2nd Abidjan Blog Camp. Image by Nadine Kouamouo

The event took place on the 14th of November 2009 at the Fondation Les Amis de l'Excellence in Abidjan, the capital of Ivory Coast. Information about the program and participants can be found here [fr].

The project leader of Abidjan Blog Camps Théophile Kouamouo wrote [fr] about the expected participants in an invitation published in his blog:

The target? People who already blogging and want to share their more experienced “tip”. Stakeholders? Those who have a theme to develop in twenty minutes, and who are willing to distinguish themselves through a comment below this post.

He listed [fr] the program:

There will be four speakers:
- Nadine Kouamouo, who will speak of liveblogging, notably about Twitter and CoveritLive.
- Israël Yoroba of Le Blog De Yoro, who will speak about referencing and maintaining a blog over time.
- Manassé Dehe (cartunelo) will show how to produce audio podcasts and video and publish them.
- Theophile Kouamouo (myself). I will speak of blogging in the workplace.

Register by clicking this link: http://abidjanblogcamp.eventbrite.com

2nd abidjan blogcamp. Image by Nadine Kouamouo

10 participants with blogging experience attended the blog camp. However, Nadine Kouamouo mentions [fr] that they had hoped of more participants. This event was live blogged by Nadine [fr]. The transcript tells that there was a bonus for the participants - a discussion on blogging under pseudonyms.

Here is a video [fr] of an interview with Israël Yoroba, who talks about the blog camp:

Theophile looks back [fr] at the success of the workshop and announces future plans of the project:

It seemed important at the outset to educate journalists, opinion leaders and influential, who have the habit of writing, the practice of the blog. We subsequently created the framework for cross-training of those who are already blogging - and will continue to meet and learn from each other within the BlogCamps.

Now it is for us to go to groups less naturally well disposed but which would benefit from blogging. We want to start by artists, writers and musicians. Perhaps in a single session, perhaps two, depending on enrollment.

We expect bloggers, blog readers and members of these groups they help us to have contacts with writers, musicians, agents and managers. This will help them share our project and to organize the next BlogCamp in early December.

2nd Abidjan blog camps participants. Image by Nadine Kouamouo

In a recent post Theophile wrote about the linguistic barrier which divides the African web (bloggers, developers, entrepreneur) like the “Berlin Wall”.

It may seem almost impossible to read afro-bloggers who write in a language we do not know - although a friend pointed out to me that Google Translate is not for dogs

Beyond what can be considered like interpersonal communication problems, it seems that the linguistic challenge is also a technological and economic challenge for us. For example, large platforms like Facebook and Google are safe to translate their interfaces in as many languages as possible, simply because they want to expand their user base and their financial value, simply.

Should we not do the same? How many Kenyan or South African start-ups are interested by developments in Côte d'Ivoire and Gabon? How many Cameroonian startups would benefit to cross the border and conquer Nigeria? I think that investor’s interest would increase if we could develop online brands which go beyond language barriers. In this regard, the blogging platform Maneno shows the path.

Ivorian Wedding. Image by Elia Varela Sera

It's really a shame that the Abidjan lagoon (named Ebrie), is now extremely polluted and in some parts of the city it stinks like a dumpster. But at night, when you can't see the fowl color of the water and the trash littering its banks, it's really quite a lovely view to enjoy sit on a terrace next to it sipping a beer.

Now let us look at some posts from Ivorian blogs [fr]:

Houedanou explains “how to create a personal website in 3 steps”. The blogger also writes about the African email scams and the Google Money kit scam.

Euclid Okolou writes about the spread of scams via sms to mobile phones instead of emails.

Israël Yoroba informs that Avenue 225, a local radio station has launched the first ever radio webcast in Ivory coast. Yoroba also writes about a debate which took place in the Deutsche Welle akademie titled “New Media for a New World: Democracy and Development“:

Roger Kasse writes a multi part report on the ill practices of private medical clinics and shops in Vavoua region. He also writes about the challenges the African bloggers face to blog - the internet is slow and costly, it takes time to blog, tools like pc and camera are not easily available etc.

Richman posts this interesting picture with the apt title “Sustainable development”:

Sustainable Development. Image by Richman Mvouama

While it can run, let's go. The decor is done with the resources available. It is also sustainable development.

