Centre for Internet and Society

The Wikimedia India Program Trust

praskrishna — 2011-11-13T07:58:38Z

A new entity, the “Wikimedia India Program Trust”, has now been formed and registered (in Delhi.) This will be the organization that will eventually drive India programs and house the team in India.

For some time, efforts have gone into creating an organization that would provide an appropriate structure to support Wikimedia program activities in India. Aspects such as the current regulatory framework (regarding funding, taxation, etc.) as well as the legal protection for the India team have been considered to determine this structure. In this context, a host of options (e.g. subsidiary, branch, Section 25) were evaluated and a determination was made towards an independent non-profit public trust. Legal advice has been taken at every stage in this decision.

Why an Independent Public Trust?

The Trust will provide an effective vehicle within India to marshal resources to support programs and partner with local institutions. The objective of the Trust is to promote the objectives of the Wikimedia movement and work closely with the Wikimedia community on various projects with an India focus. It is important to understand that the Trust will not have any editorial control over content on any of the Wikimedia projects. The Trust is a not for profit organization.

Introduction of Trustees

Trustees have been identified based upon their support for Wikimedia movement's principles and plans in addition to having reputations for good governance and management. Sunil Abraham and Rahul Matthan have been requested to be the initial Trustees. Both are friends of Wikipedia and have extensive experience.

Sunil is Executive Director of the Centre for Internet & Society (CIS), is a long term advocate of free software and IP reform and has been supporting the Wikimedia community and movement for some time now.

Rahul is a partner and heads the technology practice at Trilegal. He brings deep expertise and relationships that will be valuable for the Trust.

These initial Trustees will serve for a term of three years at the maximum. All additional or subsequent Trustees will serve on rotation in accordance with a trustee selection plan that will be prepared.

Trustees will not be compensated for their services. Governance, Funding, Financial Standards & Communications of the Trust. The Trust will be governed by Trustees who will provide oversight and guidance regarding the operations and governance of the Trust. Since the Trust is an independent organization, it will require funding for its operations which is in compliance with the legal and regulatory framework in India. It will seek funding from private donors within India as well as external sources.

The Trust has the support of the Wikimedia Foundation which is a United States based non-profit foundation. However, in India all non-profit organizations need to be in existence for 3 years before they can receive funding from sources outside India. In the interim, they can apply for prior-permission under the FCRA regulations to help expedite the process. As a result, the Trust will shortly be applying for approval to receive funds from the Wikimedia Foundation in the future.

As a Trust, we are required to have an independent external auditor. We have appointed KPMG. KPMG is experienced in auditing non-profit companies and are also auditors for the Wikimedia Foundation. Annually, the Trust will publicly disclose it's independently audited financial statements.

The Trust will publish a monthly newsletter outlining its current activities and future plans. This will commence in December 2011.

Operations of the Trust

The trust deed under which the Trust must operate clearly states that the purpose of the Trust is to independently promote the growth of volunteer activities within India in support of effective and unrestricted dissemination of free knowledge to the public. Hisham will serve as the Executive Director of the Trust. Once it is possible, additional employees will be brought on to the Trust. The Trust will eventually have an office in Delhi. In the interim, a temporary office space has been set up to facilitate establishing the Trust and its mission. It is located at Top Floor, G-15, Hauz Khas, New Delhi - 110 016. It's a couple of minutes walk away from IIT Flyover and Hauz Khas Metro. Do drop in! It's a small but cozy place and we'd love to have you over!

Conclusion

We continue to make progress in setting up program activities to support the growth of Wikimedia in India. We have a long way to go, but are glad that we are starting to build a solid foundation. The following link is for FAQs on this (and related) topics:
http://goo.gl/8Rdr2

As always, do reach out if you have any comments or questions.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/announcement-of-wikimedia-india-program-trust

Western Ghats Portal: Workshop on Biodiversity Informatics

praskrishna — 2011-11-08T05:01:14Z

The Western Ghats portal team is organising a one-day workshop to explore the contemporary state on biodiversity informatics on 25 November 2011 at Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and Environment (ATREE), Bangalore.

