Centre for Internet and Society

Change is coming, thanks to the mobile

radha — 2011-04-02T15:09:50Z

An article by NT Balanarayan in the DNA on August 27th,'09

Bangalore: A simple mobile can do much more than all your friends or send you cricket alerts, this is not me saying it, this is what a bunch of mobile enthusiasts organised under the banner of different societies are trying to say with the upcoming unconference Mobile tech for Social Change.

The event which will be held in unconference style - read: casual atmosphere - will try to focus on mobile technology and applications which can help not just connect human beings, but also improve their lives. The event is being organised by Centre for Internet Society (CIS) in collaboration with Women's Learning Partnership, Mobile Monday Bangalore and MobileActive.org and will be held on September 1.

Sunil Abraham, executive director of CIS says that the event will bring together two groups of people and provide them a platform to interact and work on ideas.

"On one side, there are the NGOs and social entrepreneurs and on the other side there are the people who develop technology for mobile phones, the geeks and the hackers etc. So if this event works out like expected, there may be a mailing list in the future so that these people can keep in touch and help develop mobile technology that will help uplift the lives of people," he says.

So how important are mobile phones as a technology? According to Abraham, it might be the easiest way for an Indian to access the internet. "There are around 400 million mobile users in India against 80 million people who have occasional access to the internet. The mobile users end up using internet technology a lot in India through GRPS, EDGE and at times indirectly through SMS gateway. This platform however, needs more work so that much more can be provided to mobile users," he says.

The Mobile Monday initiative headed by Kesav Reddy, will be helping CIS to organise the event. "We are expecting not just NGOs and developers, but also, researchers, donors, intermediary organisations and mobile operators; all in all we are expecting 100-200 participants," he says.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/change-is-coming-thanks-to-the-mobile

CC Salon

radha — 2011-04-05T04:21:24Z

Creative Commons Casestudies, Featuring Status.Net - The Centre For Internet and Society and JAAGA are organising a CC Salon on 02nd December, 2009 at 7.30pm.

Creative Commons Casestudies, Featuring Status.Net

CIS and JAAGA are organising a CC Salon (http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Salon) by Jon Phillps on Creative Commons Casestudies, Featuring Status.Net

Venue: JAAGA

Time: 7.30pm

The aim of this get together is to share knowledge and experiences of alternative copyright licensing. Artists, lawyers dealing with copyright licensing and others are encouraged to highlight their own work, experiences and queries about Creative Commons and other alternative licenses.

An abstract of the presentation and the bio of Jon is given below.

ABSTRACT:

Creative Commons Casestudies, Featuring Status.Net

Creative Commons is a well-known nonprofit organization that increases sharing and improves collaboration. Its key tools are six licenses that fit between public domain and complete control, copyright, to give you control over how your work is shared with the world. This presentation explores high level case studies that use Creative Commons licenses to make a successful project. The key featured case study is Status.Net, a new status updating hosted service and open source software that uses Creative Commons licensing for content.

http://wiki.creativecommons.org/Salon

BIO:

Jon Phillips is a community and business developer contributing to society and building meaningful relationships. In 2002 he helped launch the open source drawing tool, Inkscape and founded the Open Clip Art Library. From 2005 until 2008 he built Creative Commons’ community and business development projects and is currently a Creative Commons Fellow. Currently, he is growing the media company Fabricatorz with Cantocore Art Exhibitions, Laoban Open Soundsystems, and is recently assisting with an upcoming re-launch of Status.Net (Identi.ca). He is known for growing successful open communities globally, leading international business development in Asia (particularly China), and developing Open Marketing.

http://rejon.org/bio/#images

VIDEOS

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/events/cc-salon

CC Salon

radha — 2009-12-01T13:16:39Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/home-images/Evite%20GI-CC%20New.jpg

Books shut by law blinkers

radha — 2011-04-02T14:20:16Z

An article in The Telegraph (Kolkata) by Chandrima S Bhattacharya - 6th December, 2009

Imagine a life without books. Try to imagine it, really, said Moiz Tundawala, a student at the National University of Juridical Sciences (NUJS). He cannot read: he has lost his eyesight slowly over the years. He can only distinguish between light and dark now. But he is one of the toppers in his class and he initiated the meeting on the “Right to Read” campaign at the NUJS last month.

