Centre for Internet and Society

Social Mashup!

praskrishna — 2011-04-02T08:15:01Z

Save the Date Join us to meet India’s most passionate, innovative, and curious start-up social entrepreneurs for two groundbreaking days of conversations, connections and inspiration. This event will be held on 2-3 December 2010 at the Indian School of Business in Hyderabad.

Who’s invited? Start-up social entrepreneurs, senior social entrepreneurs, funders/investors and anyone else interested in early stage social entrepreneurship.

What will you get? You’ll have direct access to resources that meet your immediate and long-term needs. You might meet your mentor or mentee, your investor or investee, and your CEO or team member. And did we mention that we'll have a selection of artists and musicians in residence, all set to spark your creativity? Believe us, you're in for a dynamic, inspiring, affordable and fun two days that truly captures the spirit of a start-up!

What will you not get? Panels that seem to be designed for the panelists, talks that fail to inspire and networking that begins and ends with an exchange of business cards.

Speakers

The speakers represent a diverse range of perspective, experience and approach. With all of these people in the same place, sparks of social change are sure to fly.

Sachin Malhan, Inclusive Planet
Prema Gopalan, SSP
Gijs Spoor, Zameen Organics
Solomon Jayaprakash, Ashoka
Sunil Abraham, Mahiti Infotech Pvt Ltd
Ravi Agarwal, http://www.toxicslink.org/
Murali Mohan, Mukteshwari Bosco
Sunitha Krishnan, Muthu Velayutham
Dr Jayaprakash Narayan, Lok Satta Party
Vipin Thekkekalathil, Ashoka's Youth Venture India
Pankaj Jain, Acumen Fund
Payal Gupta, Flow Consulting
Rob Katz, Acumen Fund
Aarti Madhusudan, Governance Counts

Download the schedule

Contact

E-mail socialmashup@unltdindia.org or call + 91 22 3222 0475 or write to us at 4th floor Candelar Bldg, 26 St John Baptist Rd, Bandra W, Mumbai 400 050.

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Digitally Open: Innovation and Open Access Forum

praskrishna — 2011-04-02T09:26:09Z

Promoting Openness in Today's Digital World

The internet has created exciting new ways to share information and collaborate globally and we are only beginning to see its full potential. So what does the future hold, or more importantly, what could the future hold?

Join ictQATAR and Creative Commons for an interactive forum addressing how innovation can thrive in the digital age through sharing and openness. We'll take on issues such as digital content rights, the open cloud, open source software, openness in government, openness in creativity, culture and art and the value proposition of openness.

Hear the latest thinking from Google, Mozilla, Georgetown University and other leaders in the digital rights arena. Participate in lively panel discussions on openness in government, openness in business, and openness for culture and creativity.

Speakers:

Program:http://www.ictqatar.qa/output/page1988.asp#mbaker

8:45 a.m.      Registration Opens

9:30 a.m.      Welcome
                       Dr. Hessa Al Jaber, Secretary General, ictQATAR

9:45 a.m.       What it Means to be Open
                       Mitchell Baker, Chairperson, Mozilla Foundation

10:15 a.m.    Digital Content Rights
                       Joichi Ito, CEO, Creative Commons

10:45 a.m.    The Open Source Revolution
                       Chris DiBona, Open Source Programs Manager, Google

11:15 a.m.     Break

11:30 a.m.     The Open Cloud
                        Michael Nelson, Visiting Professor of Internet Studies, Georgetown
                        University

12:00 p.m.     Panel: Openness in Science and Technology

                      John Wilbanks, Creative Commons, VP for Science - Moderator

                       Shaikha Al-Jabir, Director of Marketing, Innovation and Alliance, Qtel
                       International

                       Hesham Al Komy, Head of Sales and Marketing, Middle East and Africa, Redhat

                       Habib Haddad, Founder, Yalla Startup, Yamli.com

                       Lucio Rispo, Qatar Science and Technology Park

1:15 p.m.       Lunch Break

2:15 p.m.       Panel: Openness in Government (moderated by Michael Nelson)

                       Sunil Abraham, Executive Director, Center for Internet & Society, India

                       Paul Keller, Senior Project Lead of Technology and the Public Domain,
                            Knowledgeland

                       Marwan Marouf Mahmoud, Executive Director of ICT Industry
                            Development, ictQATAR

3:15 p.m.      Panel: Culture, Creativity and Openness

                       Eric Steur, Creative Commons Creative Director - Moderator

                       Abdulrahman Al-Otaiba, Web and Application Developer

                       Arend Kuster, Managing Director, Bloomsbury Qatar Foundation
                            Journals

                        Roger Mandle, Director, Qatar Museum Authority

4:15                End

Speaker Bios:

Dr. Hessa Al-Jaber, Secretary General, ictQATAR

Dr. Hessa Al Jaber is the Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Information and Communication Technology, ictQATAR. In her nearly six years of leadership at ictQATAR, Dr. Hessa has led Qatar's ICT strategy across sectors, spearheading major initiatives in government, education and business.

She has overseen the liberalization of Qatar's telecommunications market, ushering in an era of choice and competition, and directed the modernization of Qatar's ICT infrastructure. Passionate about ensuring that the benefits of technology reach all sectors, Dr. Hessa has led numerous initiatives to make Qatar a more inclusive society through ICT.

She has spearheaded the modernization of Qatar's government through ICT, streamlining processes, making government more transparent and accessible to its people, and also launching an online portal to the government, Hukoomi. She is also leading Qatar's initiative to build the first high-capacity satellite "E'Shail" to be launched in 2012. Dr. Hessa has been instrumental in the creation of Mada, an assistive technology center that serves persons with disabilities in Qatar, as well as initiating a host of national programs that empower women and youth, and protect children online.

Mitchell Baker, Chairperson, Mozilla Foundation

As the leader of the Mozilla Project, Mitchell Baker is responsible for organizing and motivating a massive, worldwide collective of employees and volunteers who are breathing new life into the Internet with the Firefox Web browser and other Mozilla products. Baker was born and raised in Berkeley, California, receiving her BA in Asian Studies from UC Berkeley and her JD from the Boalt Hall School of Law. Her law career included working for Sun Microsystems and Netscape. She has also sat on the board of the Open Source Applications Foundation.

Baker has been the general manager of the Mozilla project since 1999, helping shape the license under which Netscape's source code was released. In 2003, she became president and founder of the Mozilla Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to openness and innovation on the Internet. In 2005, Baker led the creation of Mozilla Corp., a wholly owned subsidiary of the Mozilla Foundation. As Chairman of the Mozilla Foundation, Baker continues her commitment to an open, innovative Web and the infinite possibilities it presents.

Joichi Ito, CEO, Creative Commons

Joichi Ito is the CEO of Creative Commons. He is a co-founder and board member of Digital Garage. He is on the board of CCC and Tucows. He is a Senior Visiting Researcher of Keio Research Institute at Shonan Fujisawa Campus in Japan. He is on board of a number of non-profit organizations including The Mozilla Foundation, WITNESS and Global Voices.

He has created numerous Internet companies including PSINet Japan, Digital Garage and Infoseek Japan and was an early stage investor in Twitter, Six Apart, Wikia, Technorati, Flickr, SocialText, Dopplr, Last.fm, Rupture, Kongregate and other Internet companies. He has served and continues to serve on various Japanese central as well as local government committees and boards, advising the government on IT, privacy and computer security related issues. He maintains a weblog (http://joi.ito.com/) where he regularly shares his thoughts with the online community.

Chris DiBona, Open Source and Public Sector Program Manager, Google

Chris DiBona is the open source and public sector programs manager at Mountain View, Ca. based Google. His team oversees license compliance and supports the open source developer community through programs such as the Google Summer of Code and through the release of open source software projects and patches. In the public sector space, he looks after Google Moderator, the polling locations API. Additionally, he is on the board of Our Good Works, a non-profit that looks after the volunteer matching website Allforgood.org.

Mr. DiBona is an internationally known advocate of open source software and related methodologies. He occasionally appears on the This Week in Tech and Cranky Geeks podcasts. He is a visiting scholar at the MIT Sloan School of Management and has a masters in software engineering from Carnegie Mellon University. Additionally, he serves on the advisory board of imeem, a San Francisco, Ca. based social networking firm.

Michael Nelson, Visiting Professor of Internet Studies, Georgetown University

Michael Nelson is currently Visiting Professor of Internet Studies in Georgetown University's Communication, Culture, and Technology Program. Since January 2008, he has been doing research and teaching courses on "The Future of the Internet" and technology trends as well as consulting and speaking on Internet technology and policy.

Nelson is a Trustee of the International Institute of Communication, a member of the Board of FirstMile.us, and until April was a member of the Board of Trustees of the Internet2 university research consortium. He is also the outgoing chairman of the Information, Computing, and Communications Section of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

Panelists:

Sunil Abraham, Executive Director, Centre for Internet and Society

Sunil is the executive director of the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), in Bangalore. He is the founder of Mahiti, a social enterprise aiming to reduce the cost and complexity of information and communication technology for the voluntary sector by using free software. Sunil continues to serve on the board of Mahiti. He is an Ashoka fellow and was elected for a Sarai FLOSS fellowship.

For three years, Sunil also managed the International Open Source Network, a project of United Nations Development Programme's Asia-Pacific Development Information Programme, serving 42 countries in the Asia-Pacific region. In 2007 - 2008, he managed ENRAP an electronic network of International Fund for Agricultural Development projects in the Asia-Pacific, facilitated and co-funded by International Development Research Centre, Canada.

