The Village Telco
and
The Mesh Potato
a TEDx talk
18 September 2009
Steve Song
Telecommunications Fellow
Shuttleworth Foundation
email: steve.song@shuttleworthfoundation.org
blog: http://manypossibilities.net
skype: steve_l_song
twitter: stevesong

Connectedness

The average
Kenyan spends
more than 50% of
their disposable
income on mobile
services.

Communication Networks
12
Efficiencies Innovation

1.
Tinkering
is the new
inventing

“Economic growth occurs
whenever people take
resources and rearrange
them in ways that are more
valuable. A useful
metaphor for production in
an economy comes from
the kitchen. To create
valuable final products, we
mix inexpensive
ingredients together
according to a recipe.”
- Paul Romer
http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/EconomicGrowth.html

What would happen
if everyone had the
freedom to tinker
and adapt their
telephone networks?

2.
Emergence
is the new
order

From a mechanistic
metaphor...

... to a more organic,
living metaphor

Telephone Internet
Infrastructure Infrastructure

What would happen
if we could deploy
telephone networks
more like Internet
networks?

3.
Quantity
is the new
quality

Google's Search
Servers
Lots of
inexpensive
commodity
technology
outperforms
expensive custom
made servers.

What would happen
if telephone
infrastructure were
so cheap anyone
could deploy it?

4. Atoms
are the new
bits

The Cantenna

What would happen
if we could design
our own telecom
infrastructure?

paradigm
shift

1995
Walled
gardens

2009
Walled
gardens

expensive, locked down
telecoms in Africa
+
cheap, tinkerable,
broadband technology
=
opportunity

Village telco
workshop June 2008

Elektra
Rael Lissoos David Rowe

Early 2009

2011?

Come
join us!
http://villagetelco.org

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Steve Song
Telecommunications Fellow
Shuttleworth Foundation
email: steve.song@shuttleworthfoundation.org
blog: http://manypossibilities.net
skype: steve_l_song
twitter: stevesong