My talk about the state of communication infrastructure in Africa and why the Village Telco might be a positive force for change.

1. The
Village
Telco
or
3 pieces of kit
for a
neighborhood
network
Steve Song
Shuttleworth Foundation
12 August 2010

2. an easy-to-use, scalable, standards-based, wireless,
local, do-it-yourself, telephone company toolkit

3. Africa
http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=wb-wdi&met=it_net_user_p2&idim=country:KEN:ZAF:ZWE:EGY:TUN

4. World

5. http://siteresources.worldbank.org/EXTIC4D/Resources/5870635-1242066347456/IC4D_2009_Overview.pdf

7. 1 2
Efficiency Innovation
Communication networks are potentially enablers of both efficiency and innovation

8. 50%
Percentage of
disposable
income spent
on mobile
services in
Africa.

9. To enable innovation...
...lower
the cost
of failure
When failure is expensive, the lesson learned is to stop wasting money.
http://www.cbc.ca/spark/2009/11/full-interview-clay-shirky/

10. It's the
economy,
Stupid!
Bill Clinton famously captured the essence of necessary change in 1992

11. It's the cost
of access,
Stupid!
What an inspired African leader might say about change needed in communication networks

12. Yesterday Today
complexity
uncertainty
unpredictability
command build it and
& control you can come
trial and error is the new planning

13. 1995 2010
Walled Gardens

14. Q. What do
these two
things have
in common?
A. You don't
have access
to the recipe.
trial and error is the new planning

15. quantity is the new quality

16. United States Uganda
quantity is the new quality

17. hardware is the new software

18. hardware is the new software

19. what's needed is a paradigm shift in how we think about telecom networks

20. June 2008 – The Birth of the Mesh Potato

21. embedded Linux
telephony
development Afrimesh
toolkit
mesh management and mapping
payg voice billing system for Asterisk
powered by Open Source

22. Elektra
Rael
Lissoos
David
Rowe
What really drives the Village Telco.... people

23. o r
e rr
co iit''
ts &
acc st o s l
th
th
es f ee
tr ia he new
s is t
stupid!
planning
ware qua
hard n tity
new is
is the
are qu t he
ne
tw w
a
of
lity
s

24. Looking for...
✔ Volunteers
✔ Partners
✔ Investors

25. Steve Song
Founder
Village Telco
http://villagetelco.org
email: steve.song@shuttleworthfoundation.org
blog: http://manypossibilities.net
skype: steve_l_song
twitter: stevesong

26. Creative Commons
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Internet Map
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Bill Clinton by Chris Denbow
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