Browsing All Posts filed under »Community Informatics Practice«

Smart Cities vs. Smart Communities: Empowering Citizens not Market Economics

November 6, 2014

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So "Smart Cities" particularly in Less Developed Countries are ways of turning urban environments into gold mines for consultants, hardware and software companies and redoing the city in the image and for the benefit of its most prosperous and well-serviced inhabitants and in the meantime transferring additional resources and benefits from the poor to the rich.

The Right to Remember: A Speculative Community Informatics approach to “the Right to Be Forgotten”

July 5, 2014

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However, I am certain that having communities determine what needs to be remembered and what can allowed to be forgotten makes rather more sense and is more in keeping with the history of memory and the opportunities and value that memory provides us with, than turning those decisions over to anonymous and faceless Google administrators.

Internet Justice: A Meme Whose Time Has Come

November 27, 2013

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This list is as open ended as the Internet is open ended. Just as the horizon for enhancing the well-being of all global citizens through more efficient and effective communication and access to and use of information is continuously expanding, so is the need to ensure that the Internet is and continues to be a resource available, usable and of equitable benefit to all.

Beyond Access: Libraries Are the New Telecentres

November 16, 2013

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As those, who have been in and around community-based ICT/Internet access (community informatics) initiatives well know, the primary dilemma for these activities (e.g. Telecentres) is how to ensure sufficient sustainability, organizational stability and programmatic flexibility to allow for survival once the immediate round of funding which helped them launch, runs out.

Community Innovation and Community Informatics

April 6, 2013

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Innovation is the buzzword of the moment. Countries large and small, rich and poor, international agencies, private companies even individuals are pre-occupied with finding the key to "innovation". What precisely is meant by "innovation" of course, varies from context to context and even within contexts it is difficult to find a hard and fast definition that goes beyond simply referring to "change" of some sort and hopefully change for the better or change that builds on what has gone on before.

Community Informatics for Improving Health

March 11, 2013

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Maintaining and improving the health of its members is one of the most important functions that a community must fulfill. As well, we know that the cost of health care is in many parts of the world becoming a huge and even unsupportable burden because of the directions in which health care has been evolving. Finally, we know that there is a strong and positive relationship between health and one's involvement in social relationships, including those of family, friends and community. Thus exploring how Information and Communications Technologies might enable health and health services by, through and within communities would seem to be a natural focus for Community Informatics.

Glocality: Thinking about Community Informatics and the Local in the Global and the Global in the Local. Special Issue of the Journal of Community Informatics

September 3, 2012

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One of the peculiarities of conceptualizations in the age and context of the Internet is the continuing desire to retain the traditional categories of the pre-Internet age. We talk of rural development and urban environments, of the "local" as feature of spatial connection and the "global" as the field in which large processes and interconnections take place.

Two Worlds of Open Government Data: Getting the Lowdown on Public Toilets in Chennai and Other Matters

April 10, 2012

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There is it appears, two worlds of "Open Government Data"--one the world of smart phones, and Ipads, of apps and upscale "demographics" of interest to sponsors like Proctor and Gamble; and the contrasting world of slum dwellers without access to sanitation, of populations subject to systematic mal-and even corrupt administration --worlds where app providers and the folks who make the OGD available to them go public with multi-million dollar IPO's and ones where those with the courage to pursue public information may be putting their lives at risk.

Community Informatics and Older Persons: The Necessary Connection

March 6, 2012

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As is well known, there is a looming demographic crisis in Developed Countries with a rapidly aging population (people are living longer) and a rapidly declining birth rate. The effect of this is to put significant strains on overall economic activity and particularly on health care and support systems, as the aging population results in an increasing need for health care and medical interventions and for support and care services.

Evolving Relationships: Universities, Researchers and Communities:: Special Issue: Journal of Community Informatics: University — Community Relationships

January 12, 2012

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This issue of The Journal of Community Informatics (JoCI) deals with research relationships between universities and university based ICT researchers and communities. These matters are, of course of central significance to Community Informatics since much of CI is, in one form or another, linked into this type of relationship.