Nadine Kouamouo writes about a local geek who engaged in the community service voluntarily and helped many:

I have learned through Facebook this morning. My friend Manasseh Dehe was made available to all for providing help on how to use the WAP service for mobile phones. [..] He was happy to help twenty people today [..] and I too can now “twitter” on my phone.

Telecommunications companies should support such initiatives. Those of who opens the eyes of users on specific applications. It is not enough to just note that the “customers” do not use many applications available to them by the operators. We must help those who are willing to “educate” … only “glamorous” advertising campaigns are not enough.

Today is the Blog Action Day and this annual event aims to unite the world's bloggers where they write about a single topic in a single day to raise awareness and trigger a global discussion on the subject. Some of the members of Rising Voices projects are also participating in this event and we bring to you a brief round-up.

One of the main focus of the Rising Voices grantee FOKO is make the citizens of Madagascar a crucial factor in their unique and threatened environment. Tahina from FOKO Blog Club in Antananarivo, Madagascar writes:

Today is the Blog Action Day about Climate Change, thousands of blogs are uniting to raise more awareness and put pressure on each individual and world leaders to take quick and apropriate actions. The fight is worthwhile since the future of our kids is at stake. I’m pretty skeptical on the direct impact of this online activism here in Madagascar but since blogging has once helped Baby Kambana, why wouldn’t it do the same for all of us. We want to tell the World as well that we do care.

He points out to the action required:

How many of the Malagasy homes are using coal and woods to cook? 80-90%? We just can’t afford other source of energy in the long term. And this is where higher responsibles should take actions.

Patrick from Tamatave, Madagascar: Looking for the right place where to plant a tree

Lyva, another member of FOKO writes [fr] from Antsirabe :

We believe that everyone should be concerned by this problem because no one ever knows what season we see. For example, is this spring or summer? The temperature varies a lot because there is no winter. It drops to 3°C while in spring and in summer it rises to 35°C or more. (machine translation)

Ariniaina tells what prevents people from taking action against environmental damage:

I think that the main problem here in Madagascar is that people are so busy to search for what they are going to eat today. We then become selfish and just think of ourselves. We forget our neighbours and our future generation.

I hope that the Bloggers’Action of today will wake up millions… billions of people… governments… poor countries… rich countries… and then, we will altogether rescue the Earth. What I can and already do now is planting my own trees.

Théophile Kouamouo from Abidjan Blog Camps project in Ivory Coast writes about a a private conversation between him and a 70 years old Ivorian politician:

Originally from northern Ivory Coast, he told me about his childhood and told me that in front of his eyes, two rivers have dried up in his village. He saw that as the deep wells have increased the likelihood of finding water by digging decreased. What is responsible for what farmers see as a disaster or a curse? The desert encroachment, climate change, but also agro-industrial policies requiring irrigation works, all are quite dangerous in the long term.

The politician spoke with conviction, even with fear for the future, because he had seen with his eyes the danger. (machine translation from French)

“Africa is one of the places of the world most threatened by climate change,” warns Théophile.

Cartunelo from Abidjan Blog Camps writes [fr]:

As a web developer there are simple actions we can take to save our planet and make us web developers eco-compatible in Abidjan:

1. Turn off the computer: Use the lowest possible standby and hibernation.
2. Turn off your external hard drives at night
3. Use Eco-friendly Bulbs
[..]

The issue climate change is addressed specifically by another Rising Voices project. Nomad Green trains Mongolian citizens how to spread awareness - both at home and abroad - about their country's environmental crisis. Read their blog to learn more about their activism to stop degradation of Mongolia's environment.

Roger Kassé informs about the workshop held on the September 3, 2009:

At the initiative of the National Union of Journalists of Côte d'Ivoire (UNJCI) in collaboration with the Association I3C, a training seminar on ‘Journalism and e-blogging' was held at the Press House of Abidjan. This training session was attended by 10 journalists from various Ivorian media.

Théophile Kouamouo (journalist blogger) and Manasseh Dehé (computer engineer) introduced a number of citizen media tools to the participants to teach them blogging. Besides theoretical lectures the new bloggers also engaged in practical trainings.