Schedule

09:00 – 09:20	Registration of participants
09:20 – 09:30	Welcome / Introduction
09:30 – 11:15	Plenary talks - Technology behind biodiversity informatics (3 talks)
11:15 – 11:30	Tea break
11:30 – 12:30	Plenary talks - Scientific commons and policy (2 talks)
12:30 – 13:00	Discussion
13:00 – 14:00	Lunch break
14:00 – 16:00	Biodiversity portals in India - Presentations by different teams/panel discussion
16:00 – 16:15	Tea break
16:15 – 17:00	Discussions and networking

Spheres of the Workshop:

Plenary I: Technology behind biodiversity informatics - 0930 - 1115 hrs

Development of Information System, Open Data standards, Archive and Geospatial solutions, Visualization in Bhuvan - Arul Raj, National Remote Sensing Centre (NRSC), Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) - 20 mins + 10 mins discussion

Exploring the semantic web for species pages - M. Sravanthi, Western Ghats Portal - 20 mins + 10 mins discussion

Challenges on the emerging discipline of Biodiversity Informatics - Donald Hobern, Atlas of Living Australia - 30mins + 10 mins discussion

Focus:

The objective of this session is to understand the global developments in biodiversity informatics in relation with developments in India. The session will focus on:

the evolution of the discipline of biodiversity informatics and its current status
the development of standards in Indian context
the technologies for biodiversity informatics
the challenges in biodiversity informatics

Plenary II: Scientific commons and policy - 1130 - 1300 hrs

Commons in the context of Biodiversity Information - Danish Sheikh, Alternative Law Forum - 20 mins + 10 mins

Open data in the scientific realm - Sunil Abraham, Centre for Internet and Society - 20 mins + 10 mins

Discussion on Scientific commons and Policy - 30 mins

Focus:

The objective of the session is to understand the commons principle and its implications for scientific research. The session will focus on:

the experience of developing a creative commons policy in Indian scenario and the resulting impacts for scientific collaboration, open data and open access
policy and social implications of open data sharing

Plenary III - Biodiversity portals in India - 1400 - 1700 hrs

Moderation: R. Prabhakar/ MD Madhusudhan
Panelists: (Introductory note by each of the panelists - 10 minutes each)

Suhel Quader, Season Watch (www.seasonwatch.in), Migrant Watch (www.migrantwatch.in)

Sanjay Molur, Pterocount (www.pterocount.org/)

K.N.Ganeshaiah - Indian Bioresource Information Network (www.ibin.co.in)

Ramesh BR - Western Ghats Portal (www.thewesternghats.in/)

Shwetank Verma, Biodiversity of India, formerly Project Brahma (http://www.biodiversityofindia.org)

Krishnamegh Kunte, ifoundbutterflies (http://ifoundbutterflies.org/)
Vijay Barve, DiversityIndia (http://diversityindia.org/)
Deepak Menon, India Water Portal (http://www.indiawaterportal.org/)
Chitra Ravi, India Biodiversity Portal (http://indiabiodiversity.org/)
Mr D.K Ved, Foundation for Revitalisation of Local Health Traditions (http://envis.frlht.org)

Focus:

The objective of the session is to learn from each other’s experience and develop a combined vision for the future of biodiversity informatics in India. The panelists will present a focused summary of the

key features available on their portals
the experience of building the portal
the key lessons learnt
future plans

We believe these four aspects will be of common interest to all participants and the presentations are expected to stimulate discussion around these four aspects.

Summary of the Day: R Prabhakar - Call for synergy/collaboration/Thank you!!

Concept Note

Rapid advancements in the domains of computer Science and information technologies have allowed integration of biodiversity information and analytical capabilities to collaborate on social networks, leading to the emergence of a new discipline, Biodiversity Informatics. The dynamics in this discipline are defined by integrating multiplicity with the semantic web and enabling of democratic social networks focused on biodiversity. We are bound to see tremendous diversification in the scope of biodiversity informatics globally and in India.

Harnessing technology for aggregating, storing, querying and analyzing biodiversity data has seen major developments over the last decade. There has been a plethora of biodiversity information resources that include mailing lists and discussions groups, occurrence records, geographical databases, biodiversity image libraries, institutional databases, species description pages, specimen records of herbaria and museum databases, and biodiversity focused Internet sites. The challenges on the biodiversity informatics landscape are on two fronts: (1) A semantic web framework to link these biodiversity information islands; and (2) Effective and flexible data exchange standards for seamless information sharing among these sites.