The campaign aims to amend the Indian copyright law, so that Moiz and millions like him in the country have far greater access to books. Now Moiz uses JAWS, a software that reads out the text from a computer screen. Sruti Disability Rights Centre, Calcutta, organised the programme that was hosted by the NUJS and launched “Right to Read” campaign in Calcutta, after The Centre for Internet and Society from Bangalore had launched it in Chennai.

Technology has helped the visually impaired tremendously over the past decade or so. But not enough, certainly not enough people in India, which is home to the world’s largest number of blind people.

Of the 37 million people across the globe who are blind, over 15 million are Indians. One problem India faces is that such software is expensive. JAWS costs Rs 50,000 for every user. It is difficult for most to afford the software. So most use demo versions. The price also encourages piracy. And when the text is read out in English, since the software often comes from the US, the voice uses an American accent, said S.B. Patnaik, the principal of the Blind Boys’ Academy, Narendrapur, part of a panel that discussed technology as an aid to the visually impaired at the NUJS event. Many Indians find that accent difficult to follow.

The biggest problem is access to Indian texts. The Indian copyright law does not allow the conversion of all texts into formats accessible to the blind, such as in large print, audio, Braille or any electronic format. Nirmita Narasimhan of the Centre for Internet and Society said only a small percentage of Indian texts are now accessible to the visually impaired.
With her was Rahul Cherian of eBookbole, a website that encourages visually impaired and print-disabled people to connect and share books that have been converted into an accessible format.

The amendment of the copyright law is additionally important since India has already ratified the United Nations Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD).

The UN convention broadens the definition of accessibility for disabled persons considerably compared with its definition in Indian law. The activists are also demanding a change in the Persons with Disabilities Act, which defines access only in terms of built-in environment. They want to extend the definition of access, by taking it beyond the purely physical.
The UN convention extends the idea of access to many freedoms, and not only access to information, but to freedom of speech and expression and the right to culture and the right to leisure. In other words, it requires the written word to be fully available to the visually impaired, in whatever format the user is friendly with.

“India is under the obligation to implement the UN convention, since it has ratified it,” said Rukmini Sen, who teaches at the NUJS and was part of the panel.

Link to the original article

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/books-shut-by-law-blinkers

Book Stack

radha — 2009-09-18T09:56:25Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/home-images/book%20stack%20artwork.jpg

Ben

radha — 2009-12-06T10:22:17Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/home-images/benzo.jpg

Asia-Pacific Regional Forum on Mainstreaming ICT Accessibility for Persons with Disabilities

radha — 2011-04-02T15:16:04Z

The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) jointly with the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) and in partnerships with the Global Initiative for Inclusive ICTs (G3ict), the National Telecommunications Commission of Thailand (NTC), the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy (DBCDE), Australian Government, and National Electronics and Computer Technology Center (NECTEC) Thailand are organising the "Asia-Pacific Regional Forum on Mainstreaming ICT Accessibility for Persons with Disabilities" to be held in Bangkok, Thailand from 25 to 27 August 2009. The Forum is hosted by the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology (MICT) Thailand, Government of Kingdom of Thailand. Ms. Nirmita Narasimhan, Programme Manager, Centre for Internet and Society, India will be giving a presentation on Policy Formulation for Internet and Electronic Accessibility for Persons with Disabilities.

With 139 countries having signed the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities ("CRPD"), and 51 having ratified it as of October 2008, legislative and regulatory activities related to the implementation of its digital accessibility agenda will be a priority among ITU Member States. Yet, few references and guidelines are available for country regulatorys and legislators to implement such measures or foster national programmes supporting the digital accessibility agenda of the CRPD.

In order to address this challenge, G3ict and ITU organised a joint global forum on 21 April 2008 on Digital Accessibility standards in relation to the CRPD. At this occasion, ITU-D and G3ict launched a "Toolkit for Policy Makers", an online tool designed to provide practical references and case studies to support implementation of the digital accessibility agenda of the CRPD at country level. G3ict also released Version 1 of its self-evaluation methodology and is currently collecting country data for is benchmarking programme, the "Digital Accessibility Index" in cooperation with Disabled People's International and the support of the law firm Powers, Pyle, Sutter and Veryille.

The upcoming Asia-Pacific Regional Forum aims to:

Bring together policy makers, regulators, operators, industry, NGOs and international organisations involved with persons with disabilities, as well as experts and ICT professionals including disabled persons from across the region and beyond;
Discuss the global online "Toolkit for Policy Makers" that will support stakeholders in developing policies and strategies to address ICT accessibility and service needs from persons with disabilities to meet the dispositions of the CRPD;
Ensure proper publicity and generate momentum in support of the implementation of the Digital Accessibility Agenda of the CRPD focusing on practical implementation at country level; and,
Exchange country experiences and case studies among participants as well as learn about innovations of accessibility and assistive technologies and applications.