Théophile Kouamouo writes [fr] about the workshop:

They know - especially the young - that their job is changing. There have already created two blogs, one of Roger and Cynthia, in addition to that of Prosper, which already existed. Many Twitter accounts have been created.

True change agents, journalists who attended the training have already turned into evangelists of blogging. Their articles were published in Le Nouveau Réveil, L'Expression, Fraternité-Matin, AIP, etc. … We had also the opportunity to discuss the topic of online media and blogs on Radio Côte d'Ivoire and Radio Jam. (machine translation)

Roger Kassé informs about the case of toxic waste dumped in 2006 by the ship Probo Koala.

Roger also writes an interesting report on the internet scammers aka “grazers”:

Most of the time, they pose as women or are in collusion with women experts in the art of Internet scam. Their targets or victims reside in Europe. Within a decade, Abidjan became the hub of cyber crime because of these grazers. These crooks on the net belong to a vast network from Nigeria. Their scenario is simple. They storm the cyber space in the district of Abidjan. Their favorite sites are social networks like Facebook or chat sites. (machine translation)

Cinthia R Aka explains that the marketing strategists in Ivory Coast lure clients at any price:

The sellers of clothing, cosmetics and even food installed in our markets do not lack imagination when it comes to bringing people to buy their goods.

Manasseh Deheer, writes about a gathering of entrepreneurs to discuss “The new web based tools for optimizing digital identity (personal / professional).”

Yoro informs that Théophile's wife Nadine Kouamouo, a team member of the project has won the “Best woman ICT reporter” at the Highway Africa Conference.

Nadine writes about the abundance of skin whitening slogans used to sell cosmetics products in Abidjan.

We are looking forward to read more from the Abidjan Blog Camp participants' blogs.

Voces Bolivianas

Elia Varela Serra and Eduardo Ávila speaking at the Digital Citizen Indaba

Eduardo Ávila, executive director of Voces Bolivianas, was invited to share his experiences at this year's Highway Africa conference in South Africa, the largest conference for journalists from across the African continent. Speaking with Elia Varela Serra from Maneno.org, Ávila presented Voces Bolivianas as a case study of how citizen media projects can welcome under-represented languages to online conversation by adapting open source tools and collaborating with volunteer translation networks. A re-cap of the session on the Digital Citizen Indaba blog:

Just as in most African countries Internet access in Bolivia is still concentrated in major urban centres, where people have Internet at home or at work. “This not only leaves out the rural resident and lower social economic sectors but also indigenous groups and women”, says Eduardo Avila, Executive Director of Bolivian Voices. But in addition, Eduardo argues that there has been an online resurgence of indigenous languages in Bolivia.

Ávila also participated in the roundtable discussion “Are people ready to have their own means od disseminating information within their communities?”

Abidjan Blog Camps

Nadine Tchaptchet-Kouamouo from Abidjan Blog Camps, a collective of bloggers from Ivory Coast who are holding regular workshops and events to bring new bloggers into their midst, was also at this year's Highway Africa conference where she was awarded the “Best Woman ICT Reporter” prize. Looking back on her time in Johannesburg (where she stayed longer than she had expected), Nadine writes:

I do not regret having tried the “way of life” of this great country of South Africa, whose level of development can be frustrating for us, but can also inspire us in our own development. Starting with representatives at the community level (women, children, youth, etc …) it is necessary for us to see farther, think bigger, and envision the best …

Blogging Since Infancy, Uruguay

Pablo Flores from Plan Ceibal, Uruguay's One Laptop Per Chile project, and Blogging Since Infancy presented at this year's Ars Electronica Symposium on Cloud Intelligence. Pablo asked the audience to consider how those who have the most to gain can benefit from the information amassing online. The value of intelligence, after all, is in solving problems facing society. Flores points to housing, nutrition, and education as three major social issues which can be improved with more access to better information. In order to bring intelligence and information from the cloud to everyday citizens in Uruguay, for example, they need a network of connectivity and devices.