The evolution of social networks and communities around biodiversity information systems has been a unique factor in influencing the ways in which these information systems have developed. The assimilation and aggregation of user-generated biodiversity data and dissemination under the 'commons' principle has gained momentum globally. It has changed the way scientific collaborations are being made, and created possibilities for effective citizen-science initiatives. It is now possible to ask fresh questions, with more data, newer methods, better tools and for citizens to participate and report data from different geographies. With this, local-level data can be integrated with large-scale data leading to a better understanding of biodiversity.

With the increased penetration of the Internet into developing economies, and the widespread adoption of web technologies, biodiversity informatics has spawned an impressive variety of initiatives. These initiatives range from global knowledge bases and networks, national initiatives, eco-region based initiatives, as well as sharply focused initiatives which address a single species or event. There have been tangible advantages for stakeholders from these initiatives which has inspired many other endeavours. Success stories exist at both global and local level, and learning from these experiences can help one understand the multi-faceted nature of this discipline.

The Western Ghats Portal team is organising a one-day workshop to explore the contemporary state of biodiversity informatics as expressed in three spheres: i) technology behind biodiversity informatics, ii) scientific commons and policy and iii) biodiversity portals in India. With these objectives in mind, we welcome your active participation during the workshop. It could provide an opportunity for us to interact and learn from similar endeavors in this discipline.

Download the agenda here [PDF, 124 kb]

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/bio-diversity-informatics-workshop

Open Access Week begins in Bangalore

Tom Dane — 2012-08-03T23:04:06Z

On Monday 24 October, the National Aerospace Laboratories in Bangalore held an event to mark the beginning of Open Access Week 2011

During the event, Professor Balaram spoke on 'Issues of Access in Science Publishing', and Dr. L Venkatakrishnan gave a talk 'Open Access: Promised Utopia or Eventual Reality?'

Before the speakers, Shyam Chetty framed the discussion by suggesting that India currently lags behind other nations in the adoption of Open Access. He said that the Indian Council of Scientific and Industrial Research should lead an initiative to promote India's National Open Access Policy and perhaps bring it into law.

Prof. Balaram spoke next, and brought some refreshing realism and complexity to the Open Access discussion. He noted that both as a reader and as an author he supports Open Access, but there are costs involved in making research available, and these will have to be covered in some way. He shared first-hand experience of expensive subscriptions for Indian institutions, and how even the IISc has cancelled many journal purchases. In a later interview, Professor Balaram discusses some solutions to these problems.

Prof. Balaram highlighted that Closed Access journals do add value to scholarship ― in terms of peer review, editing, and aggregation (the collection of related articles in useful ways). While Open Access journals may offer these services too, Prof. Balaram suggested that some of the strongest supporters of Closed Access journals are working academics who value the increased reputation and status they can offer. This lead him to expressing an opposition to institutional Open Access mandates. Instead, he encouraged an approach where academics are motivated to open their work for self-interest, rather than by obligation.

Prof. Balaram also said that India must take an independent approach to Open Access and not expect western nations to lead the way. Increasingly India and China are seen as real competitors in the international field, and in the future may not receive concessions in journal subscriptions or other help currently offered to developing nations.

Dr Venkatakrishnan was more skeptical towards Open Access. He emphasized that the price to make an article freely available in a Closed Access journal could be over USD $3000. From this he suggested that the Gold Route to Open Access lacked potential because the costs involved are prohibitive. This does leave out alternative ways of financing Open Access journals that do not involve the author paying for submission.

Dr. Venkatakrishnan echoed Prof. Balaram in saying that a strong motivation to publish in top-tier Closed Access journals is the increased reputation or funding it can bring. While it is true that academics can usually still upload their work to Open Access databases, Dr. Venkatakrishnan concluded that he did not know if Open Access was an 'open door' or a 'blind corner'.

This could be taken as a strange end to an Open Access celebration, but the implication seemed to be this: in order for more Indian academics to support Open Access, they must be convinced of the real benefits it can bring to their own reputation and career success.

For the event flier click here
For details of Open Access Week, click here

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/lecture-at-nal

Can Innovation Solve the Grand Challenges of Indian Society?

praskrishna — 2011-10-07T12:45:10Z

It’s nearly time again for Design Public the event, a high-level conclave on design, innovation, and the public interest. Our up-coming event will be in Bangalore on the 14th of October, and will be held at the National Gallery of Modern Art, which is housed in a century-old Manikyavelu mansion, which was once the property of the Mysore royal family.

