In what is a major first for our fledgling association, the ICT Association of Malawi (ICTAM), we will host the 6th International Conference on Open Access (IOAC2008).
This not only speaks volumes for the amount of recognition we are beginning to receive beyond our borders but also of the tireless efforts of some selfless individuals in promoting our agenda.
Honourable mention here goes to our president, Boster Sibande and the chairman of the organising committee for the IOAC2008, Charles Govati.
The theme of the conference is "Open Access to ICT for Social Economic Growth" and we will be hosting it in collaboration with The Royal Swedish Institute of Technology (KTH) and The Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (OSISA).
Open Access in the context of Communication (Open Communication) means that anyone, on equal conditions with a transparent relation between cost and pricing, can get access to and share communication resources on one level to provide value added services and on another level in a layered communication system architecture. There is currently a high momentum in the deployment of infrastructure such as optic fiber, wireless technologies and the like.
It is also the advancement in the use of ICT in general such as through mobile phones and multipurpose telecentres. If used wisely, we believe these developments can facilitate the provision of relatively inexpensive, easily accessible, diversified and expandable ICT services. The objective of this workshop is to identify and share experiences on affordable and cost effective ICT technologies around the globe. Based on Open Access principles, the workshop intends to address ICT as a tool that will bring developmental change to the society at large.
The call for papers is now out and we're encouraging the participation of academicians, professionals, researchers, planners, political leaders, innovators and the private sector.
It will be hosted at the Crossroads Hotel, Lilongwe, Malawi from the 12th to the 14th of November 2008.
More details can be found by clicking on the link in the this post's title.
If you can make it, please attend, we look forward to hosting you in the warm heart of Africa!
Friday, July 18, 2008
Friday, July 04, 2008
A Tentative Sort
In this day and age of skyrocketing fuel-prices (4$ on Brent crude this week alone! And the week isn't even over yet.), World-economies playing the rope-a-dope trying to bear the brunt of punishing fiscal blows and food shortages galore, with Governments at wits end on how to maintain a semblance of normalcy, we begin to reap the bitter harvest of capitalistic avarice.
No one is angrier than the rich whose stockpile of money dwindles in value day by day.
Conversely, the poor wake up to just another dreary day, same old struggles, taking pleasure in the simplest of things, a warm meal, somewhere sheltered to sleep, health. Maybe harder than the day before, but in hardship monotony is the order of the day.
Those whose lofty dreams of success suddenly seem to be vanishing at a steady clip beyond the horizon start to despair and seek contentment in their statuses quo.
The World ticks over, life goes on, time marches on.
The panaceas for these woes are myriad, solace is sought in many different ways. Different strokes for different folks.
I find myself adrift not really wanting to settle one way or the other. Into despondency or into complacency. Into Pollyanna optimism or prospective euphoria.
Maybe some sage philosopher has already catalogued this sensation and all that remains is for me to chance upon their writings and find myself bedazzled by the glowing relevance of it all.
Still I press on, hardly engaging yet not letting go completely.
Amused, confused, worried, pleasantly surprised to discover that deep down it turns out I am after all, a tentative sort...
No one is angrier than the rich whose stockpile of money dwindles in value day by day.
Conversely, the poor wake up to just another dreary day, same old struggles, taking pleasure in the simplest of things, a warm meal, somewhere sheltered to sleep, health. Maybe harder than the day before, but in hardship monotony is the order of the day.
Those whose lofty dreams of success suddenly seem to be vanishing at a steady clip beyond the horizon start to despair and seek contentment in their statuses quo.
The World ticks over, life goes on, time marches on.
The panaceas for these woes are myriad, solace is sought in many different ways. Different strokes for different folks.
I find myself adrift not really wanting to settle one way or the other. Into despondency or into complacency. Into Pollyanna optimism or prospective euphoria.
Maybe some sage philosopher has already catalogued this sensation and all that remains is for me to chance upon their writings and find myself bedazzled by the glowing relevance of it all.
Still I press on, hardly engaging yet not letting go completely.
Amused, confused, worried, pleasantly surprised to discover that deep down it turns out I am after all, a tentative sort...
Wednesday, May 07, 2008
The More Things Change....
I wish I was smart. Really smart. So super-smart I could think up a functional solution to the maladies that ail African politics. The superbugs, XDR strains that are our inheritance from the liberation struggles of the 20th Century.
As a continent even the most-promising, the most developed, the richest countries have these people lurking around their corridors of power, barnacles even a crowbar couldn't dislodge.
Sapping the very lifeblood of the common man they posture and preen, lobby and plot, so intricately involved in their mad powerplays that they cannot smell the dawn of a new age. So rapt in their controversies they can no longer see the havoc they wreak. So lost in their faded dreams they have forgotten the ideals of their youth. No verve left in them these winded bagpipes creak out their dying notes tenaciously clinging on for the sheer sake of it, not even knowing why.
It's gotten so bad that none of the young intellectuals and visionaries want to go anywhere near politics. The image is tarnished and we live in perpetual fear of becoming like these frightsome spectres who attract sympathy at best and rancid loathing otherwise.
Free from the colonial influences that bound us (are we?) we find ourselves clogged in the muck of internecine and narcissistic ambitions.
