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Money down the drain?
Dot-com millionaires who invested in Africa to empower the poor have come to realise their efforts were a non-starter, writes Deepak Mankar.
Just the other day, I came across what seems to be an object lesson in how to research a topic with the help of the Internet. ('June 2005: Thinking Outside the Search Box') batesinfo. Mary Ellen Bates addresses the important issue of looking beyond search engines to find the best information. She explains in this post step-by-patient-step how she went about her task of tracking information on trends in the UK market for Internet phones or VOIP (voice over Internet protocol) for a client. She kicked off with a couple of search engines "just to see what alternative terms showed up, both in the search results and in the paid ads." She found mentions of 'Voice over IP', 'Internet telephony' and 'IP telephony', among others. Her next step was to review "the sponsored links, on the assumption that, if a company paid to have its ad appear for the search term VOIP, it might have relevant content." That piece clever sleuthing yielded her links to a white paper by VOIP player Avaya and to Order.VOIP.com offering a comparison chart of various VOIP providers. Then she tried Wikipedia wikipedia and How Stuff Works computer.howstuffworks and got basic information on VOIP technology and some good links to other reference sources. Two human-compiled web directories, the European portion of Open Directory Project (dmoz.org) and the UK version of Yahoo Directory, provided leads to trade associations and other organizations. From these directories, she found a link to voip.org.uk, which reviews various VOIP providers. Using search engines, she found Telephony Online magazine, a good resource guide to new telecom technologies. This jogged her memory and she went to BitPipe.com, a searchable portal of white papers, where she found some useful stuff. She checked out news sites, such as NewsIsFree.com and Yahoo News (UK), for late-breaking news. At ZDnet.co.uk and cnet.com she tracked reviews of various VOIP providers, product comparisons, video tutorials and customers' ratings. Using the tag "VOIP" on technorati and del.icio.us, she found out what users were saying about VOIP. From these postings, she got a link to VON Europe, a conference focused on Voice On the Net where she reviewed the program. She then contacted a couple of presenters to see if they would send me copies of their presentations. Blog posts also pointed her to a European Union study looking into regulation of VOIP. "Given how difficult it is to search the EU's web site europa, this was a tremendous lead," she points out. Next, she searched at the European Patent Office espacenet for recent patents related to VOIP, "to see what new developments might be on the horizon". "And finally, I went to factiva, a fee-based online service, to search for published articles in the trade and professional press, for more in-depth coverage of VOIP," she reminisces. All this took her "perhaps two hours". Great sleuthing, Mary Ellen. Sherlock Holmes would have been proud of you.
Top ten of 2005. Do you agree?
At No1 is Google evolving into "a powerhouse company, rolling out beta after beta. Some bomb (Web Accelerator); some are so fantastic … (Gmail/Gmail Mobile)". 2. Tagging "is Web 2.0 … the future of organizing information on the web". 3. MySpace.com: "Everyone who is anyone (and under 30) has a MySpace profile". (Plus, it turned the music scene upside down.) 4. AJAX: "Not a technology, but a new way of bringing technologies together…" 5. Death of free-for-all file sharing. 6. Podcasts on the rise: 7. The XBox 360: "Everyone wants one. No one can get one. People who do get them report crashing, but it doesn't diminish the demand. …millions of kids are disappointed on Christmas day." 8. DVRs: "… in more homes than ever". ("Fast-forwarding through commercials means more blatant product placement within shows. Networks force you to upgrade to a DVR by pitting their most popular shows against each other.") 9. Apple innovation: "iPods with color screens play videos. TV available for download at iTunes". 10. XML: "Every blog, every site has a feed." Wait. There's more to come: "Last, but not least: FIREFOX". infopackets.
Safety first. If your kids use MySpace.com.
This seems to be the theme of the article titled 'The hidden dangers your kids face at MySpace.com". yourkidsface. As is well-known by now, MySpace.com is a popular online community. Users post personal information (age, gender, location, pictures, place of work, school and more). "And that's the problem," argues the writer. "MySpace is an easy way for people to connect with current friends or rekindle old relationships. Unfortunately, it's just as simple for sexual predators."
Money down the drain? Dot-coms in Africa.
It's a real shame. But dot-com millionaires who invested in Africa to empower the poor have come to realise their efforts were a non-starter. "I realize now that electricity is more important for Africa than the Internet," says Ethan Zuckerman, a tech millionaire, circa the 199Os, who donated much of his wealth to initiatives that spread technology. Esther Dyson, a former member of the Internet's ICANN governing hoard and fellow technology philanthropist, agrees. "I am considered politically incorrect for saying, albeit in a muted way, that developing countries should focus more on their basic economic infrastructure than on Internet policy," she says. "The Internet is a great tool for some people but it's something of a luxury." Five years ago, when Bill Gates made a similar point, he was scoffed at. Recently, he again dismissed the MIT $100 computer for the world's poor, focusing instead on clean water, basic medicines and rudimentary education. "When people look hack 100 years from now, they'll identify the cell phone as the defining, transformative technology in Africa," says technology historian Alex Pang. "Donors should have been targeting different technologies for different segments: radio and cell phones for the not-so-literate, and Internet for the rest." intellisearchnow.
Global ads on sustainability. Find them here.
Yes, at unep, there's a new Creative Gallery on Sustainability Communications, brought to you by the United Nations Environment Program. UNEP calls it "the first international online database of corporate and public advertising campaigns specifically dedicated to sustainability issues and classified by sustainability themes." With more 700 ads in the database, you get to view a combination of print and TV commercials either all at once, browsed by theme (from 'Agriculture & Fisheries' to 'Waste & Recycling') or searched by simple keyword or an advanced search including the ability to narrow down by country or advertiser.
Going global? Use these free name searches.
For the US, the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand respectively, the following are the URLs to use : uspto.gov or mycorporation; companieshouse; strategis; abr.business and companies.
Turn here. For short films on places the world over.
TurnHere (nice turn of phrase, that!) is a new site offering information about places in the US (from New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco to Albuquerque and Woodstock, Vermont) and around the world (Reykjavik, Iceland, and the Gold Coast, for instance) via hundreds of short films, some of them sponsored. To the left of the films, most of which are between two-and-a-half and four minutes long, are pointers to other activities in the city, surrounding areas, etc. turnhere
The Soho. Cinema at your fingertip.
The First Post (it bills itself as "The Online Daily Magazine") offers you a varied bill of fare at Soho Cinema: s trailers and bits from blockbusters mainly. thefirstpost.
Deadly funny! The wit lives on.
"Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint." "Last week, I stated this woman was the ugliest woman I had ever seen. I have since been visited by her sister, and now wish to withdraw that statement." Who said these wise words? Mark Twain. "I was married by a judge. I should have asked for a jury." Only Groucho could have uttered this Marxism. For more such witty and wise stuff, visit snirk.
That's all for now though there's plenty more out there. Join me again next week, same place.
Copyright (c) 2001- 2006 by Deepak Mankar. All rights reserved. Deepak Mankar, an advertising practitioner on the creative side since 1965, is also intensely passionate about the web and web content creation. Read his online articles at asiaondemand.com. Website:http://www.addgandhi.com/original/. You may e-mail him atdmankar@bom8.vsnl.net.in. Blog: popgoestheslop.blogspot.com.
