd-sourcing to volunteer tasks. Instead of crowd-sourcing news or reports, these organizations allow a large number of people to do small tasks that help a cause or organization. An example of this would be Wikipedia, where millions of contributors assist by editing and adding new information to articles. Other websites have lists of small tasks that can be completed in anywhere from five minutes to an hour, depending on how much time the volunteer decides to set aside.

I’m glad our guest lecturer brought up the digital volunteers case study. Virtual volunteering is definitely something that appeals to me. It means that I can offer my assistance on a development project that I really care about, but I don’t have to leave my apartment or deal with commuting to and from the location. I only took a cursory glance, but there are a lot of opportunities that I think would appeal to some people in this class. It’s definitely worth looking into!

Crowdsourcing ICTs and Education

The World Bank has recently recognized the value in crowdsourcing for development. Last year the World Bank Disaster Management used crowdsourcing in Latin America and the Caribbean, partnering with Yahoo, Google, and NASA, among others. Recently they have applied crowdsourcing to the educational field, in response to systemic problems at the local and regional levels. Crowdsourcing could be used to raise low scores by sending out requests for instructional success stories, or to connect teachers to share educational strategies and solutions. One program that has already been implemented is the Open Innovation Portal, started by the US Department of Education. Open Innovation uses crowdsourcing to bring teachers together to share their knowledge on problems plaguing school systems such as dropout rates and difficult children. The program has seen instant results. Just four months after the start of the program, over 4,000 people signed up and shared many innovative ideas that may receive donor funds in order to be more successfully implemented or merely used as effective methods by other participants in the program. This is just one example of crowdsourcing being used here in the U.S. to promote educational solutions. This demonstrates one of the nearly endless ways that crowdsourcing may be utilized as it becomes a more popular strategy in ICT4D.

Crowd-sourcing and the Ukrainian Elections

After learning about crowd-sourcing from our guest lecturer I began to research other ways in which it can be used for development. I came across an article from the Washington Post titled, “Can crowd-sourcing keep corruption at bay?“

The article discusses how high corruption rates in Ukraine are threatening to affect the country’s upcoming parliamentary elections. The fairness of this election is going to help other nations decide whether or not Ukraine has a democracy, and it will determine many agreements, like trade, between Ukraine and the European Union. The country was dropped down to a ranking of “Partly Free” by the democracy organization Freedom House in 2011. Freedom House has also stated that corruption is the number one threat to Ukrainian democracy.

According to an OSCE Election Observation report, as of October 19 there had already been abuse of administrative resources, violent threats towards campaign workers, and several more reports of other campaign violations. In order to reduce corruption during the campaign, one organization has created a plan to use everyday citizens to make a most honest election.

The organization is ElectUA, and they have created a crowd-sourcing system that allows citizens to submit reports of violations. As you can see on the map in the article, there have already been over 1,000 reports submitted. The red dots on the map represent confirmed cases of violation, and the blue dots are reported cases not yet confirmed.

I think this is an incredible way to use crowd-sourcing as a means of fostering development. If Ukraine can have a fair election with little to no corruption, they have the potentially to be raised to democratic status. This would mean a lot for the political development of the country and its international relationships. This is another great example of how a crowd-sourcing technique is fostering development.

Guest Speaker: Robert Munro

Our guest speaker this week via the computer was Robert Munro. He gave us a very enlightening talk on crowdsourcing and the opportunities it creates in solving many issues around the world. Robert Munro is a computational linguist, which is someone who models natural languages through a computational perspective. This gives him a wide array of skills, which he uses in his many projects. Munro got his PHd from Stanford University and was top 5% in his class of engineering/science candidates. Currently, he is the CEO of Idibon, a company for language technologies, and does work for Energy for Opportunity in Sierra Leone. Munro also has an impressive background of many interesting and diverse projects. In 2011, he worked at Global Viral Forecasting, which aimed to track diseases worldwide. Munro also coordinated Mission 4636, in which he translated and categorized emergency texts for disaster relief in Haiti. Munro has done work with crowdsourcing world wide, and has used his unique skills set to help better the world through the use of language technology.

More information about Robert Munro can be obtain at his website.

More from Dr. Robert Munro on Tracking Epidemics, Emergency Response, Crowdsourcing, and Natural Language Processing

Today in class, we had a guest lecturer – Dr. Robert Munro – that led the class via a telecommunications source.  His discussion of crowdsourcing and natural language processing was extremely interesting, but there were a few concepts that I did not fully understand.  I decided to do a little more research about these topics online, and  I found this short video that features a brief talk given by Dr. Munro, which gives a great overview of the topics discussed in today’s lectures.  Click here to watch it!

Today’s lecture was extremely insightful and provided us with an example of how ICTs can have a hugely positive impact on development, especially in regards to epidemics and disasters.  The video is a nice supplement to the classroom lecture and gives a brief overview of some of the important topics and an extremely helpful explanation of some of the key terms and concepts discussed in our lecture today.

Here is a video of another lecture given by Dr. Munro: click here to watch this video! This video is longer and provides a more in depth description of the topics discussed today, as well as some topics and examples that Dr. Munro did not have time to cover today.

I wanted to highlight these videos in my blog so that people who were  not able to be in class (ie. non-Tulane students who are interested in the material we cover in our ICT4D course) are able to learn about these interesting ICT4D topics.  This blog is meant to serve as a forum to share information and create a public forum for discussion of ICT4D initiatives.  These initiatives and ICT tools are amazingly interesting and innovative examples of how ICT can be used for development.  I think it is important that these tools and success stories be shared among the development community.

I also think that the fact that the lecture today was presented through telecommunications (which allowed Dr. Monru to present a lecture to our class from a distance location) and the fact that these videos are available to the public on youtube are excellent examples of how ICTs can be useful for education.  Telecomm improves communication capabilities, and forums like youtube allow for information and knowledge to be made available to anyone with internet access for free.  Lectures available on youtube are an excellent example of the democratization of information and knowledge.