Flores points to a class which set up a blog to interact with fellow students across the border in Brazil. Of course such pen pal projects have existed for decades, but the blogs allow the students to interact in real time and incorporate other tools to learn Portuguese and Spanish. His presentation concludes by emphasizing the importance of avoiding black boxes - technological gadgets which function properly, but don't allow us to understand how they function. Plan Ceibal values open source technologies as a way of promoting curiosity so that students are encouraged to look “inside” the programs and adapt them to their cultural needs.

Ethan Zuckerman live-blogged Pablo's presentation. Pablo's conference statement was published in the Ars Electronica 2009 Catalog.

HiperBarrio

HiperBarrio was represented at Ars Electronica by Álvaro Ramirez, Gabriel Jaime Vanegas, and Diego Gomez. Álvaro's presentation introduced the history and evolution of HiperBarrio and how the group of young bloggers and citizen journalists in San Javier La Loma have managed to maintain a sense of community while still introducing new members to remain open and inclusive. He stressed that HiperBarrio re-thinks the roles of libraries as more than just places to consume culture produced at the institutional level; but rather that they should serve as collective laboratories to produce and publish culture from the grassroots. HiperBarrio served as a model for Chile's national library network as it re-thought the role of its libraries for the digital era, and was also presented in the application by Fundación Empresas Públicas de Medellín which eventually led to a $1 million grant from the Gates Foundation. (Ramirez points out that none of the $1 million is currently budgeted for HiperBarrio or similar grassroots new media training programs.)

Álvaro referenced the story of Suso as an example of how citizen journalism is forming a process by which the young people discover more information about their own community and become invested in its future. He also pointed out media production is providing an appealing alternative to gangs and drugs for the community's young people. An article in Colombia's El Tiempo newspaper adds:

The project was presented to the public at Ars Electronica with a video which highlights the important role HiperBarrio plays to help young people find alternatives to crime, violence and drugs in a region that has been marked by the drug trafficking, guerrillas and paramilitaries.

“When people have no access to media, and are given the opportunity to tell their stories and show who there are, then they take that opportunity,” Ramirez said to the public.

From its new project blog:

The theme for the exercise of our students is the story of their school holidays. They tell their environment, their readings, their interests. They share their stories, their photos and video.

The “blog your holidays” is part of the “AbidjanBlogCamps. The “AbidjanBlogCamps” revolves around two axes:

- A framework for training the use of social media (blogs, podcasts, social networks, etc …), open to various associations, professions, schools and youth groups in the district of Abidjan (Ivory Coast) .

- A blog that will serve as a practice ground and exposure to various communities that will be formed.

Teenagers are on vacation the first target of the initiative for two reasons:

- They are often already familiar with the Internet, with use often focused on themselves.

- They are enthusiastic and can encourage their parents to look at Web 2.0.

(Machine translation)

The post also calls for potential students who can register for free just by mailing to abidjanblogcamps[at]gmail.com.

Théophile Kouamouo, the project leader, informed earlier via an email:

We are working on the national PR campaign about blogging. We are writing a booklet and we will use this booklet to organize something like an offline buzz. With this booklet, we will explain to the community leaders the importance of blogs and convince them to send their communities to our workshops. We will also make a press conference.

We hope that with these efforts they will be able to find the intended number of enthusiastic participants.

Théophile also informs that Nadine Kouamouo, president of I3C (Information and Communication for Behavior Change) will coordinate the campaign. Théophile is also authoring a blogging guide in collaboration with Manasseh Deheer.

There was an interesting article in Africa2.0 blog describing the lack of videos uploaded from African countries (except South Africa, Kenya, Morocco and Nigeria). There are some videos on Africa in Video sharing sites like YouTube but those are mostly uploaded by the diaspora. The blog discusses the reason why:

Indeed very few videos are made by Africans on the issues of the continent. With all the scenes of daily life, events, comedy series that pass on the local channels do not provide all perspectives and there are issues missing. This lack may be explained by the fact that very few Africans have digital cameras to make videos, although some phones offer the possibility of capturing scenes of everyday life with reasonable quality. Also it is not easy to upload a 100MB video with the available slow networks. Except from selected African countries, many lack access to ADSL. But where people are lucky enough to have access to broadband there are interested users that are emerging on the continent. (Machine Translation)

As Abidjan Blog camp will also have video making and sharing in their curriculum we hope that the above issue will be addressed properly.