Aditya Dev Sood (Center for Knowledge Societies )
Sunil Abraham (Center for Internet and Society)
Harsh Shrivastava (National Planning Commission)
Zackery Denfield (Pacific Northwest College of Art)
Aditya Mishra (Headstart Foundation)
Sudhir Krishnaswamy (CLPR)
Naresh Narasimhan (VA Group)
Amit Garg (MXV Consulting)
Samar Halankar (MINT)
Rajeev Chandrashekhar (Member of Parliament)
Mahesh Murthy (Pinstorm)
Rohini Nilekani (Arghyam Foundation)
Ramesh Ramanathan (Janaagraha)
Reto Wettach (Interaction Design Studios Berlin)
Shiv Vishwanathan (Sociologist of Science)
Rishekesha T. Krishnan (IIM, Bangalore)
M. P. Ranjan (Design for India)
H. P. Khincha (Karnataka State Innovation Council)

Participation by arrangement only. Interested? designpublic@cks.in +91.9343787505

For more information, click here

Download the brochure here [PDF, 388 kb]

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/innovation-and-public-interest

Design!publiC - II

praskrishna — 2011-10-13T07:00:43Z

The Centre for Internet and Society in partnership with the Center for Knowledge Societies, Venkataramanan Associates, Center for Law and Policy Research, Headstart Foundation, Chaia Innovation Accelerator, MXV Consulting, Mint Newspaper and Confederation of Indian Industry is organising the second edition of Design Public on October 14, 2011 at the National Gallery of Modern Art in Bangalore. There will be a series of pre-conference research outings on October 13, for which participants may register in advance.

Innovation and the Public Interest

Design Public is a series of conversations about whether and how Innovation can serve the Public Interest.

At our inaugural event, in New Delhi on March 18th earlier this year, we focused on the question of whether innovation in governance is needed and how it can be achieved. An excellent overview of the event can be found in a Mint Newspaper article by Aparna Piramal Raje. While we discovered wide agreement in principle as to the need for innovation in India, there was much uncertainty about how government systems relate to innovation, and some doubt as to whether governments are in fact capable of innovation. At our upcoming event, we aim to widen the ambit of the discussion, to ask how innovation serves the public interest, thereby opening up the question of innovation to the social sector, to corporations, to venture capitalists, designers, students, academics and more.

Following Schumpeter, we understand innovation to be a fundamental part of modern economic and social life -- in fact the very source of the momentum that drives us forward into the future. However, we have also found that innovation need not be limited to entrepreneurs in the private sector, but can also be accomplished, in various ways, in government, in the public sector, and by social and developmental agencies. Moreover, if the specific components of innovation can be identified and learned, it would be possible for many more organizations and individuals to successfully drive beneficial social and technical change.

If the term Innovation describes the business or economic dimension of the forward movement of society under capitalism, then the immanent, cognitive or mental aspect of this forward movement can be captured by the term Design. It is the multivariate, parallel, sometimes collaborative process of finding solutions to problems that have no obvious and available answer. Whereas the language of design gained prominence in the Industrial Age as a means for the rendering of surfaces and finishes for the more effective marketing of consumer products (posters and toasters), the concept has far wider application in the present. Design and Innovation are by definition the strategies through which the most intractable, complex, and multivariate challenges encountered by individuals or groups.

At our event, therefore, we seek to articulate exactly how these strategies can be brought to bear on the Grand Challenges facing our society, in areas such as:

Complete and Effective Healthcare for Mothers and Children
Increased Use and Acceptance for Toilets
Broad-based Higher Education
Participatory and Responsive Civic Administration

Over the course of the day-long event, we will consider different approaches and paradigms of innovation and how they may be applicable to these grand challenges. We will break out into sessions in order to apply these perspectives and approaches to specific challenge areas. At the end of the day we will seek to expand the circle of innovation in order establish new ways of collaborating and sharing knowledge such that we are able to accelerate and intensify the application of innovation to addressing these and other grand challenges facing the public.

