More Thoughts On How to Wire Senegal

An anonymous reader submits "Last month Slashdot published a story on the Peace Corps' plans to wire Senegal. Now Peace Corps Online has published an article by a volunteer who taught computers in West Africa for two years who recommends that the White House's Digital Freedom Initiative abandon the Western paradigm of 'a computer on every desk' and borrow a lesson from telephony in third-world countries. Since a residential telephone line is a luxury item in West Africa, the 'communication center' has flourished as a private business even in the smallest of towns where it generates profits while sharing the high cost of telecommunication among the whole community. This user model coupled with deregulation of VoIP can be the key to implementation of computer technology in poor countries."

Comments

Re:Ring Around Africa?

[bravehamster]

I think I remember (perhaps from that Neal Stephenson WIRED article?) about a fat copper cable that folks were putting around Africa, on land, which I think was called Ring Around Africa.

I believe they were calling it the "Ring of Fire" and it was Lucent who was putting most of it up. But I haven't heard anything on that in a couple of years.

Not just in West Africa, but worldwide...

[J.J.]

I just returned from a three-week backpacking tour of Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama. In general, they're not in as bad of shape as Africa, but some parts still suffer the same difficulities with access and utility availability.

I told folks I'd keep in touch via e-mail, but was careful to always caveat that with "as long as I can find internet access". Next time, I'll drop the caveat. Places with phones have an "internet cafe". And they're often full.

In my constant pursuit of fluent spanish, I thought I'd have to find another bilingual computer professional to learn the spanish translation of computer-centric terms like e-mail, web, internet, scanner, mouse, instant messaging and the like. If you find yourself in the same situation, ask a kid on the bus. The older generations aren't there yet, but the kids have it down. I was amazed.

The Economist did a good article recently on [somewhat] related issues of access, business and money. Instead of working to deliver telephones, they give an account of the beer man. It's a good read. Trucking in Cameroon

Cheers,
J.J.

Joko Clubs

[mike3k]

Senegal has a successful chain of cybercafes, the Joko Clubs, where internet access is available to everyone. It was started by a popular Senegalese singer, not by the government or outsiders.

Re:Band-aid approaches don't work

[Daniel_Staal]

So, what we need is to educate the populace while we feed them. Give them a chance to learn either a trade skill, or to go to university. Then, the educated can help rebuild the country. Admittedly, computers aren't the sole answer to this, but it would be a part. Those who have the intelligence and literacy would be able to teach themselves, and as other posters have said, Google is a better textbook than nothing for schools that lack resources.

I grew up with my dad in USAID. He still works for them. That is what the US does, feed and teach, try to build the infrastructure. Or at least, what we try to do. It doesn't always work of course, but usually it does. At least until the next civil war. It is hard to get critical mass on these types of projects. At least, with the funds we give our forgein aid projects.