Dr. Shaikha Sultan Al-Jabir, Director of Marketing, Innovation and Alliances, Qtel International

Dr. Shaikha Al-Jabir a visionary IT executive who understands where business is going and takes corporate IT to a whole new level. She is currently the Director of Marketing, Innovation and Alliances in Qtel International (QI) where she is building a framework for strategic and sustainable innovation within QI.

Prior to joining QI, she was the CIO at Qatar General Electricity and Water Corporation- Kahramaa, where she established a sophisticated ICT infrastructure, placing the organization at the forefront of technology. Dr. Al-Jabir has a PhD in Computer Science, MS in Telecommunications and Computers, and a BS in Electrical Engineering.

Abdulrahman Al Otaiba

Abdulraham is a Qatari developer who has been passionate about computers since an early age. He started as a software developer, then web developer, and recently mobile application developer. Most of his personal projects are released under the open source license. He also co-founder and editor-in-chief of Almashroo Arabic blog, which talks about all sorts of web development.

Habib Hadad, Founder & CEO, Yamli.com

Habib is a serial tech entrepreneur, recently founder and CEO of Yamli.com a startup focused on empowering the Arabic language on the web. His also the founder and CEO of YallaStartup an NGO focused on early stage entrepreneurship in the MENA region.

In 2009, the World Economic Forum recognized Habib as a Young Global Leader and the ArabianBusiness named him one of the most influential Arabs under 30. He currently serves on the Global Agenda Council on innovation.

Paul Keller, Senior Copyright Advisor, Knowledgeland

Paul Keller is senior copyright policy advisor at Knowledgeland, an Amsterdam based think-tank focused on innovation in the knowledge economy. He is public project lead for Creative Commons in the Netherlands and serves as Collecting Societies Liaison for Creative Commons International.

Paul is an expert on open content licensing with a special focus on the cultural heritage organizations, the music industry and the creative industries. Next to his work for Creative Commons he is currently coordinating the copyright related aspects of Images for the Future one of the biggest digitization projects for audio-visual heritage in Europe and he is one of the architects of the licensing framework for Europeana, the European Union funded online aggregator of Europe's cultural heritage. Paul frequently advises organizations on the implementation of open content licensing strategies.

Arend Küster: Managing Director, Bloomsbury Qatar Foundation Journals (BQFJ)

Arend joined BQFJ from Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, where he was Business Development Director and led the development of Bloomsbury Qatar Foundation Journals. He has over 5 years of consulting experience in Sales and Marketing Strategies for scientific, technical and medical (STM) publishers including Elsevier Science, Springer, American Physical Society, Taylor and Francis, Wiley Blackwell, University of Chicago Press, British Medical Journal, Oxford University Press and Cambridge University Press, Palgrave Macmillan.

Marwan Marouf Mahmoud, Executive Director of ICT Sector Development, ictQATAR

An ICT professional with more than 20 years of experience working with various levels of technology, Marwan oversaw the preparation and implementation of some of the most comprehensive ICT strategies in financial institutions and now heads the ICT Industry development at ictQATAR. In this role ictQATAR, he is involved in building an ICT Industry ecosystem and a digital content ecosystem, which includes initiatives in intellectual property, broadband infrastructure, international ICT Industry cooperation and entrepreneurship programs in the digital content space.

Roger Mandle, Executive Director, Qatar Museums Authority (QMA)

Roger Mandle brings to the Qatar Museums Authority (QMA) more than four decades of experience as a senior museum executive and arts educator. As Executive Director, he oversees all of the QMA's museum programs and building projects, including the Museum of Islamic Art. His responsibilities range from administration and finance to the curatorial direction of the museums to a comprehensive educational program, which includes the creation of an international network of training opportunities for Qatari citizens who desire careers in the museum field.

Mr. Mandle comes to the QMA from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) in Providence, Rhode Island, where he served as President since 1993. From 1988 to 1993, he was Deputy Director and Chief Curator at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. Mr. Mandle was the Director of the Toledo Museum of Art in Toledo, Ohio from 1977-1988 and served as Associate Director of the Minneapolis Institute of Arts in Minneapolis, Minnesota from 1967 to 1974.

Lucio Rispo, Strategy Research Director, Qatar Science & Technology Park

Lucio has more than 35 years of experience in multinational and multicultural environments.
Lucio is currently Strategic Research Director at Qatar Science & Technology Park (QSTP). Prior to joining QSTP Lucio was Managing Director at BioGeM, a European leader in the biotech research and services. He developed strategy and services based on a network infrastructure which allows internationally cooperation.

In 2006 Lucio founded the telecom division of Pradac Informatica, Srl, which provided value added services for telecom companies, and which was acquired by Amuser. Prior to Amuser, Lucio held several executive positions including Wordwide Telecom Sales VP at Sema Group, President at Nortel Networks for the Southern European Region and CEO for Europe and Latin America at Bull.

Eric Steuer, Creative Director, Creative Commons

Eric Steuer manages Creative Commons' relationships with artists, media companies, and cultural institutions. He produces creative projects and events that emphasize the use of CC licenses, and also directs the organization's media strategy. Before joining Creative Commons, Eric was as an editor for Wired Magazine, which he continues to write for. He is on the board of CASH Music, is the co-founder of Sneakmove Recordings, and is in a hip hop group called Meanest Man Contest.

John Wilbanks, Vice President, Science Commons, Creative Commons

As VP of Science, John Wilbanks runs the Science Commons project at Creative Commons. He came to Creative Commons from a Fellowship at the World Wide Web Consortium in Semantic Web for Life Sciences. Previously, he founded and led to acquisition Incellico, a bioinformatics company that built semantic graph networks for use in pharmaceutical research & development. Previously, John was the first Assistant Director at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School and also worked in US politics as a legislative aide to U.S. Representative Fortney (Pete) Stark.

John holds a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy from Tulane University and studied modern letters at the Universite de Paris IV (La Sorbonne). He serves on the Board of Directors for DuraSpace and AcaWiki.

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Crisis for identity or identity crisis?

praskrishna — 2011-04-02T08:16:30Z

The hurry with which the government is pushing its most ambitious project to assign a number (UID) to every citizen without any feasibility study or public debate has raised many questions.

“It will empower all”, declared Prime Minister Manmohan Singh when he issued the first UID card to a villager from Tembhli village in Maharashtra. But as days pass and relevant issues come for public discourse, many people have begun to doubt prime minister’s assurance.

Unique identification number (UID), named Aadhaar is a 12 digit identification number that the government plans to issue to all citizens that will not only be an identity card but will also serve multiple purposes for its holder.

Infosys co-founder Nandan Nilekani has been assigned the responsibility to execute this proposal as Chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI). Mr Nilekani leads a team of 120 people having the task of assigning unique identities to 1.2 billion people. He plans to take Aadhaar beyond being just a 12-digit identification number for every Indian. This ambitious and mammoth project is pitched to handle projects as diverse as a national-highway toll-collection system, a technology backbone for the forthcoming Goods and Services Tax (GST) and reform of the vast public distribution system (PDS) for subsidized foodgrains.

Government plans to cover 60 per cent of the nation’s population under this project in the next three years starting October this year. This project is intended to collect identification data about all residents in the country. It is said that it will impact the PDS and NREGA programmes, and plug leakages and save the government large sums of money.

But the UID will not replace ration cards and passports, and is not mandatory as of now. No questions would be asked related to language, caste or religion of the person applying for UID.

The UID number is linked to the fingerprints and the pattern of the eyes of the person assigned that number. This inimitable biometric data ensures that any given number is linked to only one person. So there is hardly a chance of any misgiving or stealing of rations and wages from the holder. It is believed that soon banks, insurance companies, cell phone providers and hospitals will demand UID number before doing business with you.

In short, in the future our name, address, bank account numbers, personal information and identity as a whole will be solely linked and governed by those 12 digit number we hold.

Critics say that there has been no feasible study conducted about UID project, neither has there been a cost benefit analysis done. To add to it, there are serious concerns about data and identity theft.

But apart from the buzz about this new project, there is an air of suspicion surrounding it too.

The launch of the UID has led to a flurry of debate amongst policy-makers, legal experts and civil society at large. In response, Mr Nilekani claims the UID to be “a foolproof project implemented at a low cost”.

However, some critical issues remain unanswered.

One of the major objections about UID is that there has been no feasible study conducted, neither has there been a cost benefit analysis done. There is no project document as such.

To add to it, there are serious concerns about data and identity theft.

In a world where cyber terrorism is the new threat, and the countries are gearing themselves to protect against such a threat, projects like UID come as an open invitation to terrorist outfits to infiltrate their defences.

The UID number is linked to fingerprints and the patterns of the holder’s eye. But medical studies show that our eye's iris patterns can change due to aging, disease or malnourishment. More over the government has no alternative option for many millions who fall outside this pattern of identification owing to callused hands, corneal scars and cataract induced by malnourishment. Even as enrollment is poised to begin, authentication is still an unstudied field. Fake fingerprints can very easily be made. Hence, the unique element of these numbers can be tampered.

Recently, Sunil Abraham, Director, Centre for Internet and Society has remarked, “If I leave my fingerprints around, my identity can be stolen and transactions done on my behalf. They could use that number, to share information about anybody.”

A cyber-criminal having access to any person’s identification number can virtually control that person. Telephone numbers, addresses, family history can all be tracked down. Bank accounts can be manipulated and transactions done without the person knowing. Since these days, a lot of money transactions are done through internet, a cyber criminal can easily steal few UID numbers and impersonate those persons to manipulate the bank or credit card accounts.