URL: http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/asp/CMS/Events/2009/PwDs/programme.asp

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/asia-pacific-regional-forum-on-mainstreaming-ict-accessibility-for-persons-with-disabilities-1

Asia Source 3 Meeting

radha — 2011-04-02T14:27:11Z

The Asia Source 3 Meeting Reinforces Asian Free and Open Source Software Movement - More than 150 Asian Open Source activists met in the Philippines from 07th November to 12th November to discuss the latest IT-tools for NGOs and SMEs and this time the Main Theme of Asia Source 3 was: Building Capacities and Empowering Humanity through FOSS

Asia Source 3 Meeting Reinforces Asian Free and Open Source Software Movement

More than 150 Asian Open Source activists discuss latest IT-tools for NGOs and SMEs in the Philippines
Gathering ends with knowledge sharing and plans to migrate to Free and Open Source Software (FOSS)
Main Theme of Asia Source 3: Building Capacities and Empowering Humanity through FOSS

Silang, Cavite - While most technology conferences happen as swanky, slick, and well-rehearsed events, the recently concluded Asia Source 3 took the opposite track and ran a camp that was spartan yet spontaneous. From November 7 to 12, 2009, Asia Source 3 gathered 150 representatives in the Yen Center to discuss developments in open source. For those six days, the campers lived in a communal environment that married fun and relaxation with exchange of ideas.
Asia Source 3 campers represented a large cross section of non-governmental organizations, small businesses, youth networks, and technology entrepreneurs from 15 countries (see full list below). While technology issues permeated the discussions, it took place with an emphasis on the economic and social context of cooperation among developing countries.

This is the third such event in the region, organized by the International Open Source Network (IOSN) and InWEnt - Capacity Building International of Germany ; earlier camps took place in Bangalore, India in 2005 and Sukabumi, Indonesia in 2007. It is based on the source camp template of the Tactical Technology Collective, an NGO that consults for other NGOs on technology. The Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development of Germany (BMZ), the ASEAN Foundation and the Open Society Institute funded Asia Source 3, with the aim to increasing awareness and adoption of free and open source software.

"We believe that the continuous strengthening of the Free Software community through source camps like this contribute to a more open collaborative environment," said Dr. Alvin Marcelo, Director of IOSN for ASEAN+3. "While the rising popularity and relevance of open source software is now unstoppable, the challenge is to harness the many activities into a coherent whole. And we are able to achieve this through community building."

Asia Source 3 also marked the official highlight of five years of regional FOSS support by InWEnt in Southeast Asia. "We are honored to be part of this movement through our training and network program it@foss" said Balthas Seibold, Senior Project Manager of InWEnt. InWEnt has trained and connected more than 1000 experts from Indonesia, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam and the Philippines in more than 30 training courses under its it@foss program.

In the tradition of previous camps, Asia Source 3 emphasized spontaneity over rigid planning. “We try to create an environment of collaboration and community," said Allen Gunn, the event's head facilitator. "No keynote speakers, no panels, no powerpoint slides. Instead, we set-up mini-discussions."

This approach makes the exchange of knowledge and development of relationships more organic and natural. It creates opportunities to broaden expertise, and forge new ideas and connections. Asia Source 3’s theme dwelt on building capacity among technical experts and organizational practitioners. It dealt with the topics of managing and broadcasting information through free and open source software and migration from proprietary alternatives.

Asia Source 3 was jointly organized by UNDP-International Open Source Network (UNDP-IOSN) through its ASEAN+3 Centre of Excellence (based at the University of the Philippines Manila) and InWEnt - Capacity Building International Germany, together with the Tactical Technology Collective, Aspiration (USA) and the Centre for Internet and Society (India). Funders include the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development of Germany (BMZ), the ASEAN Foundation and the Open Society Institute.

Asian countries represented in Asia Source III include Bangladesh, Burma, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Mongolia, Pakistan, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Timor Leste, Vietnam.

PRESS CONFERENCE
Asia Source 3 held a press conference last November 13, 2009, 12:00 pm, at the Yen Center, International Institute for Rural Reconstruction in Silang, Cavite. Press pictures and video footage can be found at http://asiasource3.net/blogs.

