This is a special blog post to highlight that two members of the Panoply Digital team have recently achieved significant milestones. Co-Founders Michael Gallagher and Ronda Zelezny-Green are now officially PhD holders! They met before launching the consultancy since they shared Associate Professor Niall Winters (Oxford) as a supporting PhD supervisor on their different but related mobile learning PhD projects.
Read MoreMarch London Meetup: Messaging, the Unsung Hero of ICT4D
On Tuesday 28 March at 6:30pm in the GSMA HQ in Central London, we're delighted to be hosting our next Meetup (#ICT4DLdn) which is taking us back to basics with the use of messaging in ICT4D. We have five exciting speakers from organizations we're sure you'll love. You can join this Meetup by clicking here.
Read MoreWho can afford internet access in 2017? The latest A4AI report now available!
Given our experience in ICT4D, we understand well that no solution which makes use of technology will be sustainable if the intended beneficiaries cannot afford the technology. This is why we are excited to share our takeaways from the latest A4AI annual Affordability Report, what we consider to be a definitive source on issues related to ICT access.
Read MoreWhat we're hopeful about for 2017: gender, ICT and data availability
There’s no denying that for many people, 2016 was an annus horribilis, and 2017 hasn’t exactly gotten off to the best start either with the new US administration. However, amidst all this bad news and genuine fear for women’s rights and gender equality, there is one thing about 2016 in the world of gender and ICT that we’re celebrating and hoping will continue into 2017 - the growing increase in the availability of gender disaggregated data for ICT access and use.
Read MoreTo monitor, evaluate, and communicate in Kathmandu: training on ICT for Women's Business Associations in Nepal
Panoply Digital is busy with developing a training curriculum for upcoming workshops for our partner the Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE) and their partner network afield. We are doing several such two-day training events in the upcoming months with the first one being Kathmandu, Nepal in a few weeks with subsequent trainings in Argentina, Kenya, Jordan, and more.
Read MoreIn Solidarity with the 21 January International Women's Marches
Following the still hard to fathom inauguration of President Trump on the 20th January 2017, Panoply Digital was inspired to see the international solidarity of people in the women’s marches that unfolded as a resulting protest. We hope we as a worldwide community can translate these marches into political, social, and legal apparatuses that ensure we don’t have the need to do this again in subsequent generations - despite history indicating we will. At the very least, we are thrilled at the prospect of these marchers leading the fight against injustice; these are the people we want out front. Panoply Digital stands in support, and wishes to make a brief statement about what these events mean to us.
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#ICTDEthics - Tuesday 31 January Meetup Details
Well just when you thought 2017 had gone morally bankrupt, ICT4D is here to save your soul with a bit of #ICTDEthics! Our latest Meetup has all the trappings of a development worker's new year resolutions, with a bit of an academic twist.
Read MoreMeasuring the Information Society Report 2016: IDI and Relevant Findings
Developing capacity and expertise isn’t always about doing; reading and research need to be a part of the equation. I outlined a few of the reports we were reading in a previous post. Recently I was reviewing the Measuring the Information Society Report 2016 from ITU (ITU is the United Nations specialized agency for ICTs).
Read MoreWhat Panoply Digital is Reading: Bridge International vs. Kenyan Teachers; Ericsson Mobility Report, and Opera State of the Mobile Web in Africa
As we approach the end of the year, we at Panoply Digital are working our projects and spending some time in research, reading, and reflection. In the interests of sharing, I wanted to share the reading and research part as it affects many of us working in international education and ICT4D.
Read More3 great reasons to attend the ICT4D London Meet Up on 13th December
This month's London ICT4D meet up is looking at M&E for ICT4D - how to do it, how not to do it, and how to use ICTs for M&E. We're got 3 great reasons on why you should attend!
Read MoreGetting digital with data collection: a gender lens
This past week, I’ve been in Nairobi for workshops with the GSMA Mobile for Development Utilities team and their grantees. And thinking about M&E, lean data, and the use of technology to collect data - and ensuring women are included in that.