In an even uglier scenario, where people might be tracked and judged by their numbers, a criminal’s fingerprints left behind on a scene of crime can be mixed with some one else through a slight manipulation and exchange of UID numbers, making an entirely innocent person a suspect in the eyes of law. Some incompetent or revengeful government officials can also frame innocents for a crime one never committed.

Human rights activists claim that a tech-savvy person can hack into the system and gain any person’s information from the servers unless the government tightens the defenses. A reminiscence of the Bruce Willis starrer Hollywood blockbuster Die Hard 4, a bunch of techno geeks operating from trailer truck hold the entire United States hostage as they hack into every main frame computing network from transportation, communication, power, defence and individual accounts.

The number can also be used for real time tracking, profiling, mounting surveillance and ‘convergence’ of information. Apart from the concerns about identity theft, the number can also invade our private space. If in the future insurance companies and hospitals merge their databases, the insurance companies can increase premium, or simply refuse insurance cover to a person who is not keeping well.

Poor labourers and immigrants who are on the move in search of work could also be the victims of the ‘Aadhaar’. In future, in case of card being lost or misplaced, poor labour would be threatened with financial and welfare exclusion. Where being a legal resident is to be closely tied in with having a UID number, it could render the poor vulnerable to exclusion and expulsion by exploitative employers and others.

Interestingly, few months back in June, UK government scrapped the plans for the controversial 5 billion pounds National Identity Card scheme. The UK government now plans to destroy all information held on the National Identity Register, effectively dismantling the whole system.

Though Mr Nilekani claims that UID would be a cost effective project, however deeper analysis throws a different story. It is reported that the UIDAI project will cost Rs 45,000 crores to the exchequer in the next 4 years. This does not seem to include the costs that will be incurred by Registrars, Enrollers, additional costs on the PDS system to connect it to the UID, the estimated cost to the end user and to the number holder.

Defending himself from the flurry of queries, Mr Nilekani has stressed that the identification number is not mandatory for everyone and only those interested can enroll. The project aims to first enroll the poor and uneducated masses promising them better wages and ration schemes. As was reported, the first villager to get the UID card was ‘happy but did not know its benefits’. Critics allege that the reason why Aadhaar is selling itself to millions of poor in the country is to create a foundation of legitimacy to deflect concerns over its possible misuse, unsafe technology and huge costs. Later, with a larger foundation, the UID can be enforced upon all citizens in the near future as the apex identity proof, making everyone vulnerable to several risks described above.

The UIDAI project has proceeded so far without any legal authorization. There has been no feasibility study or cost-benefit analysis preceding the setting up of such a pervasive project. All calculations are of the back-of-the envelope variety. Data theft is a very serious threat to every individual and the country as a whole. There are deeply disconcerting facts about the project that should make even a die-hard UID supporter worry about its long term implications.

This article has been written by Sushant Sharma. He is a college fresher and avid reader.

Interestingly, few months back in June, UK government scrapped the plans for the controversial 5 billion pounds National Identity Card scheme. The decision came after about 15,000 citizens had already been enrolled and given their numbers. The UK government now plans to destroy all information held on the National Identity Register, effectively dismantling the whole system.

The UK system like the Indian UID had also started with much fanfare, claiming to save nearly 900 million pounds for the taxpayers. While the project was axed, UK’s Home Secretary Theresa May stated - “It (the identity card project) is intrusive and bullying, ineffective and expensive. It is an assault on individual liberty that does not promise a great good.”

The same logic implies to the India as well. But instead of scraping this over-hyped-failure-in-the-making project, our Prime Minister claims the UID project “will empower all”. But will it actually? That is for us to decide now.

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Network Culture: Archaeological and Artistic Interventions Public Seminar – Talk by Kristoffer Gansing and Linda Hilfing

praskrishna — 2010-12-01T07:07:07Z

Kristoffer Gansing and Linda Hilfling will give a talk on Network Culture on 8 November 2010 in the Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore.

“Transversal Media Practices”

by Kristoffer Gansing (SE)

Digital network culture (and before it, multimedia) has since at least the mid-1990's often been described as a situation where, through an overarching process of integration, old and new media collide and converge in different ways (Zielinski 1999, Bolter & Grusin 1999, Manovich 2001, Jenkins 2006). This study investigates how the relation between new and old media forms and their associated practices have been critically appropriated in the field of media art, specifically dealing with alternative media and emerging media-archaeological practices.

“Gate Peepin' or a few thoughts on delivering people ...”

by Linda Hilfling (DK)

The countless click-and-agree contracts populating the Web are veritable gate keepers of the communities making up today's net culture, such regulations are, although materially detached from the structures that they govern, powerful means of controlling content on the Net. Through an introduction to the critical design intervention, Gate Peepin' and related projects, this presentation opens up for a discussion on participation, means of regulation and the user's position within social media platforms.

Gansing and Hilfling have collaborated on projects since 1999. Their joint projects include experimental platforms for media production exploring local/global networks and the curating of festivals and exhibitions challenging linear assumption of technological development. They often collaborate with different communities: CUDI in Vollsmose 2000-2002, Oda Projesi in Istanbul 2003, Sarai/LNJP Colony in New Delhi 2004 and currently with the artist-run TV-station tv-tv in Copenhagen. In 2005 they initiated the media archaeological festival The Art of the Overhead, an ongoing project which pays tribute to the almost forgotten medium of the overhead projector.

About Kristoffer Gansing (SE)

Kristoffer Gansing (SE) is a researcher at K3, School of Arts & Communication, Malmö Univ, with a research project on Transversal Media Practices, dealing with the articulation of old and new media forms and practices across art, activism and the everyday in the cultural production of network culture.

About Linda Hifling (DK)

Linda Hilfling (DK) is an artist who works with the premises of participation and public spaces within media structures, with a focus on means of control (codes, organisation and law) and their cultural impact. Her artistic practice takes the form of interventions reflecting upon or revealing hidden gaps in such structures.

Also see [1] and [2]

The two talks will proceed for 30 min for each speaker followed by short Q&A’s. Finally there’ll be a joint discussion. Tea and refreshments will be served.

VIDEOS

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/events/archaeological-and-artistic-interventions

City in the Internet 1: Geography Imagined (Part 1)

praskrishna — 2012-03-13T10:43:50Z

“The estuaries that flirt with the land mass before they finally perish in the vast deep blue ocean beyond were perfect in their shape and grace. And you know what; from top it appears like a surreal landscape that is so restive and peaceful, almost heaven. The countryside is actually very beautiful”, says Pratyush Shankar in his latest blog post. A random conversation between two person discovering the joys of seeing our existence through Google Earth!

The use of maps through the Internet has seen a many fold increase in recent times. With availability of satellite information to anyone through various websites we are witnessing a sea change in the manner in which our space (cities, countryside and landscape) is being gazed upon. This is an important time historically, as it has the potential to fundamentally alter our imagination of space; right from the scale of a country to our neighbourhood block.

The Internet today is perhaps right in the middle of such mediation of the city and people. The Google maps, satellite imagery, road maps, place markers, are leading to a re-imagination of our own environment. Let us try and explore some of the key concepts that gets raised in the process of such expressions of space and its mental constructs. This is the part one of the essay and by the end of the next post I will try and speculate its impact on city spaces (yes the real space!)

Story 1: Geography is sensed and lived in

As a child growing up in a not so small town of Kota, Shailendra and his group of friends swore allegiance of silence and if needed deceit when it came to their weekend forays outside the city; a swim in the river Chambal. The swim was a big no-no for kids, as stories of people being washed away in the strong current of the merciless river that had steep banks, were drilled into every potentially aberrant child of the town. If not the force of the water it definitely had to be the crocodiles that wait for days together, at the dark bottom of the river for that one sweet sound of a child swimming above. After that it is only gore and blood. But Shailendra and his friends could not resist the temptation of a good swim in the cool water. He often boasted about his dives and his long swims and that he saw a crocodile come his way but swam faster than that wretched creature. And some time during a leisurely mood as he and his friends sat on the banks of the river, smoking Charminar with the Chambal swiftly passing below, he spoke about his dream of leaving this small city of aunts, cousins, family festivals, marriage, river and crocodile for the “big city”; the city of lights, new friends and endless possibilities. This is how he understood his city; small, protective and the big river on its periphery. The city was compact, the river dangerous, the slopes of the city lead to a valley which had rich but soft soil; not so perfect for foundations of buildings but great for mango orchards they frequented last summer. The orchards were owned by the Garasia’s, the land owning class of the villages around, and they made good money. They could marry off their daughters to neighboring villages and throw a lavish dinner for the community. Not bad at all, he thought considering the fact that this community had small land holding and almost no access to credit . Further downstream the villagers were much richer. The Patidar community here had access to capital from their ancestral assets and strong community networks as they used the river water for intense irrigation; they grew basmati rice, export quality very much “Made in India”. Their sons studied in boarding school at Mt. Abu and would often show0ff their recent shopping booty from Mumbai or Delhi. Enough land and plenty of water can do wonders he thought!

Shailendra and his friends understood the geography as much as they understood the economic processes that are associated with land and water all across the length and breath of the country. The agricultural modes as linked to the geography of land is as common a knowledge, as the fact that one has to remove slippers before entering the temple premise. The geographical understanding of a place or region is necessarily one of soil, surface drainage, river, canals and how it impacts building and agriculture activity. This is true for most souls of the large number of villages and towns of India. The geography taught at the local school’s is as abstract and distant as Galelio’s invention of telescope or closer home the 1857 mutiny against the British. Land is understood through immediate examples that affect and lets us understand the structure of space around; the relationship of land, its water bodies, forest, its produce, livestock, agriculture and people. It is this web of relationship that provides the primary reading of landscape. A reading emerging from survival and dreams. An understanding that is bodily and involves all sense.