“I blog on Africa with joy because I believe it is our individual voices that emerge and mixed African renaissance will happen as surely as the dream of Martin Luther King became reality Forty years later.”

And Théophile did not stop there. With the help of a community of experienced bloggers he went on with his dream to promote Ivorian individuals voices by teaching them how to blog. Based on his idea on arranging a blogcamp in Africa, he had applied for a Rising Voices micro-grant and the project “Abidjan Blog Camps” has been selected as one of the grantees of the latest round.

Skylines of Abidjan

We have discussed with Théophile about the preparations for the Abidjan blog camps:

RV: Who are your target participants? Have you selected them?

Théophile Kouamouo: We are targeting communities that will naturally gain by expressing themselves through the citizen media tools. Artists, craftsmen, who would like to show their talent; activists and associations that would like to plead their cause; the groups of young people who would like to speak. We have not selected them yet. We will invite some of them to share with them about the program, and we will select the most interested communities.

RV: When will the workshop start? What will be taught? Have you prepared the curricula?

Théophile Kouamouo: The workshops will start in one month. We will teach how to create a blog, how to make podcasts (audio and video), how to promote a blog by links and communities like Facebook and Twitter, how to write on a blog more efficiently and how to build a community. We are working on the curricula.

RV: Who will be the trainers? Have you recruited them?

Théophile Kouamouo: Some of them are known, like me, Nadine Tchaptchet-Kouamouo and Israël Yoroba, winner of the BOBS 2008 price of the best blog in French. We are in contact with Etum and Djé and are open to other potential trainers.

RV: Have you selected the venue? What will be the facilities there?

Théophile Kouamouo: Not yet. But we have identified some.

RV: How long will the training continue?

Théophile Kouamouo: Two days by session.

RV: How will you keep the participants motivated?

Théophile Kouamouo: We will be in contact with them by mailings and phoning and we will display their work on our collective blog.

RV: What do you feel that the Ivory Coast bloggers lack?

Théophile Kouamouo: I think that they need to learn how to use some means like podcasts and photos to express themselves. And the local blogosphere needs more diversity.

RV: Do you have any plan to post English translations of you selected contents for the world readers?

Théophile Kouamouo: We will try to translate our best content but we'll need to have some translators working for free.

Feast of Internet in Ivory Coast. Image Courtesy of Israël Yoroba

Israël Yoroba writes about “La Toile d'Or” (Feast of the Internet) in Ivory coast which was held from 27th of April to 1st of May 2009. This year's theme was “what to do with Internet”.

The Abidjan Blog Camps will surely guide Ivorians how to make proper use of Internet and bring them to the blogosphere to initiate a change.

Of the 270 project proposals, the following five are most representative of the innovation, purpose and goodwill that Rising Voices aims to support.

Abidjan Blog Camps

Théophile Kouamouo has long been one of Francophone Africa's leading bloggers. Based in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, Kouamouo is one of the founders of the Ivoire Blog network and started the wildly successful meme “Why I Blog About Africa.” (Elia Varela Serra summarized many of the resulting responses in a two-part series on Global Voices.) Kouamouo is now trying to bring many more of his countrymen and women to the blogosphere by organizing a series of “blog camps” around Abidjan in which current Ivorian bloggers can discuss the issues affecting them and show new bloggers how to join their ranks. Kouamouo first proposed the idea on his blog back in August last year, which attracted a number of enthusiastic commenters supporting the idea. Blog Camps have a long history of attracting new citizens to the participatory net. A number of blog camps have taken place in India, including in Chennai in 2006 and, more recently, in Mumbai. Blogcamp CEE last October brought many new participants to the Russian-speaking blogosphere. For the most part, however, West Africa (and particularly Francophone West Africa) has been left out of the booming global blogosphere. That is starting to change. Panos West Africa, in partnership with Highway Africa and Global Voices, recently announced the winners of the Waxal - Blogging Africa Awards. Next year we can expect to find many more Ivorians on that list as Théophile Kouamouo sets out to organize a series of events that will bring dozens if not hundreds of Ivorians to the blogosphere. Abidjan Blog Camps will also promote more pan-African online interaction by teaming up with existing blog camp movements in Madagascar, Kenya, Uganda, Mauritius, and South Africa.