Panchayat meeting on Village Sanitation in Khera village, Budaun District, UP

Agenda

09.00 Word of Welcome and Mutual Introductions
10.00 Innovation and the Indian Corporation

- Samar Halankar, Hindustan Times (moderator)

- Anil Narayan Sondur, TATA Elxsi

- Harish Bijoor, HB Consults

- Ekta Ohri, Center for Knowledge Societies (respondent)

11.00 Is Innovation in the Public and Social Sectors Possible?

- Sunil Abraham, Center for Internet and Society (moderator)

- Rohini Nilekani, Arghyam Foundation

- Ramesh Ramanathan, Janaagraha

- Ashwin Mahesh, Mapunity

- Sneha Raman, Center for Knowledge Societies (respondent)

12.00 The Challenge of Start Up Innovation

- Amit Garg, MXV Consulting (moderator)

- Mahesh Murthy, Pinstorm

- Zackery Denfeld, Pacific Northwest College of Art

- Naresh Narasimhan, VA Group

- Aditya Dev Sood, Center for Knowledge Societies (respondent)

13.00 Lunch: Regional Cuisines of Karnataka prepared with Local Ingredients
14.00 The Theory and Practice of Innovation
- Aditya Dev Sood, Center for Knowledge Societies (moderator)
- Reto Wettach, Interaction Design Studios Berlin
- Shiv Vishwanathan, Sociologist of Science
- M. P. Ranjan, Design for India
15.00 Grand Challenge Breakout Sessions
A: Online Higher Education
Moderator: Sunil Abraham, Center for Internet and Society
Innovation Expert: Sneha Raman, Center for Knowledge Societies
Domain Expert: Udhay Shankar, Intel
B: Quality Maternal and Child Healthcare
Moderator: Jayna Kothari, Center for Law and Policy Research
Innovation Expert: Shehla Hussain, Center for Knowledge
Societies
Domain Expert: Lakshmi Menon, G.E. Healthcare
C: Toilet-training for All!
Moderator: Sudhir Krishnaswamy, Center for Law and Policy Research
Innovation Expert: Namrata Mehta, Center for Knowledge Societies
Domain Expert: Sunita Nadhamuni, Arghyam
Tea Served During Breakout Sessions
16.30 Reports Back from Breakouts
17.30 Conclusion: Planning and Policy for Innovation and the Grand Challenges of Society
- Sudhir Krishnaswamy, Center for Law and Policy Research (moderator)
- Harsh Shrivastava, National Planning Commission
- Anant Shah, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
- Jamuna Ramakrishna, Hivos Foundation
- Dilini Wijeweera, LIRNEasia
- Gaurav Gupta, Dalberg
- Riku Mäkelä, Finnode

Individual Participation

In order to make each voice count, entry to the conclave will be by arrangement only. Others who are truly interested, should please drop us a few lines on how they would like to contribute and we will be glad to get back in touch. There are no registration fees. However, we would like to see participants take their own initiative in covering their own travel costs and making their own arrangements for stay so far as possible. If specific needs are perceived, please communicate them to the organizers. If you are interested in participating in this conversation on innovation, design thinking, and the public interest please contact Anand Vijayan at anand@cks.in.

Institutional Participation

Confederations of industry, associations of management, departments of government and diverse development sector and civil society organizations are invited to express their interest in supporting this event.

Organizers

Center for Knowledge Societies (CKS)
Center for Internet and Society (CIS)
Venkatramanan Associates (VA)
Center for Law and Policy Research (CLPR)
Headstart Foundation (HF)
Chaia Innovation Accelerator (ChIA)
MXV Consulting (MXV)
Mint Newspaper (MN)
Confederation of Indian Industry (CII)

For participation: contact Anand Vijayan, Innovation Planning, CKS
For media: contact Ayesha Vemuri, Innovation Research, CKS (ayesha@cks.in)

For more info, click here [PDF, 496 kb]

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/events/design-public-in-bangalore

The Impact of Regulation: FOSS and Enterprise

praskrishna — 2011-09-22T10:53:49Z

The workshop seeks to elaborate the impact of regulation, between Free and Open Source Software and Enterprise. It will look at the following key areas:

Education,
Software development,
Digital Content,
Empowering persons with disability,
FOSS for disaster preparedness etc.

If time allows, we will explore, if cloud computing is an open Source adjacent?

This lively discussion, is meant to bring into perspective the real picture in the market and broaden the minds of participants to realize the options available and come up with recommendations on what needs to be considered to have a fair playing ground, more especially for the developing countries.

Which of the five broad IGF Themes or the Cross-Cutting Priorities does your workshop fall under?

