Computer for every Child
Just a short note on a news item about an adapted version of Edubuntu 7.04 being deployed to schools in Macedonia (F.Y.R.O.M.).
The interesting part is that these 20.000 PCs (7.000 already shipped) will be equipped with (X300) Thin Clients by NComputing, which allow 7-8 users on each machine at the same time.
I’ve posted it here because Daudi’s comment the other day over at Erik’s Realm reminded me of this “sharing perspective” – which I think will be one of the reasons why any real multi-user OS will eventually win the game. As for the Linux vs. Windows debate: I personally don’t care which system is used, as long as it’s secure enough (viruses = kill productivity), provides a good usability and won’t be affected by power cuts.
Related to this owner-user-question, I wonder how many average users every mobile phone has in a country like Kenya (given that a phone may only be used by one person at a time and that different profiles depend on the SIM in gsm phones).
Halbwertszeit
The worst job about online stuff is thinking of decent content which may be published on more important platforms than private blogs.
During the past few weeks, I had to think of content which shall be published on a website that will be launched soon. I think it’s even easier to write a proposal for a project because then you know only a few recipients will be targeted and you can streamline and adapt the content for their perspective. With websites though, there’s this 24/7/365 readership out there that closely follows all your steps and mistakes – and everyone has a different opinion on issues you are writing about. This generates conversations – which is good and wanted.
The difficulty really is to find a politically correct way in between all those opinions and still hit the nail on its head with precise definitions.
What I like about blogging is that I can just put my own content online without thinking too much about how it could offend others, how I wouldn’t have to double-check content with my boss who will even find the smallest typo and that I can actually cover any subject that I like.
Also, it’s interesting to see how services like Twitter are used to express feelings or moods, while blogs are then used to cover subjects that have a slightly longer Halbwertszeit. That’s an interesting development, I think. Seeing how these new services are used and how the general opinion on blogs has changed in the last two years. From personal diaries to corporate blogging -how nice is that!
Back to the content management: while thinking about the ultimate content for this project I am currently on, I came to realize that it doesn’t really matter what’s online – as long as there are enough conversations going on. Editing content with such an assumption in mind, the approach to getting your message and content across to the readers becomes much easier.
Spendenmarathon 2007
The person who designed this billboard may have agreed with me about the beauty of this kid (who btw reminds me of Jirani), but just after taking this snapshot tonight, I immediately realized what bugs me about this advertisment for an upcoming fundraising campaign to be aired on tv on November 22nd:
poorly dressed + small + black + kid = poverty?
As long as such stereotyped messages are used to raise attention for the fact that still a lot of people are living in poverty, I will keep on hearing phrases like “..but you are white, you’re supposed to be rich!”.
Not yet convinced? Then do a quick image search on Google with the keyword “poverty”….
Sevilla!
Catedral – the third largest cathedral in the world.
Took a Ryanair flight to Jerez on Furahiday Nov 2nd – and from there a bus to Sevilla for a week of sunshine, a gas stove in the kitchen (= cooking is much more fun with gas) and for that special feeling of being on the road again. Low budget, that is.
Despite of the pleasant climate, there are some other factors here that remind me of Nairobi:
Sevilla is a dusty city where almost every inch of soil has been sealed with stones and thus turned into an enlarged pavement. While that’s different from Nairobi, it’s still strange to see this kind of “waste” within Europe. Well, Spain… (*sigh*)
Maji ni maisha. Water is Life, especially in the dry south of Spain. Looking out of the window, I get to see this:
See any trees? Yeah, those few on the left side are already considered a lot! There’s something like drip irrigation all over the city for the few trees found in this city.
Talking about water: I still haven’t found any water filter candle so far, but am very tempted to build my own (approved) filter as drinking water is bought in 5l bottles. Tap water is a bit too chlorinated…
..which is why it reminds me of public swimming pools – which seem to be lacking around here in this area. “Only to prior appointment”, I was told, which means that you’ll have to be a member of a swimming club and register for empty slots in the morning hours. Much like Nairobi, I guess. There’s a market for public swimming pools. I bet!
“Ndugekire maguta mengi irio-ri“, I am often tempted to say here, “don’t put too much oil in my food”. If you’re into oily food, this is the place for you.
torta de aceite (handmade cake with oil, typical of Seville)
Eating obviously includes the consumption of other stuff…like Marijuana. You know Marijuana is sold in Amsterdam in The Netherlands but here it is smoked in public in huge amounts. This really reminds me of Nairobi.