Ceasefire Liberia

Just west of Ivory Coast lies Liberia and its roughly 3.5 million inhabitants. Settled by free slaves from the United States in the early 19th century, Liberia fell into a 14-year dark period of civil war and lawlessness that concluded in late 2003 with the presence of ECOWAS and the United Nations. Today Liberia is slowly recovering despite inadequate infrastructure, unemployment at around 80%, and former combatants (many of them minors) who must be re-integrated into society. Many unemployed Liberians have put their hopes in friends and relatives living abroad in the United States. However, there is often a lack of communication and understanding between Liberians at home and those living in the diaspora. By partnering with African Refuge - a drop-in center for West African youth - and the Century Dance Complex in Park Hill, Staten Island (the largest Liberian community outside of Africa), and Amnesty International in Monrovia, freelance journalist Ruthie Ackerman aims to help foster a transatlantic Liberian blogging community.

Those Liberians who lived through the war — whether soldiers or not — experienced some type of trauma or displacement. By creating a community and sharing experiences with others, it has helped give these youth a purpose and vision that there is something larger than themselves. This will benefit the community (on both sides of the ocean) on many levels: Liberians, many of whom have difficulty adjusting to life in America, can reconnect with their families and dispel myths about what life is like in the U.S. There are also left-over tensions from the war, which may be able to be diffused through the dialogue created between the communities.

Real Experience of the Digital Era - China

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Shenyang, literally meaning “the city to the north of Shen River” and capital of the Liaoning province, is touting itself as China's “next tourist destination.” But whether you are visiting the ancient pagodas of Old City or the official “High-tech Industrial Development Zone” the tourist brochures won't mention the city's male and female sex workers who mostly come from poor rural communities in search of talked-up urban opportunities. In partnership with the Ai Zhi Yuan Zhu Center for Health and Education documentary filmmaker Wei Zhang will train male and female sex workers who use the AZYZ center how to maintain a blog and upload short video documentaries to share their experiences, opinions, and troubles in order to promote more understanding of the region's sex worker population.

Nomad Green - Mongolia

Environment officials from throughout Northeast Asia met in Ulaanbaatar this week for the first time to discuss climate change and how to enhance energy efficiency in the region. Mongolia's capital city was a fitting location for the meeting as the country's environmental deterioration has accelerated recently due to rapid urbanization, industrial growth, and increased coal consumption. Ulaanbaatar is frequently shrouded in a haze of thick pollution:

Desertification from climate change is threatening the livelihoods of nomadic Mongolian tribesmen and the country's saiga antelope was just named the most endangered antelope species in Asia. It is amid so much negative news that Portnoy Zheng, in collaboration with the Mongolian and Tibetan Foundation and the Mongolian Green Party, will train Mongolian citizens how to spread awareness - both at home and abroad - about their country's environmental crisis. Nomad Green aims to 1.) train citizen journalists how to use blogs, digital video, podcasts, and map mashups to report on environmental news, 2.) create a network and community of environmentalists sharing and spreading information about related threats, solutions, and opportunities, and 3.) translate content into Chinese and English to promote more regional and international cooperation in facing Mongolia's environmental challenges.

Empowerment of Women Activists in Media Techniques - Yemen

With international coverage of the Middle East focused on the Israel-Palestine conflict, the war in Iraq, Iran's nuclear program, and the financial markets of the Persian Gulf States, little attention is given to one of the region's poorest countries, Yemen. The few spikes in media coverage of Yemen over the past few years are all related to fears of al-Qaida presence.

In collaboration with the Hand in Hand Initiative, Ghaida'a al-Absi will organize a new media training course for female politicians, activists, and human right workers in order to bring a new perspective to the Arabic-language blogosphere and to build an online network of Yemeni gender activists. It is fitting that today, on the 98th anniversary of International Women's Day, we announce al-Absi's initiative to bring more women's voices to the internet. The deteriorating status of women's rights in Yemen is frequently documented and discussed, but rarely do women themselves take part in those discussions. By reaching out to NGO's and political parties throughout Yemen al-Absi aims to change that.

Please join me in congratulating and welcoming the newest five grantee projects to our community.