Access and Diversity

Have you organized an IGF workshop before? Yes

If so, please provide the link to the report:

http://www.intgovforum.org/cms/index.php/component/chronocontact/?%20chronoformname=Workshopsreports2009View&curr=1&wr=43

Provide the names and affiliations of the panellists you are planning to invite:

Mr.Samer Azmy- ICT Manager / Solution Integration Consultant, Huawei(Moderator)
Mr. Satish Babu -ICFOSS,India
Mr. Yves Miezan Ezo- Smile Training, Manager, (France)
Mr. Sunil Abraham,Executive Director, Center for Internet and Society, Bangalore, India
Mr. Evans Ikua- FOSS Certification Manager in the ict@innovation program
Dorothy Gordon- Director General, AITI-KACE
Ms. Judy Okite (Remote Moderator)

Provide the name of the organizer(s) of the workshop and their affiliation to various stakeholder groups:

Mr. Samer Azmy- FOSSFA(Pan-African)
Mr. Satish Babu -ICFOSS,(India)
Mr. Yves Miezan Ezo - Smile Training Centre(France)

Organization: FOSSFA, ICFOSS

Contact Person: Mr. Samer Azmy, Mr. Satish Babu

Workshop Number: 211

See the event details on the IGF website

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/foss-instrument-for-accessible-development

Draft Report on Open Government Data in India (v2)

pranesh — 2011-08-23T02:47:22Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/ogd-draft-v2

Glossary

praskrishna — 2011-08-23T02:45:45Z

pdf

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/glossary.pdf

Case Studies

praskrishna — 2011-08-24T07:54:15Z

See the case studies

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/case-studies.pdf

Design! Public

praskrishna — 2011-08-23T02:44:24Z

pdf file

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/design-public.pdf

Open Government Data Study: India

pranesh — 2011-08-23T02:43:49Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/open_data_india_final.pdf

Open Government Data

praskrishna — 2011-08-23T02:43:15Z

pdf

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/open-government.pdf

Open Government Data

praskrishna — 2011-08-23T02:42:46Z

pdf

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/open-government-data.pdf

Open Government Data Report

praskrishna — 2011-08-23T02:40:59Z

Open Government Data Report (PDF) published by CIS.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/ogd-report

August 2011 Bulletin

praskrishna — 2012-08-13T05:13:23Z

Greetings from the Centre for Internet and Society! In this issue we are pleased to present you the latest updates about our research, upcoming events, and news and media coverage:

Researchers@Work

RAW is a multidisciplinary research initiative. To build original research knowledge base, the RAW programme has been collaborating with different organisations and individuals to focus on its three year thematic of Histories of the Internets in India. Five monographs: Re: Wiring Bodies by Asha Achuthan, Archive and Access by Aparna Balachandran and Rochelle Pinto, Porn: Law, Video, Technology by Namita Malhotra, The Last Cultural Mile by Ashish Rajadhyaksha and Internet, Society and Space in Indian Cities by Pratyush Shankar were officially launched at the Locating Internets: Histories of the Internet(s) in India — Research Training and Curriculum Workshop in Ahmedabad.

Workshop organised in CEPT, Ahmedabad

Locating Internets: Histories of the Internet(s) in India — Research Training and Curriculum Workshop: Call for Participation [19 to 22 August 2011]

Digital Natives with a Cause?

Digital Natives with a Cause? is a knowledge programme initiated by CIS and Hivos, Netherlands. It is a research inquiry that seeks to look at the changing landscape of social change and political participation and the role that young people play through digital and Internet technologies, in emerging information societies. Consolidating knowledge from Asia, Africa and Latin America, it builds a global network of knowledge partners who want to critically engage with the dominant discourse on youth, technology and social change, in order to look at the alternative practices and ideas in the Global South. It also aims at building new ecologies that amplify and augment the interventions and actions of the digitally young as they shape our futures.

Featured Research

Between the Stirrup and the Ground: Relocating Digital Activism (This paper by Nishant Shah and Fieke Jansen was published in Democracy & Society, a publication of the Center for Democracy and Civil Society, Volume 8, Issue 2, Summer 2011).

Accessibility

Estimates of the percentage of the world's population that is disabled vary considerably. But what is certain is that if we count functional disability, then a large proportion of the world's population is disabled in one way or another. At CIS we work to ensure that the digital technologies, which empower disabled people and provide them with independence, are allowed to do so in practice and by the law. To this end, we support web accessibility guidelines, and change in copyright laws that currently disempower the persons with disabilities.

