Technology For Peace - Ideas From The Trenches

Slide 1: TECHNOLOGY FOR PEACE: IDEAS FROM THE TRENCHES Sanjana Hattotuwa

Slide 2: Sri Lanka

Slide 3: Conflict transformation A process of engaging with and transforming  relationships, interests, discourses and, if necessary, the very constitution of society that supports the continuation of violent conflict CT cautions against too much of confidence in to  agreements Conflict can never be resolved, but it can be transformed  negotiate differences non-violently

Slide 4: ICT and conflict transformation “Satisficing” Culturally Online + Offline appropriate and sustainable Conflict Transformation Mobiles as well Interoperable as PCs Open Standars

Slide 5: ICT4Peace? “We value the potential of ICTs to promote peace and to  prevent conflict which, inter alia, negatively affects achieving development goals. ICTs can be used for identifying conflict situations through early-warning systems preventing conflicts, promoting their peaceful resolution, supporting humanitarian action, including protection of civilians in armed conflicts, facilitating peacekeeping missions, and assisting post conflict peace- building and reconstruction.” Paragraph 36, WSIS Tunis Commitment, 2005

Slide 6: My work in Sri Lanka Writing from 2001, working actively from 2003  Set up InfoShare in 2003 – only one of its kind in Sri  Lanka Applied research – technology that works, not just  promises Real life scenarios  Imagining solutions and pushing the art of the  possible

Slide 7: Scenario Grassroots organisation with big staff turnover  Limited Human, Financial and Technical resources  Website launched but not updated  You need to communicate your work  You need to communicate your community’s ideas  and aspirations / possible engender them Apathetic and unreliable traditional media coverage  Violent context 

Slide 8: The hardware

Slide 9: Connectivity – Wireless Broadband

Slide 10: Planning for content Think strategically – knowledge expands  exponentially Text, photos, audio and video complement each  other Who are your primary and secondary audiences?  Who are your content producers?  What media do the above use? 

Slide 11: Web 2.0 Wikipedia and Facebook are prime examples  User generated content  “In 2006, the World Wide Web became a tool for  bringing together the small contributions of millions of people and making them matter.” – Time Magazine Interactive, community based, conversational spaces  Two way communications 

Slide 12: Facebook – For personal use http://www.facebook.com Picture 2

Slide 13: Facebook – For campaigns http://www.facebook.com Picture 1

Slide 14: VOIP Voice over Internet Protocol / Voice over IP  Gives ulcers, migraines and reduces life expectancy  of traditional telecoms executives Free PC to PC anywhere in the world anytime  Cheap international dialing rates for fixed and  mobile phones Call conferencing  Easy recording for podcasts / Great for interviews 

Slide 15: Skype http://www.skype.com Picture 2

Slide 16: Skypecasts – Community conversations Picture 2

Slide 17: Call recorders for Skype You can use any of these programme to easily create a recording of your conversation, which you can upload to the web and create a podcast with ease.

Slide 18: Podcasts Audio broadcast available on the Web to the public  for free downloading to a personal computer or a digital audio player. podcasts_hero20070905

Slide 19: Podcast recording Audacity for Windows XP / Quicktime 8 for Mac Vista / Mac / Linux

Slide 20: Publishing a podcast http://ourmedia.org

Slide 21: YouTube http://www.youtube.com Picture 3

Slide 22: Flickr Picture 1

Slide 23: Use the tools in your OS Microsoft Picture 1  Office Picture Manager iPhoto on the  Mac Basics the same  as high end software Easy to use 

Slide 24: Use the tools in your OS Picture 2 Windows Movie Maker on the PC  iMovie on the Mac 

Slide 25: Google Maps http://www.ushahidi.com/ Picture 1

Slide 26: Blogs Can you send an email with an attachment? Then you can blog!  Shortened form of the phrase “Web log”  Like a diary or journal, but online. No coding knowledge necessary.  Easily link to other blogs, create local and international campaigns,  by-pass traditional media and potential have greater reach, can include multimedia Well over 70 million – the new Guttenberg of the web. 

Slide 27: Blogs Picture 1

Slide 28: Writing a post

Slide 29: Blogs – Typical features Comments on posts  Trackbacks (a way through which you are alerted  when others link to your posts) Categories / Sections  Archives  Blogroll (a list of other blogs you find interesting or  deal with similar issues)

Slide 30: RSS RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication, which is a  great name because the concept is just that: Really simple. It allows you to subscribe to an information feed that  gets delivered directly to your RSS reader or Web browser. So instead of visiting several different Web pages each  day or performing the same Web searches over and over, you can set up RSS feeds to do it for you.

Slide 31: Google Reader http://reader.google.com Picture 2

Slide 32: Instant Messaging Use MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, Skype,  Google Chat to coordinate and collaborate Saves on emails  Bounce off quick ideas  Quickly plan for action  Share small files quicker 

Slide 33: Twitter

Slide 34: Twitter.com

Slide 35: Mobiles In everyone’s hands  Persistent – Messages can be stored, forwarded  Cheaper to buy than a PC  Web integration (mobile > Twitter > RSS)  Great for community campaigns. Can complement other  media strategies for national level campaigns. Citizen journalism – Everyone is a witness! 

Slide 36: FrontlineSMS.com • It has been conceived, designed and written with NGOs in mind • The system can be used for internal staff-based communications, or to provide information to local communities via a sign-up process, or both. • Field-based NGOs can keep in touch with their fieldworkers from anywhere in the field.

Slide 37: Mobileactive.org 1. Using Mobile Phones in Electoral and Voter Registration Campaigns 2. Using Mobile Phones in Advocacy Campaigns 3. Mobile Phones in Fundraising Campaigns

Slide 38: Google Apps Government can’t easily shut down or block  Robust, reliable, pervasive, platform agnostic  Group calendaring, instant messaging, document  creation and archives, wikis, webpages, email lists and email services, online and offline access

Slide 39: This I believe http://www.thisibelieve.org Picture 1

Slide 40: Conversations with history http://www.uctv.tv/cwh/ Picture 2

Slide 41: Insight on conflict http://www.insightonconflict.org/ Picture 3

Slide 42: Groundviews http://www.groundviews.org Picture 1

Slide 43: Groundviews http://www.groundviews.org Picture 1

Slide 44: Oral histories – VOR Radio Picture 1

Slide 45: My personal bias

Slide 46: Ideas Ask people to send in ideas for peace on pre-paid forms  (through post) printed inside toothpaste, shampoo, soap, washing powder, milk power cartons and packages – which target females in households who may not necessarily otherwise engage in peace related dialogues. Scan or capture feedback and post it on website. A website that counts down to a million “voices” in support of  peace – people call in to a toll-free hotline from any mobile or landline to answer a) what does peace mean to you b) how will you work towards strengthen that which you outlined in (a) – in three minutes or less.

Slide 47: Ideas Collaborate with projects such as www.witness.org that  use digital media to record human rights violations Mobile phone based “swarming” –get your community  together quickly to a spot to stand up for something Capture ideas for peace through mobiles (competitions  for best 5 word idea for peace via SMS)

Slide 48: Thank you! sanjana@info-share.org  http://ict4peace.wordpress.com  http://sanjanah.wordpress.com 