Read Morepi-top, EkoBits, and Digital Citizens Fund: running the gamut in coding and ICT education
Picking up where I left off in a previous blog post on learn to code initiatives, today we have a few more entries into the rather large field. Yet these aren’t initiatives focusing on learning to code as an end in itself, but rather as building capacity for actually doing something. Before diving in, we need to be critical about learning to code initiatives. We need to know how they empower (or not) teachers, how they teach (or not) critical thinking skills, how they prepare (or not) students for an undefined future. Coding is great but I don’t see it as an end to itself. And these initiatives seem to agree with me.
Read MoreApplication integration and universal messaging apps
I’ve long been a big fan of the great work Souktel do and the latest offering from them only validates that further. At the recent MERLTech conference, Souktel introduced their latest release – a new suite of integrated messaging apps
Read MoreThe Latest Gender and Mobiles News: The Sharing Economy Meets M4D & The Digital Gender Audit
For the past five years or so, Panoply Digital co-Founder/Director Alex Tyers and I have been producing the Gender and Mobiles newsletter. It started out initially as the Gender and Mobile Learning newsletter but we quickly found that there was not enough content being written in that area to fill our coffers. This evolution benefited us and our readership greatly as we have been able to highlight a wider range of fascinating stories that illustrate the increasingly complex relationships between women, men, girls, boys and mobile phones.
Read MoreTracking, Monitoring, Surveilling: Context Matters with ICT for Children in Asia
Reading a recent UNICEF post from Suman Khadka titled Star Wars: Force For Change supports digital monitoring systems in Cambodia, I found myself reflecting a bit on visibility in terms of tracking, monitoring, and surveillance. The project that Khadka describes involves “the technology for a digital tracking system which converts the paper-based method to an Inspection App. The app can complete the equivalent of a 20-page form — a process that previously took multiple days — in just one day.”
Read MoreThree Opportunities for Digital Development in Myanmar
In July 2016 and on behalf of the GSMA (the corporate hat I wear!), I traveled to Myanmar with my friend and colleague Ramat Tejani for the first time. We were there to conduct a mobile telecoms policy training workshop with Myanmar government, private sector and multiple civil society stakeholders. However, before the work began, we took a mini-vacation and I saw a few potential opportunities for digital development in this relatively recently opened country.
Read MoreMobile takeaways from non-tech projects: from gers in Mongolia to migrants in Thailand
In this post, I wanted to highlight a few projects in development, some foregrounding and some backgrounding technology, in the Asia Pacific region and discuss some takeaways from these projects that are applicable to almost all development projects. If you are looking for projects in the Asia Pacific region, I generally recommend some of the content being generated by the UNESCO Asia and Pacific Regional Bureau for Education office out of Bangkok, particularly the ICT in Education group, as they give a good snapshot of activity in the region. So much so that the projects I am discussing here are taken directly from their newsletter.
Read MoreUser testing with teenage girls - what do you need to consider?
Here at Panoply Digital, it’s been a busy few months with lots of exciting work happening all over the world. As for me, this summer I’ve been busy doing user testing for an IVR-based edutainment service for adolescent girls in Bangladesh, working with Praekelt Foundation and BRAC. I wrote a blog post a year or so ago about user testing a mobile product with women, and I thought it might be time for a quick update, based on what I’ve experienced this time around.
Read MoreSpeaking to Zambian Youth about Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights
Last week, I was in Lusaka hosting user feedback workshops for Praekelt’s TuneMe service. TuneMe is a mobi-site targeted at youths and not only provides sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR) information, but speaks to them in a relatable and personal way, moving beyond the clinical and avoiding any patronising 'do this, don't do that’ tones.
Read MoreSITUATING MOBILE IN “THE JUNGLE”: THOUGHTS FROM MY 24 HOURS IN CALAIS (PART 2 of 2)
The tragedy of what is occurring in Calais can be read in various media outlets online, so I will not take time here to rehash the details. What I will do in the second and last of a two post series is highlight some of the opportunities for mobile that I saw while volunteering. In my first post, I focused on my experience working in the donation processing warehouse in support of the refugees. In this second post, I will share the power and potential of mobile for refugees based on my visit to “The Jungle.”
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