Interview

An Interview with David Baines (Maureen Agena interviewed David Baines of Mada Centre for Assistive Technology in Khattar).

Access to Knowledge

New Blog Entry

Govt for Legalising Parallel Import of Copyright Works; Publishers Oppose

Openness

CIS believes that innovation and creativity should be fostered through openness and collaboration and is committed towards promotion of open standards, open access, and free/libre/open source software.

Featured Research

Call for Comments on Draft Report on Open Government Data in India (v2) (Nisha Thompson has updated the Open Government Data Report prepared by CIS last year including additional case studies and the National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy).
Open Access to Scholarly Literature in India: A Status Report: Call for Comments (The report has been prepared by Prof. Subbiah Arunachalam and Madhan Muthu. It surveys the field of scholarly and scientific publication in India and provides a detailed history of the open access movement in India).

Internet Governance

Although there may not be one centralized authority that rules the Internet, the Internet does not just run by its own volition: for it to operate in a stable and reliable manner, there needs to be in place infrastructure, a functional domain name system, ways to curtail cyber crime across borders, etc. The Tunis Agenda of the second World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), paragraph 34 defined Internet governance as “the development and application by governments, the private sector and civil society, in their respective roles, of shared principles, norms, rules, decision-making procedures, and programmes that shape the evolution and use of the Internet.” Its latest endeavour has resulted into these:

New Blog Post

Bye Bye email? (Email might be the default method of communication for most of us, but could it be going the telegram way, writes Nishant Shah. The article was published in the Indian Express on August 21, 2011).

Public Lecture

The Mirror in the Enigma: How Germany lost World War II to a Mathematical Theorem (Rohit Gupta gave a lecture at CIS on August 12, 2011).

CIS is doing a project, ‘Privacy in Asia’. It is funded by Privacy International (PI), UK and the International Development Research Centre, Canada and is being administered in collaboration with the Society and Action Group, Gurgaon. The two-year project commenced on 24 March 2010 and will be completed as agreed to by the stakeholders. It was set up with the objective of raising awareness, sparking civil action and promoting democratic dialogue around challenges and violations of privacy in India. In furtherance of these goals it aims to draft and promote over-arching privacy legislation in India by drawing upon legal and academic resources and consultations with the public.

Featured Research

IP Addresses and Expeditious Disclosure of Identity in India (Prashant Iyengar reviews the statutory mechanism regulating the retention and disclosure of IP addresses by Internet companies in India and provides a compilation of anecdotes on how law enforcement authorities in India have used IP address information to trace individuals responsible for particular crimes).

New Blog Entries

Whole Body Imaging and Privacy Concerns that Follow (by Elonnai Hickok)
Financial Inclusion and the UID (by Elonnai Hickok)
CCTV in Universities (by Merlin Oommen)
Re-thinking Key Escrow (by Natasha Vaz)

Event Report

Privacy Matters, Chennai – the event was organised by IDRC, Society in Action Group, Madras Institute of Development Studies, Consumer and Civic Action Group, Privacy India and CIS on August 6, 2011.

News & Media Coverage

Net Gain [The Telegraph, 24 August 2011]
IISc students boycott UID, don’t want Big Brother to keep watch [Bangalore Mirror, 23 August 2011]
In the Right Circle [Indian Express, 24 July 2011]
The Siege of Android: How Google Lost The OS War [Business.in, 17 August 2011]
The Unsocial Network [Mail Today, 14 August 2011]
Hazare 'clicks' with city techies [India, 18 August 2011]
Govt wants to monitor Facebook, Twitter [Times of India, 8 August 2011]
Nothing unique about this identity [Deccan Chronicle, 5 August 2011]
Tired of tele-marketing calls? Act on privacy right: Experts [Times of India, 7 August 2011]
When Knowledge Isn’t Written, Does It Still Count? [New York Times, 7 August 2011]
Indian super-cops now patrol the www highway [Hindustan Times, 6 August 2011]
Better Understanding of the Idea of Privacy Sought [Hindu, 7 August 2011]
Converting Indian Slacktivists Takes (Offline) Time [Wall Street Journal, 2 August 2011]

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CIS is grateful to Kusuma Trust which was founded by Anurag Dikshit and Soma Pujari, philanthropists of Indian origin, for its core funding and support for most of its projects.

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