Tag Archives: Africa
Africa online 2011: The mobile continent
February 28, 2011… up with some truly innovative applications.
Show me the money
If there’s one area where Africa leads the world, it’s mobile banking. The Kenyan company M-Pesa is a branch-less, mobile money system that allows customers to transfer cash by SMS. In Nairobi, apparently, you can even pay taxi drivers by mobile. The success of services like M-Pesa is jaw dropping: in Kenya over $30 million worth of mobile transactions are carried out every day. And, if there really are more mobile …
Tags: Africa crowd crowdsourcing crowdsourcing platform distributed work iPhone Kenya M-Pesa Mobile banking Mobile phone Nairobi SMS
Africa, crowd, crowdsourcing, crowdsourcing platform, distributed work, iPhone, Kenya, M-Pesa, Mobile banking, Mobile phone, Nairobi, SMS | 2 CommentsAfrica Online
January 7, 2010Share
Speak to me of Africa and my mind fills with images of broad savannahs, teeming with wildlife. Dense, impenetrable jungles, also teeming with wildlife. Vast, inhospitable stretches of desert, not quite so teeming with wildlife. Warthog and Meerkat singing show tunes as they help a young Lion reclaim his rightful place as….The Lion King!
Okay, clearly I’ve seen too many Disney films. In reality things …
Tags: Africa crowdsourcing Disney Internet Rwanda samasource txteagle WiMax Zimbabwe
Africa, crowdsourcing, Disney, Internet, Rwanda, samasource, txteagle, WiMax, Zimbabwe | 1 CommentCrowded planet: desperately seeking sustainability
November 8, 2011Share According to the latest UN figures , there are now over 7 billion people living on planet earth. In response, the world’s media has exploded with dire predictions of famine, war and climate disaster (and some great info-graphics ). Of course, in Finland over-population is hardly a major problem (except for reindeer and right-wing politicians ). But we’re probably …
Tags: Africa Asteroid Bruce Willis crowd crowdsourcing ESA European Space Agency foldit Near-Earth object Tenerife Ushahidi
Africa, Asteroid, Bruce Willis, crowd, crowdsourcing, ESA, European Space Agency, foldit, Near-Earth object, Tenerife, Ushahidi | Leave a commentPaying the price for Google Maps?
October 31, 2011… due to Google’s own crowdsourced mapping project, Map Maker, which has been a huge success in Africa and India. In 2005 only 15% of the world’s population had online maps, thanks to the Google Map Maker crowd, it’s now over 30%.
If Google wants to charge people/ companies that profit from using Google Maps, fair enough. But charging not-for-profit crowdsourcing organizations to use maps where much of the data has itself been crowdsourced (for free) from people in the developing …
Tags: Africa crowd crowdsourcing google Google Map Google Map Maker Google Maps API microwork OpenStreetMap Ushahidi
Africa, crowd, crowdsourcing, google, Google Map, Google Map Maker, Google Maps API, microwork, OpenStreetMap, Ushahidi | Leave a commentLibya, liberation and the crowd
March 17, 2011Share The recent uprisings in North Africa and the Middle East have taught the world a lot about people power. Depressingly, they’ve also shown how easy it is for a crazy dictator to shut down the internet.
At the time of writing, Libya is still almost totally offline.
It’s clear that oppressive regimes are scared of the web. Considering the online creativity of the young, tech-savvy crowd you can understand why. Deprived …
Tags: Aljazeera Arab world CNN crowd crowdfunding crowdsourcing crowdsourcing platform distributed work Libya microwork Middle East North Africa Twitter Wadah Khanfar
Aljazeera, Arab world, CNN, crowd, crowdfunding, crowdsourcing, crowdsourcing platform, distributed work, Libya, microwork, Middle East, North Africa, Twitter, Wadah Khanfar | 1 Comment← Older posts
