Revi SterlingFounding Director – ICTD Graduate Program

(recruiting video removed – 44MB!)

It’s our birthday!

A short program historyA less-short ICTD historyWhere ICTD is heading – challenges and opportunitiesAnd hats…

Program history• Respond to ever-increasing

interest in “tech for good”• Create academic

practitioners who are competent in both ICT and international development, especially fieldwork methods

• Offer unique opportunities for individualized study in policy, entrepreneurship and sustainability

• Promote learning by doing through lab and practicum

The kinds of students we graduate:

Haiti: “Solar powered school PC labs”Partners: GreenWifi/Inveneo, World Vision

Student speaking in Mexico Congress on ICT for anti-trafficking

Agriculture extension tech project, Nigeria

Maternal health monitoring technology, Kenyatta National Hospital

Distance education and water monitoring, Peru

ICTD 1.0 ICTD 2.0 ICTD Technology driven: telecenters, web, email

Engagement driven:Working with communities, platforms

Data driven: big data, open data, monitoring and evaluation, Internet of Things

Technology for technology’s sake

Technology to support development sectors

How do we define technology?

Access: bring people to technology

Bring technology to people

Who is left behind?

Equipment: recycled, donated, PC-based, technology charity

Custom hardware, mobile-based, pilots – but is it computer science?

Underserved places are the cutting edge locales to conduct tech research

Funding: CSR, high tech RFPs, fad donors, gov’t

Funding: foundations, “grand challenges”, tech moguls, BOP strategies, social entrepreneurship

Funding: crowdsourcing, partnerships, social enterprises, Dev RFPs combined w research

Adoption of ICTD: marginalized in development industry

Move towards mainstreaming, academic response, hackathons

Leapfrogging; Global South produces its own technology; technology as “glue” to sustain/scale

Palepu and Sterling

ICTD 1.0

• Collapse of Berlin Wall--11/89: The event not only symbolized the end of the Cold war, it allowed people from other side of the wall to join the economic mainstream. (11/09/1989)

• Netscape: Netscape and the Web broadened the audience for the Internet from its roots as a communications medium used primarily by 'early adopters and geeks' to something that made the Internet accessible to everyone from five-year-olds to eighty-five-year olds. (8/9/1995)

• Work Flow Software: The ability of machines to talk to other machines with no humans involved. Friedman believes these first three forces have become a “crude foundation of a whole new global platform for collaboration.”

• Uploading: Communities uploading and collaborating on online projects. Examples include open source software, blogs, and Wikipedia. Friedman considers the phenomenon "the most disruptive force of all."

• Outsourcing: Friedman argues that outsourcing has allowed companies to split service and manufacturing activities into components, with each component performed in most efficient, cost-effective way.

• Offshoring: Manufacturing's version of outsourcing.• Supply-Chaining: Friedman compares the modern retail supply chain to a river, and points to Wal-

Mart as the best example of a company using to streamline item sales, distribution, and shipping.• Insourcing: Friedman uses UPS as a prime example for insourcing, in which the company's

employees perform services--beyond shipping--for another company. For example, UPS itself repairs Toshiba computers on behalf of Toshiba. The work is done at the UPS hub, by UPS employees.

• In-forming: Google and other search engines are the prime example. "Never before in the history of the planet have so many people-on their own-had the ability to find so much information about so many things and about so many other people", writes Friedman.

• "The Steroids": Personal digital devices like mobile phones, iPods, personal digital assistants, instant messaging, and voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP).

UN Millennium Development Goals

“Measuring the impact of ICT in meeting the MDGs”

“ICT role in achieving the MDGs”“ICT - MDG linkage at regional and national level”

“MDGs & WSIS”

“ICT for Development: Contributing to the Millennium Development Goals”“Innovation and Investment: ICT and the Millennium Development Goals”

“How ICT Can Help Us Meet the Millennium Development Goals”

• “Leapfrog” traditional development• Information = empowerment• Mobile/Internet Drive Economic Growth

‘Technology as panacea’ phase

Qiang, 2009

Gurstein, Keniston, Kuriyan, Colle, Harris, Best, Jensen, Esterhuysen, …

Much hype, little progress – what were we doing wrong?

ICTD 2.0

URENIO Research

The world is spiky.

2009: Heeks – ICTD 2.0 ManifestoMove from access to integration - with development sectors and effortsContentOutcomesCommunity participationBring tech to people, not people to techAcademic ICTD

Too many pilot projects

Mobile health projects in Uganda – pre moratorium

COVERAGE: In Africa just 50 percent of the rural population is covered by cell service

CONTENT: Language and literacy issues (500m)

COST: Internet costs average 1.7% of average income in developed vs. 31% in developing countries

-ITU

ICTD

Post-2015 framework

Sterling, 2013

supply-side development vs.

demand-side development

LeapfroggingNetworking and Connectivity Energy Monitoring and Evaluation

IPv6 (Bhutan); TV White Space; Google Loon, UAV/drones

Micro grids, phone charging/light hybrids

Big Data, Open Data, Integrated sensors, Internet of Things

Data for Development• Faster outbreak

tracking and response

• Improved understanding of crisis behavior

• Accurate mapping of needs and gaps

• Ability to predict demand and disruption

“Who is ‘data’ really?” Salmon

“Southern made”:Educational tablets and devicesAgriculture applications Governance applications…

South to North tech transfer: UshahidiCommCareBRCKHealth devices

For diaspora, low resource, rural, green

The “secret” digital divide

• Internet Gender Gap in SSA: 43%• 25% gap worldwide (200M)• 75% of the world’s poorest are women• 500M illiterate women WW• Inequitable development ≠ sustainable

development• Role of tech/role of culture

LookingAhead

Technology for accountability

• Wireless sensor networks for monitoring and evaluation

• Integration with engineering for development• New standard of data collection • Does big and/or open data keep us honest?• Fairer sourcing and decommissioning

Technology for innovation

• Pushing computer science research in networking and protocols, energy and power, interfaces, sentiment analysis, data mining

• South South collaboration• Intersection with MakerFaire and FabLab

communities –esp around repair and re-use• Disruptive and hidden technologies– Nanotech, software defined radio, wearables

Technology for aspiration

• Can technology itself be empowering?– building capacity– Extending abilities / magnify talents– increasing social capital– Addressing psychological concerns

• Mix of professional, personal, entertaining and fulfilling

• Applications that anticipate need or conditions• Consolidation, interoperability and “best of”• What are your ideas?

And now, cake.