First links of 2009: tracking the Gaza conflict, e-Learning in Nepal, spreading social media literacy

A daily reading of the blogosphere this week has provided a feast of new year predictions, wish lists and tips for 2009 that reveal some really interesting online and tech innovations that could have a great impact on the non-profit and development arenas in the year ahead.

The big story of course has been the ongoing conflict in Gaza; but this too has seen quick-thinking people adapt new technologies for communication and data-building to track the conflict and help build information for use by humanitarian relief agencies.

Mainstream news channel Al Jazeera English are utilising a platform first developed during the post-election violence in Kenya in early 2008 to track events in Gaza. Ushahidi – meaning “testimony” in Swahili – uses “crowd-sourced” information to map crisis situations. It allows anyone to submit information via sms, email, or through the web (Al Jazeera is utilising a Twitter feed). OpenStreetMap (OSM) –aimed at creating a free, editable map of the world – diverted their energies to a special Gaza project early in the week. They are looking for people familiar with street names and landmarks to enhance the limited existing map. Reuters Alertnet has a list of other mapping initiatives.

 

Social media: building bottom-up communications

At the BBC World Service Trust London office today we welcomed an excellent external speaker, on a subject of particular interest for me (and indeed this new blog). Nathalie McDermott from social enterprise start-up On Road Media spoke to staff in London about flexible, cost-effective solutions for facilitating communication between and across marginalised groups and hard-to-reach communities.

Nathalie gave numerous examples of how free software and “web 2.0” technology has enabled marginalised groups to engage and report on their own communities and culture. Free networking sites such as Ning and Facebook and content-sharing sites like YouTube and Flickr run alongside blog platforms (this blog is hosted on wordpress) that empower the kind of “citizen journalism” and individual reporting and commentary that traditional news gatekeepers have struggled to handle. She spoke of the unique opportunity of these tools to give people their own voice, generate powerful broadcast output, and reinforce and support community cohesion.

 

Google Flu Trends: of mobs and medicine

Yet another example of the all-seeing nature of Google’s digital domination was unveiled this week with the launch of Google Flu Trends, a new application from the internet giant’s charitable arm Google.org that provides information on the spread of the infection by tracking individual Flu-related internet searches such as “aching muscles”, “headaches”, “fever” and so on.

According to data mined from their archives, a Google mapping of the past 5 years’ flu-related searches almost exactly matches the statistics of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The crucial difference being, that the digital data Google provides could be accessed, analysed and acted upon quicker than traditional methods of tracking disease and infection. According to an article in the IHT, there are 36,000 flu-related deaths in the US each year – a far higher figure than expected for this uninitiated reader, and one that underlines the fact that an ability to respond and react quicker to regional flu epidemics could potentially save lives.

 

Information overload vs information deprivation

A deliberately provocative headline in Wired magazine this week “Twitter, Flickr, Facebook, make blogs look so 2004” heralded an article arguing that the “golden age” of blogging – where ‘amateur wordsmiths’ could ‘pour their hearts out’ in cyberspace and be rewarded with high Google rankings is over. A new generation of micro-blogging tools like twitter, and alternative formats such as YouTube and Flickr have replaced the more traditional long-form text weblog, itself overtaken by blog magazines such as the Huffington Post said Paul Boutin. This being the internet, the article was quickly picked up on – and blogged – by amateur and professional hacks alike, which resulted in a surreal exchange on the BBC’s Today programme on Radio 4 this morning as presenter John Humphreys struggled with social media linguistics and asked his guests how many real friends they had.

This seems a neat reflection of the evolving nature of information exchange and flow that new technologies and online applications have made possible in the last few years. For many of us around the world daily exchanges on social media networks such as Facebook, plus access to news through TV, radio, online, print newspapers and on mobile phones is an unconscious act. We are used to consuming information in a variety of formats – often complaining that there is too much of it.

However tomorrow (24th October) on World Development Information Day (also UN day), it is worth remembering that in a media-rich world, many of the planet’s poorest still lack access to potentially life-saving information.

In a new policy briefing from the BBC World Service Trust “Left in the dark: the unmet need for information in humanitarian response” (PDF, 750MB), Imogen Wall and Lisa Robinson argue that millions of people, already suffering or at risk through manmade crisis or natural disaster, are having their problems compounded because they are denied access to basic information that could help them save or rebuild their lives.