Why the future of African journalism lies in mobile social networks

Jude Mathurine Coordinator New Media Lab Rhodes University [email_address] Why the future of African journalism lies in mobile social networks Presented @ Media140, Sydney Future of Journalism in Social Media age

Are African produsers ready for social media?
Internet is still elite medium
This affects what is represented, who is represented and how they are represented
Africa constitutes about 4-5% of world’s Internet users
10% of South Africans have Internet access
5% in Nigeria
5% in Namibia
8% in Kenya
2,4% in Uganda

Not really!
But constrained by income, education, literacy, access to bandwidth, electricity and geography and bad regulation among others.
This skews WHO is able to use the Internet in general and social media in Africa in particular

Example: South African web
13% of South Africans 16yrs and older in major metropolis have accessed the Net in the past 4 weeks (+- 1.3 Million people)
50/50 male/female split
2/3rds of users are White
Predominantly still English speaking
Ave. household income has come down a bit (+- R13K / month) High LSM
2/5ths have a tertiary degree

The reality is
2005 average household income is R6 215 p/m (Stats SA)
This does not account for racial differences in income which has SA with the 2 nd worse Gini coefficient in the world
Blacks constitute 80% of the total population
Whites constitute about 9-11%
English speaking population as first and additional language totals only 13 million out of population of 44 million

So what?
Online social media biased towards wealthy, educated, urban elites (generally English speaking); people in communications disciplines et c.
Conversation in African social space is not representative of majority aspirations and replicates inequalities in social power
But it’s a great captive market – high LSMs, early adopters

So what?
If local media in Africa want to grow social networks as new public sphericules and as markets for monetisation, they have to help foster national ICT capacity; monitor ICT policy and market players
Groundwork in creation of social media already done by NGOs, commercial organisations, international social media e.g Ushahidi, Haiya, Zoopy
Means PARTNERSHIPS
Traditional media proprietary and BAD at partnerships

Are journalists ready for social media?
Not really
Little new media education
Shortages of computers
Shortage of cell phones
Shortcomings in the basic distribution of ICT,

Expensive broadband: In Africa, the cost of basic broadband per month was $366 in 2006. In Europe the average cost was estimated at $40
Malawi: one newsroom allows internet access for 30 minutes a day (2008)
Many newsrooms don’t have basic Content Management Systems
Some major titles in Southern Africa still don’t have web presence – not even a free blog
No ICT or social media policy in newsrooms

Only few well-heeled news operations allow journalists’ access to Facebook
Fewer allow access to Youtube;
Africa’s leading PBS, the SABC doesn’t even allow comments on news stories
Twitter?
Result – arid ground for open and conversational journalisms

Does The Digital Divide mean Africa will be left behind in real-time and social media revolution?

Not really!! Alexa ranking of top ten websites circa May 2009
MADAGASCAR
Yahoo
Google.mg
Google.fr
Google
Facebook
Moov.mg
Sobika
Windows Live
Free
MSN
KENYA
Yahoo
Google.ke
Google
Facebook
Windows Live
MSN
Youtube
Blogger
Wikipedia
Tagged
ZA
Google.co.za
Facebook
Google
Yahoo
Youtube
Wikipedia
News24
Blogger
Gumtree
MSN
NIGERIA
Yahoo
Facebook
Google.com
Google.com.ng
Windows Live
Youtube
MSN
Wikipedia
Blogger
Vmn.net

Two African countries are Opera’s Top 10 international users

Mobile Use/Consumption

The revolution will be mobilised

The African participatory web will be mobile
Personal customisable information and communication platform
Leapfrogs infrastructure and distribution limitations of fixed line Internet
2002 to 2008: global fixed line grew by 27 million .
2002 to 2008: global mobile subscriptions grew by 3.1 billion

Growth trends
Africa 2007: 28,5m landlines
Africa 2007: 198m mobile phones
Even lowest functionality mobiles can be used for SMS and creating SMS social networks
China: 30% of citizens access the Internet on their mobile phone.
Jamaica: Mobile web surpassed fixed line Internet

Social media roles
Time space distantiation, mobilisation, resource coordination, education, health
Communicating with Africa’s diaspora
Providing real time market information etc.
Example: Niger saw a 6.4% drop in grain price due to SMS sharing of market info
Political accountability e.g Ghana, Zimbabwe
Real-time monitoring and conflict reporting and prevention in Kenya, South Africa, Palestine, DRC (Ushahidi)

Youth
Youth are the future of African media as constitute the largest population demographic
Youth are also most vulnerable and least considered in editorial strategies and agenda setting
Youth are future of African democracies
Social media provide youth’s ‘gateway’ experience for further interaction with web

Mxit – 15m users

The Grid –location based social network

The Grid – GPS based social network can be used for locative reporting

Kabissa – networks African civil society groups using ICTs

Gatorpeeps –Twitter knock-off (integrates with Twitter account if desired)

Zoopy – online video community

Haiya – Kenya

But what about?
High handset costs?
Unreliable electricity supplies?
And low literacy levels?
Whatever works

No electricity, no problem Yes, it is a solar powered donkey cart

No electricity, no problem? Informal rechargers. Solar jackets for Boda Boda riders

What about handsets?
Google Android Open Source mobile operating system frees OS from hardware
Could result in cheap local cellphones
Venezuela produces Vergatario
Vergatario includes telephony, MP3, 3MP camera and MP4 playback
Price - $15

Bandwidth costs?
Four new subterranean sea cables to increase bandwidth capacity and (hopefully) decrease costs:
Seacom
EASSY
West African Cable System
Google’s O3B Project

SMS Africa’s killer near real-time app
Not all phones are smart phones but technology is recycled and handed down every two years
SMS is still the ‘killer app’ in Africa
Even lowest functionality mobiles can be used for SMS
In developed world, SMS is used as one to one tool – in developing world, it is a one to many tool using SMS networks
That is why Google introduced SMS search in Uganda in July

SMS in newspapers
SMS becomes talkback mechanism
User tips, viewpoints, responses, helps set editorial agendas
Reader SMSs published in newspapers and online
Where media freedom may be limited SMS provides outlet for free expression
As result, newspapers like The Namibian take flak from politicians for publishing SMS comments

The Namibian

Izindaba Ziyafika (the news is coming)
Knight funded project in School of Journalism
Linked to South Africa’s oldest independent newspaper
Links a Content Management System (Nika - give) for curating and managing newspaper workflow
Digital content available for other platforms like SMS networks, wired and wireless web
Thatha (Take) creates a SMS gateway for receiving user text messages

Grocott’s Citizen Media Newsroom

Citizen contributed media (Grocott’s fire photograph below)

Grocott’s Citizen SMS

MyMakana Citizen generated stories

Izindaba Ziyafika (the news is coming)
Citizen Journalism newsroom established
Platoons trained – students, NGOs, municipal councillors
Pro-am relations necessary to foster news awareness, basic skills for using computers and mobiles
Nika CMS available as Open Source tool for distribution
Nika CMS shifts analogue newspapers into the digital age
Changes news model from lecture to conversation

Concepts

A future for African social web is possible

Conclusion
Social media in Africa will be part of strong mixed media systems where mobile will be more important than the desktop access
Growth and use of African social media must be driven by media leaders who should learn from counterparts in commercial, NGOs and ICT4D sector
Social media can be important spaces for public discourse for democratisation and development especially among youth

Join the conversation Jude Mathurine @newmediajude http://nml.ru.ac.za

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Why the future of African journalism lies in mobile social networks

by Jude Mathurine on Nov 05, 2009

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