High Tech + Low Tech in Cambodia
NY Times reports on the "Motoman" program in rural cambodia, which uses a mixture of low tech and high tech tools to create
a workable communications network in Rural Cambodia [free registration req'd].
Once a day, an Internet "Motoman" rides a cherry red Honda motorcycle slowly past the school. On the passenger seat is a gray metal box with a short fat antenna. The box holds a wireless Wi-Fi chip set that allows the exchange of e-mail between the box and computers. Briefly, this schoolyard of tree stumps and a hand-cranked water well becomes an Internet hot spot.
It is a digital pony express: five Motomen ride their routes five days a week, downloading and uploading e-mail. The system, developed by a Boston company, First Mile Solutions, uses a receiver box powered by the motorcycle's battery. The driver need only roll slowly past the school to download all the village's outgoing e-mail and deliver incoming e-mail. The school's computer system and antenna are powered by solar panels.
These systems are amazing. But I'm worried they fall short. Perhaps it's just the Time's portrayal, but the gee-whiz factor failed to resolve to any concrete benefits for the users of the network. Near the end of the article, the discussion turns to the fact that poor countries tend to use communication access charges--telephone, satellite--to generate income, and the potential for the Internet to overthrow such economic structures.
[via
boing-boing]
In that context, Nicholas Negroponte, who subsidizes one rural school in the area, is quoted touting the benefits of connecting rural schools to the Internet. But given his simultaneous assertion that the government of Cambodia (and other poor countries) would lose substantial income, will the benefits of increased communication outweigh the costs of wider economic collapse? There's a free market economy strand here that remains unexamined. Certainly increasing communication can be a good thing, but the failure to articulate any real benefits in the article, coupled with the potential economic damage, need to be thought about much more critically.
Anyone who has spent more than a few minutes watching people overpay for useless junk on eBay should recognize that unrestrained economic activity is not always beneficial to individuals in the system, and not always worth the social cost.
Posted by johndan at January 26, 2004 05:43 AM
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