Story 2: Geography is contested

The push and the subsequent fall was bad, considering the fact that it was only suppose to be a friendly game of football with the boys from the municipal school. Pyjama chhap; that’s what Ajay used to call these boys. Ajay knees were badly bruised, something he had got used to since he joined the school football team. But the injuries and the resultant bandage were in fact trophies he did not mind showing off in his neighborhood. Sweet pain eh! But today his encounter with the boys from Municipal School no -32, Kandivalle in the football match left him a bit shaken. There was something about that push, something strange in the eyes of the boys who did him in. No apology, no shake of hands but a brutal look as if that bunch might kill him if he come anywhere close to them. Ignoring the skirmishes, he soon carried out with his show of bandages in the knee and slight limp in school; a typical John Travalto one. This had been a regular ritual he performed often to woo the girls of the class, a show that said “I am the Alpha male and have just returned from a battle where I proved my supremacy. I am broken here and bruised there. Some sympathy, some support, some sweet nothing talk or maybe a gentle caress might help”. And life goes on. A daily ritual of updating the facebook profile, completing the homework, sourcing the “ultimate porn”, avoiding dad, recharging the sim, football practice and girls.

Life rolled on till the day Ajay was again confronted with the same pyjama chaap kids of the Municipal school. This time it was beyond the security of his school compound in the market street exposed to the elements. The same dirty look and menacing stare. He tried to smile but before he could realize the one in the center with a dark face and curly hair shouted “matherchod bahut shaana ho gaya hai tu” (mother fucker you have become too smart these days). Now this one was a pure googly. Ajay was stumped, confused and more than anything else he was sweating with fear. Why me and why here in full public view. But..but what is the matter boss, he said? Matter is very clear, said the other one with a squint eye; your dads behind eviction of two shops, one house, three families and four dogs. You assholes have brought these families to street because your dad brought the municipal bulldozers to clear the plot in front of his clinic so that he can plant trees and have a nice parking for his clients. Now this was heavy… very heavy. Ajay just could not fathom why it had to be him. And.. and what is in that piece of land anyways. A large neem tree, dusty rough surface, some shanty and a nullah flowing with the exposes water pipe.

The encounter lasted a few seconds but it was devastating. He ran to the comfort of his house and immediately asked for hot masala maggie. Oh sweet home; it felt so good to curl up on the couch, switch the channels of the television, check the emails; all so personalized and predictable. He wanted all the familiar comforts that day…

Ajay soon outgrew the incident and went about planning his daily inaction’s, weekly bunks and occasional dates. But that incident also changed him. He had a keener eye now, for both sensing trouble and also to things around him he earlier had failed to notice.

He understood how the rivulet that flows from the ghats to the sea, actually is the life line of some twenty thousand families that stay there with their dogs, cats, shops, scooters and some even cars. He knew that the mangroves of the city are now piece of trophy used by the environmentalist to rally for protection and stop the International Airport project. He knew how the Mumbai floods were actually man-made as subsequent corrupt municipal officers choose to ignore the fundamentals of topography and water. That is how he learned about the geography of his city; from being absolutely ignorant about his surroundings, he suddenly knew how his city is the space of conflict, of emancipation, deceit, opportunity and corruption. The fractured geography of his city told the story of survival, human ingenuity and violence.

The “image from top”

“The view of the Earth from the Moon fascinated me—a small disk, 240,000 miles away. It was hard to think that that little thing held so many problems, so many frustrations. Raging nationalistic interests, famines, wars, pestilence don’t show from that distance”

Frank Borman, Astronaut aboard Apollo 8, ‘A Science Fiction World—Awesome Forlorn Beauty,’ Life magazine, January 1969.

The view of the earth from moon and satellites in the late 50′s and 60′s contributed to imagination of the planet as an artifact that is small, vulnerable and alone in space. It fed a whole generation of activists, scientist and media to speak about the earth as a unique place. The image of earth with its deep blue surface, clouds and spots became the single most important symbol that fueled the the hearts and minds of the generation, that questioned the development model of the western world. It attacked the core values of modernity and growth that was drunk on technology, performance and confidence to master the elements of nature. But at the same time, it hearled a very different way of reading space. Riding on the growth of both print and visual mediums it led to an explosion of imagery that showed the “God’s view of the earth”. A fantastic collage of calm blue oceans, neat forests and swirling clouds streams. The good old map that existed in Geography- II textbooks of schools were so boring now; way too abstract and almost a diagram.

That old maps did not inspire any spatial imagination but it did have these lines where none existed. The straight lines of longitude, the dark red meridian, the political boundary of nations, the dark circular one of the capital city. And yes the arrows; the ones showing the direction of the ocean current, swirling all around the blue waters. Maps are much maligned lot these days. Often seen as expressions of the intent to document, control and exploit the land that was colonized by them, maps were instrument of power struggle in India and elsewhere. But they do exist amongst us like many other colonial legacies. Maps are provocative, they express an opinion and engage with the user to form a dialogue of questions and answers. For example the map of Delhi metro is statement of origin-destination possibilities of the large city. A statement of the state of flows and possibilities for movement of one self in the space.

Maps are a statement of processes of space which may or may not express visually. For example the map showing the per-capita consumption of cereals in a district, may or may not manifest as a form. It is the story of the people, their ability to access food supplies etc.

The map is telling a story that made you develop an imagination of space. The satellite image leaves nothing for imagination.

But the view from top has often been perceived to be the real space; as it actually exists. Unlike maps that are either surveyed and drawn, Google Maps and such derivatives on the internet today use an “image from top” as a basic conceptual ground to explore space. Let us now try to deconstruct this phenomenon further.

The image of space below taken from top is important from the point of view of creating grounds for further information. The image pretends to be complete, authentic, accurate and real. There is no possibility for error. The camera are special, there lens accurate, the satellite is state of art and the image is not “photo-shopped”. This portrayal assumes that the visual image is the baseline reality to be recognized. The image then claims to be “the” window to reality and becomes the mediator between the person and his/ her imagination of the surrounding space. Unlike maps wherein the first cut documentation is a bodily involvement of people with space while conducting physical surveys, it is the snap of the camera in case of satellite images. Whereas it is common knowledge that ground physical survey are way too accurate in terms of their dimensional characteristics, the “image from top” are seen to be more closer to reality. This raises interesting questions from the point of view of our understanding of space be it the forests, oceans, rivers, countryside or cities.

Will the dependence on the image (satellite pictures) and its derivative maps that we are witnessing through the internet today for visualizing space lead to a viewer that is satisfied with the “happy” image of his surroundings? Does it mean that the visual (image) becomes more important than the “process” (be it processes of nature, human survival, achievement etc) when imagining space. In short are the meanings attached to the image limited now than before.

So are we headed towards a more homogeneous imagination of our space and its parts due to the mediation by the same image through the internet? The forest are dense, the plantations greens, the coastline smooth, the old city organic and water bodies are deep blue.

Wait! The story has a new twist

But there is something also happening to the image on the internet. There are place markers, text, suggestions, stories, links to other site and even pictures overlaid on the satellite images or its maps. The story is getting interesting now; the technological possibility of user participation is creating a new layer of information and opinions on the maps. Far from being a specialized cartographic exercise, maps are being now created by people. It expresses their impressions, choices and preferences about their space.

This phenomenon of the individual expressions over the expanse of the vast space is new and needs to be further understood. More about it in the next post…..

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/histories-of-the-internet/blogs/internet-society-and-space-in-indian-cities/city-in-the-internet

As somebody who thinks he is quite “with it” when it comes to digital technologies, my universe was slightly shaken by a bunch of screen-agers. I asked them if they blogged. There were 10 seconds of awkward silence, in which they exchanged looks, cleared throats and fidgeted. I thought I had perhaps crossed a line and they might be uncomfortable sharing their personal blogs with me. The universe of blogs is often restricted to close friends. I was just about to reassure them that they did not have to share theirs, when a bold one looked me in the eye and said, “You still blog? You must be so old! Blogging is, like, so 20th century!” The school kids, their pockets bulging with iPods, PSPs, cellphones and Bluetooth devices all nodded in unison.

It was a startling realisation that about a decade ago, there were young people, largely in schools and universities, for whom blogging was the coolest thing. Sites like LiveJournal, Blogspot and Wordpress were the hottest addresses. People formed communities, interest groups, meet-up platforms, swap groups and cool-kids’ clubs while providing detailed insights into their personal life and incisive commentary on the world around them. Blogging has been accepted by all sectors of society; governments use them for the dissemination of policies and reports, marketing companies use them to share reviews and invite feedback, schools and universities use them as teaching tools.

However, after this unsettling adventure, I decided to figure out where the younger generation was spending its time. A little bit of prodding and the screen-agers guided me to interfaces that were more than just screens to access the internet. And so I was introduced to FourSquare, the geo-tagging application that rides on your cellphone and publishes information about your physical location. An app which has become a rage around the world. With the easy availability of smart phones and cheap GPRS access, it has become easy to triangulate one’s position using Global Positioning Systems (via satellite) or your Internet Service Providers. FourSquare, like many other applications, blurs the ever decreasing gap between virtual reality and real life, and now allows users to “check in” at locations that they pass through and publish information about their whereabouts, on sites like Facebook or especially dedicated sites.