There are lots of commercials on tv for cars – much more than in Germany (which is a car building nation, I’d say). There are many new cars on the road, and while this may be limited to the city only, I hardly ever see older cars here (> 10 years). An indicator for the upcoming middle-class?
My perception is that peoples living in hot climates hardly ever have a (good) taste when it comes to interior design. This is also why IKEA comes from Sweden! Now, while the typical Spanish living room may look like any other living room in countries surrounding the Mediterranean Sea, this awful assortment of styles often still costs a lot of money (or am I just too German on this? :-)
Came across this ad on the limited usage of plastics in the environment which end up in the sea. Well….they certainly need some awareness for the environment with all those plastics here and there (water bottles, plastic bags, everything sealed 3x in plastics, etc.) so this looks like a good initiative to me.
Will be heading home tomorrow evening, from sunny 24°C to a rainy 3°C with snow and ice cold wind….argh!
Tusker Tools
…So I went on safari and bought this super small padlock for my luggage in a Turkish shop at the railway station in Frankfurt:
Tusker Tools?!
“He wants to cut but not possible due to heavy duty” :-)
A TUSKER logo is even engraved into the padlock itself, which makes this gadget somehow special to me (especially since I am the owner of tusker.DE and .INFO since some years now, and this guy who runs Tusker Werkzeuge Handels GmbH somehow never approached me over the domain so it’s nice to see some of their products for sale after all those visitors who have been on my tusker sites, looking for different stuff that sells under a Tusker brand name…).
mobile blogging, part 2
Mobile blogging…as in blogging directly from the phone or another portable device other than notebooks. Why would someone want to blog from a phone?
Well, computers in the form of desktop personal computers or laptops are still expensive. Despite of relatively high initital costs, an uncertain power supply and restricted internet access not only in “underdeveloped” countries for conventional computers, interesting stories are often best caught through the use of mobile devices. Another very important reason is that many consumers today are using mobile phones as the mobile phone sector is a fast growing market. We do not necessarily need to have a look at the unstable political situation in a country like Burma/Myanmar to understand the importance of being able to directly post content to the internet through a mobile device – but it serves as a good example to illustrate what should be possible with todays technology.
Obviously, the process of mobile blogging may be split up into a) the creation of content/media and b) uploading everything to a website/database on the internet.
As mentioned in my previous post on this subject, I initially assumed that it would all depend on the right gadget.
An advanced smartphone with a dedicated QWERTY keyboard does of course add comfort to the process of entering longer text, but it isn’t necessary to use one in order to get your stuff online. Hence it comes down to the right software solution on both the phone and online.
Another interesting observation is that manufacturers of mobile phones have in the past often only put an emphasis on giving users the ability to pull content from internet to their phone. Apple’s iPhone is a very good example for this as it comes with a media player which plays YouTube videos and a flexible browser which even display the URL. But also other phone manufacturers like the big players Nokia and SonyEricsson implemented RSS-capable browsers into their phones that automatically pull the required content from the internet without any computer in between. Now compare that with other mobile multimedia devices such as an iPod or a Creative mp3 player, which in the past always required a computer in between to synchronize content. With todays mobile phones, you can directly pull content from the net via GPRS, EDGE, UMTS or WiFi. Sexy.
The internet, though, and especially the Web 2.0 approach online lives from user generated content. I think that the use of the internet through a mobile platform will become more and more important in future, especially since mobile phones have become the leading platform for IT in developing countries.
And this upcoming development where we’ll see global players like Google distributing a sound software solution which combines and contains all these different services (telephony, messaging, streaming of multimedia content and uploading it to a site online) is reason enough to believe that we’re just at the very beginning of mobile services. Especially those that are I) easy to use (~usability) and II) don’t cost anything extra to the user – because he’s the one who creates content. Mobile phone operators seem to have understood that so far, which is why everyone wants to jump on the train of providing the right platform for content generation.
Anyways, I promised to deliver a small – not complete – overview of decent phones that already add some comfort for compiling mobile blog post. If you think there’s any phone that should be part of this list, pls feel free to drop a comment below. Thank You!
Ok, let’s start with Nokia ‘s range of phones:
1. Nokia N95
Since I am using this phone, I can acknowledge that it’s a great phone with a good camera but lousy built quality (compared to other slider phones), a slow camera (autofocus), weak battery runtime, chronical shortages of RAM which limits true multitasking and a simple T9 keypad – which of course doesn’t offer the same comfort as a QWERTY keyboard. However, since it is one of Nokia’s flagships and just offers a wide range of services at once, I included it here in this list. The N95 also connects to Nokia’s SU-8W bluetooth keyboard:
The downside to this external solution? Relatively small keys, a bluetooth connection that will further drain the battery on your phone and a huge price of at least EUR 100,-. That’s a lot of mbeca just for a keyboard.