MORE INFORMATION
More information on Asia Source 3, and information on all organizers and funders
To join the community
More information on the International Open Source Network (UNDP-IOSN)

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/asia-source-3-meeting

Art and Social Media

radha — 2011-04-05T04:17:50Z

Art Resources and Teaching Trust in collaboration with The Centre for Internet and Society, is organizing a workshop titled "Art and Social Media" on January 16th-17th 2010, to be conducted by Anita Garimella.

Art, Resources and Teaching Trust (A.R.T.) Bangalore and The Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore invites you to a two days workshop, “Art and Social Media” by Anita Garimella.

Anita Garimella (http://www.linkedin.com/in/anitagarimella) is an internet and software product management and marketing consultant. After graduating from Stanford University’s Human Computer Interaction Program in 2000, she has worked on several projects in the industry including the creation and design of applications for Wallop, Facebook and Bebo.

The schedule of the workshop is as follows:

Day 1
Social Media, Web 1.0 and 2.0, and Art 11.00 AM - 1.00 PM
•    What is Social Media – and how does it connect with Web 2.0?
•    How is Social Media measured?
•    Virality, and the dangers of this new yardstick
•    Brief overview of Art & Social Media

Lunch 1.00 PM - 2.00 PM

Deep Dive – Case Studies of Art and Social Media 2.00 PM - 4.30 PM
•    Art blogs & discourse
•    Facebook & art
•    Art-making
•    Art marketing
•    Art pedagogy

Day 2
Opportunities & Challenges for Art using Social Media 11.00 AM - 1.00 PM
•    What is art in this context?
•    What are good ways to use social media for art?
•    Importance of defining goals in social media usage
•    Copyrights and public domain
•    Democratization of art – is that really possible?

Lunch 1.00 PM - 2.00 PM

Future of the Internet and technology and their impact on Art 2.00 PM - 3.30 PM
•    Web 3.0: Surf to Search to Subscribe
•    How to penetrate in an increasingly aggregated world
•    New technologies

Find attached a registration form. You can also download the registration form from www.artscapeindia.org. Interested participants can complete the registration form and send it along with a DD of Rs.1800/- (per participant and includes lunch and handout material) to the address given in the form.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/events/art-and-social-media

Art and Social Media

radha — 2010-01-06T08:05:03Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/home-images/artandsocialmedia.jpg

Art and Social Media

radha — 2010-01-06T08:06:33Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/advocacy/Art%20and%20Social%20Media%20workshop_reg.pdf

Amendment to Copyright Act opposed

radha — 2011-04-02T12:49:15Z

A report on the press conference held on 15th April, at the Press Club, Bangalore : The Hindu

Bangalore: The proposed amendment to the Copyright Act 1957 will deprive over 70 million persons with disabilities in India from exercising their Right to Education, according to the National Access Alliance.

The amendment, being introduced in the budget session of the parliament will prevent non-governmental organisations, educational institutions and persons with disabilities from converting reading material, including textbooks and reference material, into audio, digital and other formats.

“The licence procedure for the conversion of these formats is cumbersome, restrictive and lengthy. This will deprive students with print disabilities of their Right to Education,” Sunil Abraham, executive director, The Centre for Internet and Society, told presspersons here on Thursday.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/amendment-to-copyright-act-opposed

Agriculture, ICT and Community

radha — 2011-04-05T04:29:16Z

Sampada Foundation in collaboration with Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore and Institution of Agricultural Technologists present: 'Agriculture, ICT and Community'

Sampada Foundation in collaboration with Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore and Institution of Agricultural Technologists present:
Agriculture, ICT and Community on the 21st of September, 2009 at 10am. The agenda for the day will be as follows:

Sampada Community - an overview (15 minutes)
Introduction: Krushi Sampada (15 minutes)
Launch of e-book - By Nagesh Hegde
Talk by Addoor Krishna Rao: “Transformations in Agricultural Sector”
Discussion: Agriculture, ICT and Community

There will be no entry or registration fees. All are invited and are welcome to bring their friends along.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/events/agriculture-ict-and-community

Agriculture, ICT and Community

radha — 2009-09-17T06:54:26Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/home-images/Agriculture-%20ICT%20and%20Community.jpg

Agenda - R2R - Kolkata

radha — 2009-11-06T06:50:16Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/home-images/right-to-read-campaign-kolkata/Agenda.pdf