For the digital native it has become a way of forming a support group and a peer network like never before. Of the six digital natives I spoke to, at least two keep track of their close friends through this app. All of them have participated in flash parties, one met his girlfriend because they happened to be in the same coffee shop and sent each other messages. Two confessed to “stalking” somebody in school using the app. And then one told me the story of how FourSquare helped her in a sticky situation. Let’s call her R.

One night, after a study session with her friends, R and her roommate started their 2 km walk home. On the way, they became aware of a group of boys following them. They were only half-way home and the streets were completely deserted, since it was past midnight. R posted about it on FourSquare, and marked the route she was taking home and sent it to all the people who had checked in at different places on that route. And to her relief and surprise, she immediately received messages on “how to be safe”. One enterprising user asked all the users still awake on the route that R and her friend were taking to come out and stand at their gates. In a matter of minutes, R was delighted to see the streets no longer deserted. On the short walk home, she encountered 17 people, mostly young, standing by and seeing them home to safety. R recalls the incident with pleasure.

When I asked her about the possibility of somebody else harassing them because they knew they were vulnerable, she looked a little perplexed and said, “but they were all my friends,” despite the fact that she did not know any of them and had never met them. They were together in a design of trust that the application provided and because of their digital commonalities, they had become friends and neighbours and communities of support for each other. “And now you are going to blog about it, aren’t you?” asked R, as all of them burst into giggles.

Read the original in Indian Express

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/you-are-here

નિશાંત શાહ: ડિજિટલ પેઢીનો ઉદય

praskrishna — 2011-08-04T10:31:25Z

‘ડિજિટલ નાગરિક’ તેમને કહેવામાં આવે છે જેણે સામાન્ય જનજીવનમાં ડિજિટલ ટેક્નોલોજીના પ્રવેશ થઈ ગયા બાદ જન્મ લીધો છે. ડિજિટલ નાગરિકો દરેક જગ્યાએ છે. હવે સમય આવી ગયો છે કે આપણે એ જાણવાનો પ્રયાસ કરીએ કે આ લોકો કોણ છે, તેઓ શું કરી રહ્યા છે, તેઓ પોતાના અંગે શું વિચારે છે અને કેવી રીતે તેઓ કશું પણ જાણ્યા વગર આપણા ભવિષ્યને નવો આકાર આપવાનું કામ કરી રહ્યા છે.

એક નવા પ્રકારની ‘ડિજિટલ નાગરિકતા’નો ધીમે-ધીમે ઉદય થઈ રહ્યો છે. ડિજિટલ ટેકનિક આપણી નવી પેઢીના સામાજિક ડીએનએનો એક ભાગ બની ચૂકી છે. આ પેઢીએ ટેક્નોલોજીની દુનિયામાં જ જન્મ લીધો હોવાથી તેમનો તેની સાથેનો સંબંધ તેમની અગાઉની પેઢી જેવો નથી. દુનિયાના ઘણા બધા લોકોને અસર કરનારી ઓગસ્ટની એક ઘટના જાણવા જેવી છે. તેઓ જ્યારે પોતાનાં કમ્પ્યૂટરો,પીડીએ, આઈપેડ અને લેપટોપ પર ઓનલાઈન થયાં ત્યારે તેમને અહેસાસ થયો કે તેમની વાતચીત,ગપ્પાંબાજી, ચેટિંગ, શેરિંગ સહિતની અનેક બાબતોની તાસીર કોઈ પણ જાતની પૂર્વ સૂચના વગર રાતોરાત બદલાઈ ગઈ છે.

એક નાનકડા પરિવર્તને અનેક આયામો ખોલી નાખ્યાં છે. દુનિયાના કરોડો લોકો માટે દોસ્તી કરવાનો, સંબંધ બનાવવાનો, વ્યવસાયિક નેટવર્કની સ્થાપના કરવાનો, મનોરંજનનો, યાદોનો સંગ્રહ કરવાનો અને એક-બીજા સાથે આપ-લેનું માધ્યમ બનેલી વેબસાઈટ ફેસબુકે પોતાના પ્રાયવસી સેટિંગમાં એક નાનકડું પરિવર્તન કરીને અનેક લોકોને નવી સુવિધા પૂરી પાડી છે. જેના દ્વારા તેઓ જ્યાં ઇચ્છે ત્યાં ‘જિયો ટેગ’ (એક એવી પ્રણાલિ જેના દ્વારા ફોટા, વીડિયો, વેબસાઈટ જેવા વિવિધ મીડિયા કે આરએસએસ ફીડમાં ભૌગોલિક ઓળખના ડેટાને જોડી શકાય છે) નો ઉપયોગ કરી શકે છે.

બદલાઈ રહેલી દુનિયામાં આ પ્રકારની સુવિધાઓ મહત્વની બની રહી છે. ડિજિટલ નાગરિકો વચ્ચે આ બાબતો ચર્ચા અને કેટલીક વખત અફવાનો વિષય પણ બની જતી હોય છે, જેની પાછળ ચર્ચા કરવામાં યુવાનો પોતાની ઘણી ઊર્જા ખર્ચી નાખે છે. વેબદુનિયામાં તમને એવા અનેક લોકો મળી જશે જે ટિન ફોઈલની ટોપી પહેરીને ફરતા હોય છે અને નવા માધ્યમમાં જૂની માન્યતાઓ અંગે વાતો કરતા હોય છે. તેમને માટે આ નવી ટેકનિકલ સુવિધાઓનો અર્થ છે રોજિંદા જીવનના અનુભવો અને વિચારોને એક-બીજા સાથે વહેંચવાનો વધુ એક નવો વિચાર.

‘જિયો-ટેગિંગ’ જેવી સુવિધાઓનો ઉપયોગ કરતા લોક વાસ્તવિક જીવન અને કલ્પનાઓની સરહદોને એક-બીજા સાથે મિલાવી દેવાનું પસંદ કરે છે. આપણામાંથી ઘણા લોકો એવા હશે જેમને આ બધી બાબતો વિચિત્ર લાગે એમ છે. તેઓ વિચારશે કે આ પ્રકારની પ્રતિક્રિયાઓનું શું કારણ છે? છેવટે લોકો આટલી સામાન્ય બાબતોમાં કેમ રસ દાખવે છે? આ પ્રકારની ફાલતું બાબતો માટે લોકોને સમય ક્યાંથી મળે છે? જે લોકો ડિજિટલ દુનિયાથી અપરિચિત છે કે જેમને તેની સાથે કોઈ સંબંધ જ નથી, તેમની સામે હું માથું નમાવ્યા સિવાય કશું કરી શકું તેમ નથી.

પરંતુ પોતાનો ઘણો બધો સમય ફેસબુક, માયસ્પેસ અને ટ્વિટર જેવી સોશિયલ નેટવર્કિંગ સાઈટ પર વિતાવનારા, ગેમ્સ રમતા, બ્લોગ લખતા કે બીજાના બ્લોગ પર પોતાનો અભિપ્રાય વ્યક્ત કરતા, પોતાના ફોટો એકાઉન્ટને અપડેટ કરતા રહેતા અને પોતાની ડિજિટલ ઓળખને વધુ વિસ્તારતા રહેતા ‘ડિજિટલ નાગરિકો’ માટે આ તમામ બાબતો અત્યંત મહત્વની છે.

કદાચ તમારામાંથી ઘણા લોકોએ આ અગાઉ ‘ડિજિટલ નાગરિકતા’ અંગે સાંભળ્યું નહીં હોય, પરંતુ આ કોઈ કપોળ કલ્પિત વાત નથી. ‘ડિજિટલ નાગરિક’ તેમને કહેવામાં આવે છે જેણે સામાન્ય જનજીવનમાં ડિજિટલ ટેક્નોલોજીના પ્રવેશ બાદ જન્મ લીધો છે. આ કારણે તે કમ્પ્યૂટર, ઇન્ટરનેટ, મોબાઈલ ફોન, એમપીથ્રી જેવી ટેક્નિકલ સુવિધાઓથી સંપૂર્ણપણે વાકેફ છે. સામાન્ય રીતે ૧૯૭૦ બાદ જન્મેલાને ડિજિટલ પેઢી કહેવામાં આવે છે, પરંતુ ૨૧મી સદીની માહિતી ક્રાંતિમાં ઊછરેલી પેઢી માટે આ વ્યાખ્યા ફિટ બેસે છે.

‘ડિજિટલ નાગરિકતા’ શબ્દનો સૌ પ્રથમ ઉપયોગ માર્ક પ્રેન્સ્કીએ વર્ષ ૨૦૦૧માં પોતાના પુસ્તક ‘ડિજિટલ નોટિંગ્સ, ડિજિટલ ઇમિગ્રન્ટ્સ’માં કર્યો હતો. ડિજિટલ નાગરિકોનાં સામાજિક ગુણસૂત્રોમાં જ આ ટેક્નોલોજી સમાઈ ચૂકી છે. તેની સાથે નવી પેઢી એટલી વણાયેલી છે કે તેમને તે કૃત્રિમ ઉપકરણ નથી લાગતાં. આ ટેક્નોલોજી તેમની જીવનશૈલીનો એક ભાગ બની ચૂકી છે. ‘ડિજિટલ નાગરિકતા’ના સૌથી મોટી ઉંમરના સભ્યો તે છે જેમણે પોતાની ઉંમરના ત્રણ દાયકા પાર કરી દીધા છે.