The new N95 8GB version (N95-3) as well as the improved version for the US-market (N95-2) come with an improved battery and more RAM and some other minor changes that don’t affect its blogging capabilities.
2. Nokia E90
Woooohaaaa! Expensive, bulky and a little bit buggy, which is why Nokia took it from the market for some weeks. Since it’s also based on the Symbian S60 platform (as opposed to the previous “Communicator” models which were based on Symbian S80 platform), it also runs the same programs as other S60 3rd edition phones. Comes with a sweet QWERTY keyboard (as pictured above), 3,2mpix cam (which is ok), two displays (!) and average battery runtime.
3. Nokia E70
Fellow blogger Kirima is using such a phone for surfing the inet from his rural home. I like this phone, even the previous models that came with a foldable keyboard like this one were nice (although they are known to be having some software issues…).
4. Nokia E61/61i/62
Sigh. The E61 (no camera, joystick instead of joypad) and the E61i/62 are very nice for mobile blogging. Especially the above pictured E61i which comes with an average 2mpix cam and a perfect QWERTY keyboard as well as the whole connection range of GPRS up to WiFi. VoIP included. Sweet!
5. Nokia E51
Best Nokia release imho. A small, brick-styled (candy bar) business smartphone with a 2mpix cam, the S60 platform and VoIP capabilities. This phone will sell quite well, I think, despite of its humble appearance. Comes with a T9 keypad.
6. Nokia N93/93i
I played with the N93 and the N93i in a shop last weekend, and while N93 is still better than the N93i, both phones are actually only good at recording videos because of their stereo microphones (important fact) and extremely good lenses + optical zoom. No QWERTY keyboard although of course you can also connect the above mentioned bluetooth keyboard.
7. Apple’s iPhone
…delivered to you as a printable cut&glue version (pdf), because that’s the best way to handle this design object. :-)
Seriously, the iPhone is a great innovation and comes with a VERY unique user interface. It lacks a few features that other phones have but has its own market and will therefore be just as good as other phones. I like the iPhone although I’ve figured out for me that it does not have what I need in a phone.
No exchangeabooool battery, no keypad or keyboard = no tactil feedback while pressing the virtual keys on the display, no MMS (not really needed if e-mail is used instead), lousy camera. I think the iPhone is good for WiFi environments – so if you’re in the USA and hopping from one Starbucks WiFi hotspot to the next – then this is your phone.
Have to ask fellow bloggers Christian and Erik on their mobile blogging experiences. And what about the iPhone that was on display @ Skunkworks Kenya earlier this week ?
8. SonyEricsson K800i
SonyEricsson’s sweetest phone ever (except for the T39m, yes :-)!
Comes with a nasty little joystick that often tends to retire within the first three months, but satisfies its user with a very decent 3,2 mpix cam and the best T9 keypad from SE ever. Included in this list because I see many ppl using this phone as a camera and music player. Actually had plans of buying this as a substitute to my N95.
The K800i comes, like most other new SE phones, with a little program that enables direct uploads to blogger.com (= Google). More on this later (part 3) as Nokia also supports the “blogging” platforms offered by Yahoo!.
Hmmm….SonyEricsson => Google and Nokia = > Yahoo! ??
9. SonyEricsson P1i
The SE P9i comes with a full QWERTY keyboard, a 3,2 mpix cam, WiFi and a stylus similar to those found on Windows Mobile phones.
10. SonyEricsson M600i
Obviously, the M600i comes without a camera but with a QWERTY keyboard.
11. HTC phones….
This list will never be complete, and while I am just confused about which HTC phone I should add to this list (Aegeus, saidia mimi tafadhali…si i hear u r back online anyways :-), I will update this post during the next few days and even deliver a part 3 which will cover the other side of the game: the software solutions that make mobile blogging possible.
Pls stay tuned!
the choo issue
Compared to the population of the world, only a few people are able to drive a Mercedes-Benz, Audi, BMW or Lexus – yet they are built with some sort of comfort and perfection in mind.
Everyone of these 6,6 billion people out there, however, needs to go to toilet. Every day.
I wonder why ppl spend so much money on good cars and other items but actually never really think about improving their sanitation needs. Same attitude applies to ppl using public toilets. How come many people often don’t care about clean sanitation facilities?