Kenya, Zimbabwe, Mali, Nigeria, Somalia, Malawi... Politics, Politicians, pitiful people.
Is it all a game one wonders? A dream perhaps? Shall I wake up and find functional governments, working assemblies, responsible leaders allowed to rule in peace? Can I hope?
As one decade has melted into another and I no longer feel invincible and ageless, as I start a family and begin to consider MY legacy I wonder...
...The More They Remain The Same.
As a continent even the most-promising, the most developed, the richest countries have these people lurking around their corridors of power, barnacles even a crowbar couldn't dislodge.
Sapping the very lifeblood of the common man they posture and preen, lobby and plot, so intricately involved in their mad powerplays that they cannot smell the dawn of a new age. So rapt in their controversies they can no longer see the havoc they wreak. So lost in their faded dreams they have forgotten the ideals of their youth. No verve left in them these winded bagpipes creak out their dying notes tenaciously clinging on for the sheer sake of it, not even knowing why.
It's gotten so bad that none of the young intellectuals and visionaries want to go anywhere near politics. The image is tarnished and we live in perpetual fear of becoming like these frightsome spectres who attract sympathy at best and rancid loathing otherwise.
Free from the colonial influences that bound us (are we?) we find ourselves clogged in the muck of internecine and narcissistic ambitions.
Kenya, Zimbabwe, Mali, Nigeria, Somalia, Malawi... Politics, Politicians, pitiful people.
Is it all a game one wonders? A dream perhaps? Shall I wake up and find functional governments, working assemblies, responsible leaders allowed to rule in peace? Can I hope?
As one decade has melted into another and I no longer feel invincible and ageless, as I start a family and begin to consider MY legacy I wonder...
...The More They Remain The Same.
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Enter The Year of the Rat
On January the 1st 2008 in the backseat of a friends car en-route to Lilongwe after some crazy new year celebrations in Blantyre I experienced a feeling I haven't felt in a long time. I call these feelings my Milestones and they normally presage some major life-change for me. I remember having one around April in my final year of primary school and nothing could have been truer. Major changes happened in my family life and living conditions and I was forced to develop a strong resilience to change.
The most striking of these sensations however came in 1998/1999. Strange date I know but there is a reason. It was at the stroke of midnight and I was standing in the little stretch between the Kenya-Tanzania border at Namanga known as 'No-mans Land'. It was eerily quiet with just the occasional static of the guards radios and a few drunken shouts disturbing the calm. The atmosphere around me felt charged and even as I was embarking on a journey into the great unknown the following morning a tremendous resolve to see myself through crystallised within me then and has seen me through since. Truth be told, the feeling I talk of here has never been an epiphany, rather a slowly growing realisation that creeps up on you through your subconscious then suddenly resolves into sharp focus.
Change is a part of life and never easy, only inevitable. One learns to embrace it when it can no longer be postponed. You're never really ready for it and sometimes wonder how on earth you got through it.
I stand at those crossroads now. It's never any one decision to make but a fascinating web of intricately woven threads that each affect the other and yet make these decisions you must.
According to the Chinese, it a a year of the Rat, auspicious to them as the Rat is considered a courageous and enterprising person.
In numerology as well 2008 bears a lot of portent as it can be read as a 10 or as a 1 from the sum of its parts.
I'm not into astrology or anything, I just generally like being well informed, particularly in a year that I know will be tremendously formative for me as a person and for the rest of my life.
As events take shape I pray for the Wisdom to make the right choices.
To all who see this take time to be introspective, insofar as is possible realise who, what, when and why you are as that knowledge will guide you through the year.
All the very best, here's to a happy and prosperous 2008!
The most striking of these sensations however came in 1998/1999. Strange date I know but there is a reason. It was at the stroke of midnight and I was standing in the little stretch between the Kenya-Tanzania border at Namanga known as 'No-mans Land'. It was eerily quiet with just the occasional static of the guards radios and a few drunken shouts disturbing the calm. The atmosphere around me felt charged and even as I was embarking on a journey into the great unknown the following morning a tremendous resolve to see myself through crystallised within me then and has seen me through since. Truth be told, the feeling I talk of here has never been an epiphany, rather a slowly growing realisation that creeps up on you through your subconscious then suddenly resolves into sharp focus.
Change is a part of life and never easy, only inevitable. One learns to embrace it when it can no longer be postponed. You're never really ready for it and sometimes wonder how on earth you got through it.
I stand at those crossroads now. It's never any one decision to make but a fascinating web of intricately woven threads that each affect the other and yet make these decisions you must.
According to the Chinese, it a a year of the Rat, auspicious to them as the Rat is considered a courageous and enterprising person.
In numerology as well 2008 bears a lot of portent as it can be read as a 10 or as a 1 from the sum of its parts.
I'm not into astrology or anything, I just generally like being well informed, particularly in a year that I know will be tremendously formative for me as a person and for the rest of my life.
As events take shape I pray for the Wisdom to make the right choices.
To all who see this take time to be introspective, insofar as is possible realise who, what, when and why you are as that knowledge will guide you through the year.
All the very best, here's to a happy and prosperous 2008!
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