જ્યારે સૌથી નાની ઉંમરના તેમને કહેવાય જેમણે તાજેતરમાં જ દુનિયાને જાણવા-સમજવાની શરૂઆત કરી છે. શક્ય છે કે દુનિયાનાં અનેક મહત્વનાં દસ્તાવેજોમાં હજુ તેમના નામનો સમાવેશ પણ થયો ન હોય. ડિજિટલ નાગરિકો દરેક જગ્યાએ છે. કદાચ તેઓ એવી માહિતીઓ અને જાણકારીઓના સ્ત્રોત છે જેમને આપણે વિકીપીડિયા પર વાંચીએ છીએ.

ડિજિટલ નાગરિકો સંપૂર્ણ રીતે નવી ટેક્નોલોજીમાં ઊતરી ચૂકેલા છે, નિપુણ છે. તેમને માટે ભૌતિક દુનિયામાંથી આભાસી-કાલ્પનિક દુનિયામાં પહોંચી જવું ડાબા હાથનો ખેલ છે. સમય અને સ્થળની મર્યાદાઓ તેમના માટે કોઈ અર્થ નથી રાખતી. તેઓ ધીમે-ધીમે, ચુપચાપ પરંતુ નિરંતરતાની સાથે આપણી દુનિયાની રૂપરેખાઓને બદલી રહ્યા છે. આ ‘ડિજિટલ નાગરિક’ આપણી દુનિયાના સ્થાયી નાગરિક છે અને હવે તેમની વાતો પર ધ્યાન આપવાનો સમય આવી ગયો છે. આપણે એ જાણવાનો પ્રયાસ કરીએ કે આ લોકો કોણ છે, તેઓ શું કરી રહ્યા છે, તેઓ પોતાના અંગે શું વિચારે છે અને કેવી રીતે તેઓ કશું પણ જાણ્યા વગર આપણા ભવિષ્યને નવો આકાર આપવાનું કામ કરી રહ્યા છે.

નિશાંત શાહ, લેખક સેન્ટર ફોર ઇન્ટરનેટ એન્ડ સોસાયટીના સંશોધન ડાયરેક્ટર છે.

This column on Digital Natives by Nishant Shah appeared in the Gujarati newspaper Divya Bhaskar

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/digital-native-in-divya-bhaskar

Hogyan szűrik a kormányok az internetes tartalmakat?

praskrishna — 2010-10-13T12:01:00Z

Az internet szabadságáról tartanak háromnapos konferenciát Budapesten a Google és a Közép-Európai Egyetem (CEU) szervezésében. Kedden az internetes tartalmak szűrése volt a legfontosabb téma a rendezvényen.

Rob Faris az amerikai Open Net Initiative nevű szervezet képviseletében beszélt kedden a kormányzati internetszabályozásról. Faris különböző országok eljárását vizsgálta, és a befolyásolás, a tartalomszűrés három generációját különítette el.

Az első lépés az egyszerű szűrés volt, amely szoftverek segítségével találta meg és tiltotta le a nemkívánatos tartalmakat. A második generáció már valamivel kifinomultabb, de továbbra is részben az elsőn alapul. A szoftveren kívül azonban más eszközökkel, például jogi fellépéssel lehetetlenítette el az állam ezekben az országokban azokat a szájtokat, amelyek a kormányzatnak nem tetszettek.

Egyes országokról is szólt Faris. Kiemelte Argentína esetét, amikor bizonyos időszakokban lehetetlen volt Maradonára keresni a dél-amerikai országból, illetve bizonyos argentin verziójú keresőprogramokon. A sportolón kívül néhány argentin politikusra sem adott találatot a szóban forgó keresőprogram.

A harmadik generációs internetszűrés már igazán kifinomult technológiát alkalmaz. Ez bizonyos politikai nézetek terjesztésén és a közvetítő eszközök "nem túl kemény" befolyásolásán alapul. Ilyen, Vlagyimir Putyint támogató kormányzati propaganda folyik például Oroszországban Faris szerint.

A szakember úgy véli, Kína a legjobb példája annak, hogy a szűrés és szabályozás mindhárom generációja "együtt él" - bizonyos szájtokat teljesen blokkolnak, máshol a tartalmat szűrik, és a harmadik generációs módszerek is megjelentek az ázsiai országban.

Faris előadása után indiai, pakisztáni és kirgiz hozzászólók árnyalták a képet: a pakisztáni Shahzad Ahmad, a Bytes for All szervezet munkatársa arról az esetről beszélt kimerítően, amikor egy bíró a szélsőséges csoportoktól befolyásolva betiltotta szinte az egész Facebook és sok más internetes oldal elérését is Pakisztánban. Végül a legfelsőbb bíróság felülbírálta ezt az ítéletet, amit Ahmad nagy sikernek tekint.

Sunil Abraham az indiai Centre for Internet and Society képviseletében viszont arról beszélt, hogy az indiai szoftverfejlesztés központjában a Microsoft szakértői képzik a bírókat az internetes jog alkalmazására, Indiában tehát más a helyzet, mint a szomszédos Pakisztánban.

A kirgiziai Tattu Mambetalieva a Civil Initiative on Internet Policy képviseletében oroszul szólalt fel, a tolmács és az ő szavaiból kiderült, hogy Kirgizisztánban az ötmillió lakos közül nyolcszázezren neteznek. Viszont ott is van negatív példa: egy internetszolgálató kiadta felhasználóinak adatait a kormányzati szerveknek, és sokan ezután börtönbe kerültek a volt Szovjetunió közép-ázsiai utódállamában.

Read the original in hvg.hu

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/hogyan-szurik

Konferencia az internetes szólásszabadságról Budapesten

praskrishna — 2010-10-13T11:03:16Z

Az internet és szólásszabadság viszonyát vitatják meg Budapesten, a Közép-Európai Egyetem és a Google szervezte, háromnapos konferencián

Az internet és a szólásszabadság viszonyát, az internetes tartalmak korlátozásának nemzetközileg egyre elterjedtebb gyakorlatát vitatják meg a Közép-Európai Egyetem (CEU) és a Google által közösen szervezett háromnapos budapesti konferencián.

A hétfői előkészítő műhelybeszélgetések után a konferenciát hivatalosan kedden nyitotta meg John Shattuck, a CEU rektora. Köszöntőjében úgy fogalmazott, hogy egyeteme "a szabad kifejezés laboratóriuma", melyet egy elnyomó rendszer romjain hoztak létre. Mint mondta, akár az internet, a CEU is határokon átnyúlik, diákjai a világ minden részéről érkeznek. Kifejtette, hogy az internetes szólásszabadságért folytatott küzdelem rendkívül összetett és állandó érdekellentétektől - így a biztonság, a privát szférához való jog és a kifejezés szabadsága gyakori ütküzésétől - terhes.

"Az internet az emberi szabadságért vívott küzdelem fontos eszköze lehet egy olyan korban, melyben a jövő rendkívül bizonytalan" - zárta bevezetőjét Shattuck. A CEU rektora után David Drummond, a Google alelnöke köszöntötte a résztvevőket. Drummond arról beszélt, hogy az internetes tartalmakat egyre több ország korlátozza valamilyen mértékben: míg 2002-ben még csak négy ilyen állam volt a világon, addig ma már negyven. Törökország, Kína, Oroszország és mások eközben saját, államilag támogatott keresőmotort terveznek kifejleszteni - tette hozzá.

Drummond hangsúlyozta: a Google célja a szabad önkifejezés és az információhoz való hozzáférés lehetőségeinek lehető legnagyobb mértékű kiterjesztése, a "szabad, nyitott és biztonságos internet" megvalósítása. Az első tematikus blokk egyik résztvevője, Sunil Abraham, az indiai Centre for Internet and Society (Internetért és Társadalomért Központ) munkatársa élesen bírálta a fejlett országokat: úgy vélte, csak addig támogatják a nyitott, korlátozásoktól mentes internetet, ameddig nem sérülnek a szellemi tulajdonjogaik és az azok utáni bevételek. Emlékeztetett arra, hogy a szabad internet és az online szólásszabadság nemcsak emberi jogi, de súlyosan gazdasági kérdés is.

Rob Faris, az amerikai Open Net Initiative (Nyitott Hálózat Kezdeményezés) munkatársa szerint nyilvánvaló, hogy az interneten megtalálhatók illegális, illetve sértő, bántó, de még legális tartalmak is; a kérdés, hogy hol lehet meghúzni ezek között a határt, és kinek van ehhez joga - tette fel a kérdést. Az Egyesült Államokban - említette példaként - a kongresszus kétszer is megpróbálkozott az pornóoldalak betiltásával, a legfelsőbb bíróság azonban mind a kétszer visszadobta a tervezetet - a kompromisszumos megoldás végül az lett, hogy iskolákban, könyvtárakban és hasonló helyeken letiltották ezeket az oldalakat, máshol viszont nem.

Rob Faris is kiemelte, hogy a szabad internetezés korszaka végérvényesen lezárult, a hatóságok ma már a címek letiltásától a tiltott tartalmakat megjelentetők fizikai zaklatásáig számtalan eszközzel korlátozzák a világhálót. A rohamosan terjedő kép- és videomegosztó, illetve közösségi oldalak ellen egy másik - például Kína által követett - stratégia az alternatív, helyi szoftverek kifejlesztése - magyarázta Faris. Az amerikai szakember kifejtette azt is: a szabályozási kérdéseket bonyolítja, hogy a közösségi oldalak saját - sokszor az általános hatóságinál szigorúbb - szabályzatot alkotnak felhasználóik részére.

