[bytesforall_readers] Re: RE: [Telecentres] how many / emergencysystems

[Gurstein, Michael]

I guess like everyone else I've been watching the tragic events unfold
on television with a sense of sadness and powerlessness.  Not much that
one can do from so far away except at this point to make a donation and
to make the kinds of noises that get governments to move away from
inactivity.  
 
Fortunately my family and I weren't personally impacted so far as we
know, but the events took on a very direct force when we saw what seemed
to be video from a resort in Thailand where we had stayed 3 years ago
and which indicated that the bungalow where we were staying would have
been completely inundated by the wave.

And thinking of it and scanning the Net for information and for stories
I'm struck by a couple of things concerning the role (and lack of role)
of the Net in these events.  The Net appears to be playing a very
significant part in responding to the needs of those at a distance--the
on-lookers for information, stories, ways of contributing and so on;
families and friends of those possibly impacted with attempts at
creating listings of the found and the lost and for those on the ground
to manage the concerns and queries of those farther away; and one
expects that behind the scenes much of the co-ordination and planning
that is being done by aid organizations is being done in ways that are
pushing the boundaries of Computer Mediated Communication and managing
at a distance.

I guess I'm a bit surprised that the Net wasn't able (yet?) to bridge
the information divides between those who had some idea about what might
be coming (the scientists and those immediately impacted) and those who
might have been able to make some use of that information in the places
where the impact took appreciable time to be realized.  Those who had
the information couldn't use it, and those who needed the information
couldn't/didn't get it.  The "degrees of separation" imposed by
nationality, language and perhaps most important, domains of knowledge
and profession (and the related social linkages, network based trusted
relationships, communication pathways and so on), just weren't
there--and one wonders whether that was simply a matter of it still
being early days in our Internetted world or something more profound and
permanent.

It seems likely that some sort of Tsunami Early Warning System will be
set up in the region probably with an ICT base (I seem to recall
something similar being in place for the Pacific Islands, for hurricanes
as well as Tsunami's I would assume), but given the infrequency of these
events, how useful it will be seems questionable.

>From a Community Informatics perspective though, I'm wondering whether
there is a future role here for our efforts and approaches. Certainly,
the "Community" side of the equation will be of immense importance as
much of the reconstruction will be done of and through existing local
communities.  But what of the Informatics side.  Don Cameron has
indicated considerable skepticism of the value of ICTs in this context
where the need for water, shelter and food are so pressing.  Certainly,
there is a need for Management/Organizational Informatics at least from
the perspective of managing aid and a considerable degree of
infrastructure reconstruction.

But what of "Community Informatics"... Is this something to be left to a
later stage when other matters have been dealt with and as Don suggested
there is some resources and time available for "recreation", or is it
the case, as I have a sense, that CI is something more important than
that and should be built into the communities directly as they are being
re-constructed.  I'm thinking for example of the need for communities to
be able to self-organize and self-manage their reconstruction, to access
external resources but to manage their deployment locally themselves.
I'm also thinking of the probably increased need to create and maintain
links with local diaspora and local well-wishers as they are dispersed
around the globe and can act as sources of support as for example
through remittances.  I'm also thinking of the as yet largely unrealized
potential for leap-frogging into community based ICT enabled health
service, linkages for local economic development, supports to
re-building local school systems and so on. And of course, the creation
of the kind of information and knowledge networks that would bind these
communities, many of which appear to be extremely isolated and with
little communication links to the larger world, as ways of providing
early warnings of future such events.

But maybe all of this is wishful thinking.

Best to all for the New Year and particularly to those impacted by the
recent events.

Mike Gurstein  

-----Original Message-----
From: telecentres-bounces at wsis-cs.org
[mailto:telecentres-bounces at wsis-cs.org] On Behalf Of
donc at internode.on.net
Sent: December 30, 2004 12:48 AM
To: Profitinafrica at aol.com; john.lawrence at undp.org;
bytesforall_readers at yahoogroups.com
Cc: telecentres at wsis-cs.org; joyojeet at SIMS.Berkeley.EDU
Subject: Re: [bytesforall_readers] Re: RE: [Telecentres] how many /
emergencysystems

Dear Peter,

As always a belated response to people in great need,
however to maybe offer some hope - Yesterday the Australian Federal Govt
announced that Geoscience Australia
(http://www.ga.gov.au/) was now tasked with constructing a Tsunami
early-warning system for SE Asia similar to that in the Pacific. They
are seeking international partners however if necessary will go it alone
to see the project completed (as reported).

This is mostly in acknowledgement that as with the US, Geoscience Aus
was well aware of the Tsunami's approaching Asia through their network
of seismic and oceanography sensors and had notified EMA (Emergency
Management
Australia) who in turn had a capability to provide at least
30 minutes advance warning to most of the impacted areas,
and in the case of India more than 1.5 hours warning. Sadly, and to the
great frustration of all involved, despite frantic attempts EMA were
unable to contact any coordinated Asian authorities to let them know
about the threat. We also must acknowledge that even if they had been so
able, there was no mechanism in place to notify the people. It all comes
down to communications (it's the same with any civil emergency).

So to your second point about communications, not only is
the technology available; it has been available for nearly a century
making the lack of a coordinated communications network throughout SE
Asia even more tragic for those involved. 

The reality is that emergency technology is not expensive;
it just requires management, coordination and cooperation to become a
reality. From a technological perspective Australia's primary emergency
notification system consists of nothing more complex than common
house-hold radios. Emergency alerts are broadcast across the public
spectrum. Emergency notifications (calls from people needing help when
telephony and other techno-based systems fail during Cyclones or floods
etc.) are mostly carried by a very old, yet inherently very reliable UHF
citizens band radio network monitored by volunteer emergency groups
throughout the nation. People are notified about threats on or near our
beaches by old air-raid sirens. This is not a system requiring computers
or any other form of advanced technology other than a few UHF repeaters
at strategic locations to provide nation-wide coverage (you will find
fixed and portable UHF transceivers at every remote community or
settlement on the continent). The reason it's so reliable during civil
emergencies is because it does not rely on computing technologies.

The real problems yet to be addressed are those of
priorities, coordination and cooperation - the systems themselves are
very cheap, however they only work if emergency mitigation is deemed a
priority and accompanied by appropriate management and support
processes. Whilst we continue to see limited resources being prioritised
towards what are mostly 'recreational technologies' like the Internet at
the expense of life-preserving systems we probably will not see any true
developments. 

Rgds, Don
_______________________________________________
telecentres mailing list
telecentres at wsis-cs.org
http://mailman-new.greennet.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/telecentres
To unsubscribe, send a message to telecentres-request at wsis-cs.org with
the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.