A felszólalók egyetértettek abban, hogy az internet szabályozása terén nagyon sok a megválaszolatlan kérdés, ezért a konferencia után létrehoznak majd egy honlapot, ahol folytatódhat az eszmecsere.

See the original in Hirado Online

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/konferencia-az-internetes

Internet, szabadon

praskrishna — 2011-04-02T09:25:49Z

A polgárjogi aktivisták konfrontálódtak és panaszkodtak, a Google és a Facebook hárított és panaszkodott az Internet at Liberty konferencián, amelyet kedden és szerdán rendezett a Google és a CEU Budapesten.

– Célunk a szabad, nyílt és biztonságos internet. A Google igyekszik maximalizálni az információhoz való szabad hozzáférést, bár néha hibázunk. Útelágazáshoz érkeztünk, valószínű, hogy az internet korlátozottabb lesz, és a felhasználókat megfosztják hatalmuktól. 2002-ben még csak négy, 2010-ben már 40 ország – köztük Irán, Törökország, Oroszország és Kína – kormánya blokkol tartalmat a neten. Azon vannak, hogy kiépítésék saját, államilag támogatott és feltehetően cenzúrázott keresőiket. A Google célja, hogy a net szabad maradjon – röviden ezt mondta David Google Drummond, a Google jogi igazgatója, egyben a Google egyik alelnöke a Google és a CEU és a Google által szervezett nemzetközi konferencián, az Internet at Liberty 2010-en kedden Budapesten.

Hát ezért kár volt ilyen messzire jönni.

De még mielőtt a hallgatóság egy emberként a laptopjába bújt volna, hogy a Farmville-ben bekkelje ki az elkövetkező két napot, szerencsére kiderült, hogy a jelenlévők között akad rengeteg polgárjogi aktivista, netes szabadságharcos és született privacymániás a világ minden részéről. Ők gondoskodtak róla, hogy személyes, országos, sőt globális volumenű panaszaikkal árnyalják a süppedő padlószőnyegből és az erdei gigantposzterből áradó, felelősségteljes corporate derűt.

„Az internet önmagában nem változtat meg semmit. Ki kell menni az utcára, és a vérünkkel kell fizetnünk!”; „Legalább mondják meg, mi a szart csinálnak!”; „Tudja maga, milyen rendőrségünk van nekünk Pakisztánban?” - ilyen és ehhez hasonló hozzászólások árnyékolták be a felelősségteljes corporate derűt. Amely a sötét fellegek ellenére egészen kedd estig kitartott; de ne szaladjunk ennyire előre.

A jó, a csúf és az illegális

Az internetes szólásszabadság története a jó, a csúf és az illegális története, mondta a konferencia első beszélgetésén Rob Faris, a Harvard Berkman internetes központjának kutatási igazgatója és a nyílt internetért ügyködő OpenNet Initiative munkatársa. A legfontosabb feladat Faris szerint eldönteni azt, hol húzódik a határ a csúf, de még törvényes, és az illegális tartalom között. Erre a legjobb példa a netes pornó helyzete az Egyesült Államokban: az USA Legfelsőbb Bírósága kétszer is megsemmisítette a betiltást célzó törvényeket, és most ott tart az ügy, hogy csak az iskolákban és a könyvtárakban elérhetetlen a pornó, egyébként alkotmányos védelmet élvez. Nem úgy, mint Indiában, de ne szaladjunk ennyire előre.

Faris szerint ugyanakkor világszerte mostanában jelennek meg az internetszabályozás második generációs módszerei, amelyek között ott vannak a szerzői jogi alapon benyújtott eltávolítási kérelmek, sőt az aktivisták és a médiaszájtok ellen intézett kibertámadások is. Az egyes országok kormányai finomítottak szűrési módszereiken, Bahreinben és Jemenben például a választások idején csak speciális szájtokat és információt blokkoltak, Argentína eljutott odáig, hogy néhány éve sikerült a Yahooból elérhetetlenné tennie a Diego Maradonára vonatkozó találatokat. Faris konklúziója: nemzetközi megoldásokra van szükség. De ne szaladjunk ennyire előre.

Panaszfal extra

Nem kellett sok idő hozzá, hogy a konferencia egyetlen hatalmas panaszfallá változzon, vicces és kevésbé vicces panaszrohamokkal. A kirgiz meghívott, Tattu Mambetalieva elmondta, hogy Kirgizisztánban kevesen neteznek, mert drága. Sunil Abraham, az indiai meghívott elmondta, hogy náluk blokkolják a pornót, különös tekintettel a Savita Bhabhi kalandjait ábrázoló képregénysorozatra [Warning: Not safe for work - adult content]. Sazad Ahmad, a pakisztáni meghívott elmondta, hogy a náluk a kormány blaszfémiára hivatkozva blokkol, de mindig kiderül, hogy politikai okok állnak a háttérben.

Egy szíriai aktivista arra panaszkodott, hogy a tunéziai kormány 12 millió dollárért vett a netes forgalom ellenőrzésére szolgáló szervert, és hogy a fejlődő országokban a tartalomszűrésre használt szoftvert nyugatról szerzik be. Egy jemeni aktivista arra panaszkodott, hogy a yemenportal.net-et blokkolja a kormányzat, és hogy a világ semmit nem tud az országban zajló tömegtüntetésekről, nem beszélve a helyi LGBT-közösségéről és a rockegyüttesekről. Tunéziában az a probléma, hogy ha tömegmegmozdulás szerveződik a neten, húszezren feliratkoznak ugyan rá, de csak tízen mennek el. Törökország több száz szájtot blokkol, köztük a YouTube-ot és a Google számos szolgáltatását (Docs, Books, Translate). Azerbajdzsánban két bloggert bebörtönöztek írásaik miatt, és azért nem engedik ki őket, mert nem számítanak újságírónak. A Facebook törli a szoptató anyákról készült képeket, és a Wikipédián az emberi anatómiát taglaló szócikkeket illusztráló fotókat egyre gyakrabban váltják fel rajzok.

Csodák csodájára a panaszok úgy pattantak le a jelen lévő politikusokról, diplomatákról és üzletemberekről, mint eltévedt golflabda a moha lepte kőkerítésről: a Facebook, a Google és a francia külügyminisztérium jelen lévő képviselői, részben tehát a közvetlen címzettek végig ügyesen hárítottak. Folyamatosan hangoztatták, milyen irtózatosan nehéz dolguk van ebben az egyre globálisabb világban, ahol diktatúrák és demokráciák között kell zsonglőrködniük, mindenkinek a kedvében járniuk, és ők mindent megtesznek ugyan, de hát Kína, ugye. Meg Irán. Főleg Irán. Így aztán nem hozott érdemi vitát a Facebook és a Google közös színpadi szereplése sem, pedig a két cég magas szinten képviseltette magát: a Google-től Drummond, a Facebooktól egyenesen Lord Richard Allan, Hallam bárója, volt brit parlamenti képviselő jött el Budapestre, akivel interjút is készítettünk [2].

Még a kritikus sem kritizál

„Nem áll szándékomban a privacy-vel kapcsolatos kritikát megfogalmazni”, mondta nekik kérdésnek látszó expozéjában Marc Rotenberg, az Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) igazgatója, akitől joggal lehetett várni, hogy rendesen megszorongatja a Google és a Facebook tökét. Rotenberg a két cég képviselőihez intézett beszédében annyit mondott, hogy nem feltétlenül hasznos a szólásszabadságot és a magánszférát két ütköző, egymással kiegyensúlyozandó területként felfogni. Szerinte a kettő inkább kiegészíti egymást: az anonim véleménynyilvánítás joga például olyan terület, ahol kéz a kézben jár a magánszférához fűződő jog és a szólásszabadság.

Rotenberg szerint még a privacy semmibe vételével folyamatosan vádolt Facebook sem az ördögtől való, olyannyira, hogy ő maga is fent van rajta. „A Facebook olyan, mint a telefon vagy az email. Használjuk csak politikai aktivizmusra, de legyünk tisztában a hiányosságaival” - mondta Rotenberg, aki szerint a kritikánál többet használ a dialógus.

Mindeközben Lord Allan of Hallam szorgalmasan jegyzetelt az általa csak fPadként emlegetett, Facebook-kék színű füzetbe, Drummond a Google-től pedig atyai stílusban oktatta: „Sok-sok hibát fognak még elkövetni – mondta a Google főjogásza a brit bárónak. – De idővel majd beletanulnak”.

A példátlan kultúrdialógus-kényszerben szinte elsikkadt az egyik legeredetibb résztvevő, Jevgenyij Morozov mondanivalója, pedig Morozov a techvilág jelenleg talán legnépszerűtlenebb álláspontját képviseli: azt hangoztatja, hogy az internet hozzásegíti a diktatúrákat ahhoz, hogy megerősítsék saját hatalmukat A belorusz származású blogger, újságíró és kutató általában szkeptikusan gondolkodik az internet demokratizáló hatásáról. Morozov, aki a tavalyi TED konferencián egész előadást [3] tartott arról, hogyan élnek vissza a diktatúrák a modern technológiai eszközök és a web általában jótékonynak tartott adományaival, azt mondja, hogy az internet egyszerre autonóm erő, és egyszerre a hatalom eszköze. A kutató szerint túlságos leegyszerűsítés a kérdést az aktivisták és a kormányok közötti harcra lebontani. Először meg kell érteni a kultúra, a vallás, a nacionalizmus közötti kapcsolatokat, és csak utána kitalálni, hogyan vonatkoztatható mindez az internetre. A tanulság: tovább kell tanulmányozni a kérdést. Morozov nézeteit nem mindenki osztotta, egy hozzászóló szerint például Iránban kifejezetten jót tesz, hogy a bloggerek fényképeznek, írnak és az anyagot feltöltik a netre, legalább el tudják mondani, hogy a világ figyeli őket. És ez már önmagában reményt kelt.

Read the original in index

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/internet-szabadon

How the UID project can be a cause for concern

praskrishna — 2018-04-09T12:59:02Z

The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), headed by Nandan Nilekani, is the UPA government's most ambitious project, where one billion Indians are branded with a unique identity number.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh handed over the first of the Aadhaar cards at Tembhli village in Nandurbar district of Maharashtra. This mammoth project aims to provide Indian residents with a unique 12-digit identification number that will serve multiple purposes.

Given the reach and the impact of such an exercise there is much excitement around the Unique Identity (UID) number (also known as Aadhaar) drive, along with some confusion.

However, there remains some concerns of identity theft.

For example, the number is linked to their fingerprints and the patterns in their eyes. Since those markers are unique to each of us, no one will steal their rations and wages again. They will be issued only after verification. But our eye's Iris patterns change, with age, disease or malnourishment. Fake fingerprints can very easily be made. Hence, the unique element of these numbers can be tampered.

Sunil Abraham, Director, Centre for Internet and Society said, “If I leave my fingerprints around, my identity can be stolen and transactions done on my behalf.”

Activists claim that in a few years, banks, insurance companies, cell phone providers and hospitals will demand UID number before doing business with you. They could use that number, to share information about anybody.

Hence, Abraham said, “An insurance company and a hospital can merge databases. If you have AIDS or TB, they can bump up your premium, or refuse you cover.”

Usha Ramanathan, lawyer said, “Say I go to Srinagar six times in a month. That information could be accessed by the government because the airlines asked for my number before booking a ticket. And that could make me a suspect. There's something wrong in being treated as a suspect for no other reason, than state paranoia.”

Interestingly, even though India seems excited about this project, Britain recently stopped attempts at biometric based identification systems, after warnings that such a database could easily be hacked.

See the video here.
See the original coverage in IBN Live

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/uid-project-concern

In new Facebook features, a comeback for community

praskrishna — 2011-04-02T09:58:34Z

Nearly 750 tweets bombard the web every second. Internet traffic is growing by 40 per cent a year. People post 2.5 billion photos on Facebook every month. Every minute, 24 hours of video is uploaded on YouTube. But who owns all that data? Until now, big business was in complete control and used the data to monetise operations. But all that is set to change. With Facebook launching two new features, ‘Groups' and a ‘Download your information,' the community is making a comeback.

More control over data

If Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is to be believed, users now have more control over who sees their data and how much. They can also bundle up their entire social graph (as a zip file) and walk away to another service.

‘Groups' tries to tackle one of Facebook's long-standing problems. On Facebook, everyone, from your boss to your long-lost school friend, is a “friend.” And this means annoying, sometimes embarrassing situations.

An easy way to form small private groups on a social network, as we do in real life, is the “biggest problem in social networking,” Mr. Zuckerberg told journalists after the announcement.

The Groups feature allows you to form small circles of friends. Up to 300 Groups per user are allowed, and the tool also allows Group chat and emails. The groups can be open, closed, or secret, depending on the privacy settings.

Gaurav Mishra, Director (Digital and Social Media), MS&L Group, Asia-Pacific, says this step is important for Facebook, given the rising competition in social networking.

With alternatives on the horizon, such as Diaspora, which is being designed as an open-source, privacy-conscious social network, and Google's plans to integrate social networking elements into its services through ‘Google Me,' Facebook has to take up this “strategic pre-emptive move,” says Mr. Mishra.

But the Groups feature comes with its own baggage. It is not ‘opt in.' A friend can add you to the Group, and you get to decide whether you want to be in it or not. It appears that in the trade-off between giving the user more control and encouraging use, Facebook has chosen the latter.

Users will also have to be prepared for more noise as the new features offer a mirage of secure conversation space that will encourage them to share more personal details.

“The amount of sharing will go up massively and will be completely addictive,” Mr. Zuckerberg predicted.

Sunil Abraham, Executive Director, Centre for Internet and Society, says: “Facebook has always taken a more promiscuous approach to configuring our social behaviour online, the primary motivation being the maximisation of user transactions and consequently profits.”

According to him, the logic of adding a user to a group without seeking permission first makes a lot of assumptions, including that you check your account regularly to do early damage control and that your friends follow best security practices.

“I would warn people not to do anything on a Facebook group — open, closed or secret — that they would not do on email.”

Read the original in the Hindu

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/new-facebook-features

Technical Aspects of UID: A Public Talk

praskrishna — 2011-04-04T07:23:15Z

Prof. K Gopinath from Indian Institute of Science and Sunil Abraham from the Centre for Internet and Society will give a lecture on the technical aspects of UID on 20 October 2010 at the Centre for Internet and Society in Bangalore.

Prof. Gopinath and Sunil Abraham will give a lecture on the technical challenges in realizing UID-like systems. Given the publicly available information, the speakers will evaluate the realizability of an online pan-India UID system and identify some issues that may need to be addressed.

About Prof. K Gopinath

K Gopinath is a professor in computer science and automation at the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore. His research interests are in operating systems and related systems such as security. To know more about Prof. Gopinath, visit his homepage.

About Sunil Abraham

Sunil Abraham is the executive director of the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS),in Bangalore. He is the founder of Mahiti, a social enterprise aiming to reduce the cost and complexity of information and communication technology for the voluntary sector by using free software. For three years, Sunil also managed the International Open Source Network, a project of United Nations Development Programme's Asia-Pacific Development Information Programme, serving 42 countries in the Asia-Pacific region.

VIDEOS

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/events/technical-aspects-of-uid

University Students create New Wiki Entries and Blog about It

praskrishna — 2010-10-07T07:34:12Z

Nearly 60 students doing the New Media Practices course of the New Media Masters at Media Studies in the University of Amsterdam had an assignment to write a new Wikipedia entry and write a blog post about their experience on a collaborative blog called Masters of Media. This blog which was founded in September 2006 is now in use by the fifth generation of students.

These blog posts are now online!
See the profile of Masters of Media and the pictures of all the three classes.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/research/conferences/conference-blogs/new-wikipedia-entries

The silent rise of the Digital Native

praskrishna — 2011-08-04T10:31:14Z

In late August, this year, the world shook for many when they went online (on their computers, PDAs, iPads, laptops) and realised that the comfortable zone of talking, chatting, sharing and doing just about everything else, had suddenly, without a warning, changed overnight (or afternoon, or morning, depending upon the time-zone they lived in). With a single change in its privacy and location settings, Facebook, home to billions of internet hours consisting of relationships, friendships, professional networks, social gaming, entertainment trivia, memories and exchanges, allowed its users to geo-tag themselves when on-the-move.

Much energy, rumour and panic has gone into the introduction of this feature. The interweb has been abuzz with people wearing tin-foil hats (or the digital equivalent of it) and shouting as loud as they can, about the old paranoia of Big Brother in new settings like Facebook. It is of almost no consequence that the feature is not really indulging in any private tracking but was offering an interesting mix of bringing together the everyday physicality of life on to the Facebook feed.

Geo-tagging, a term which refers to your ability to expose your location (voluntarily) using mapping visualisation tools that can triangulate your position using GPS or IP address systems, while accessing internet platforms or games, is being widely used by users of technology who enjoy blurring the lines between real life and virtual reality.

Facebook’s Places feature allowed users, accessing Facebook from their mobile phones, to ‘check-in’ to places near them, calculated on the position of their mobile phones, thus making it available for them to share where they are (or were) with their friends. While the panicwallahs who were going blue in their face have started breathing again, there is something in this panic about being located and marked, that needs further probing. I am aware of the possibilities of abuse it might lend itself to, if, say, for instance, I had stalkers (I have none, though), or if somebody accusing me of stealing their pig and my lawyer can prove that I (or at least my phone) was in a particular location at the time the crime was being committed.

To many, this might seem some sort of an exaggerated reaction. How can people be so interested in trivial things like these? How can people have time to actually be doing ‘all this stuff’? To those digitally dissonant I offer a tilt of the head but to the Digital Natives who occupy, seamlessly, their social networking sites, their everyday material life, their MMORPGs (games, in shorthand), their blogs, their photo accounts and their multiple distributed digital selves, these things are important.

You might not have heard of the phrase Digital Natives, but they are here and among us. The generation that grew up with digital technologies as a part of their social (and in some case, biological) DNA relate to technologies differently. Rather than external prostheses or tools of function, technologies are their ways of being.

The oldest Digital Native has turned 30 this year, and the youngest Digital Native is still gestating, visible only in sonograms and medical records that document its presence. Digital Natives are everywhere and they might be producing knowledge that you and I read off Wikipedia. They might be playing games and immersing themselves in fantasy universes. They might be forming communities that transcend geographies and lifestyles. They might be orchestrating political campaigns that affect the fates of nations. They might be changing the notions of ownership and property even as we read this. They are embroiled in new technologies, they move from the physical to the virtual with effortless ease. They are slowly but relentlessly changing the contours of the worlds we all occupy. Digital Natives are here to stay and it is time we start listening to them, about who they are, what they do, how they think of themselves and how they are shaping the futures of the days to come.

Read the original in Daily News and Analysis

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/digital-natives/blog/silent-rise