Macro

AOk. African problems are "information" problems

AO: This quote (see copy-pasted below) states that IBM (Research) believed that "many of the hardest problems in our world today, particularly in Africa, are problems of information." The speaker...Read more

What kinds of expertise or types of knowledge are mentioned?

Keynote Presentation at IBM Research Lab. (2014, March 18). [Transcript based on personal recording].

Thematic Analysis: Qual Open Data

Government of the Republic of Kenya. (2008). Kenya Vision 2030 (The Popular Version). Government of the Republic of Kenya.

AO: This is the Kenya Vision 2030 document launched in 2008 (and republished as the "popular version") in 2018 on the Vision 2030 website (https://vision2030.go.ke/). The document outlines the long-term development blueprint for the country.Read more

2006 Kenya National ICT Policy

AO: This is the first publicly published national ICT policy (although there was one drafted in 1997 that was never followed through). This was published in 2006. It was followed by another iteration in 2016...Read more

Kenya ICT Authority. 2014. “The Kenya National ICT Masterplan.”

AO: This five year ICT Masterplan was released by the Ministry of Information in 2014.Read more

Learning from Nairobi

Something Kim said - about Nairobi being an important site to learn from given that many in the US may be forced to go into the more informal economy, etc. - reminded me of a twist of that point...Read more

How is “Nairobi”, “Kenya”, and/or “Africa” invoked when data (sharing) is mentioned?

2020_SEPT_24 WRITING MEETING_Transcript

Thematic Analysis: Qual Open Data

MACRO: Nairobi Cosmopolitanism

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Amrute, S. (2020). Bored Techies Being Casually Racist: Race as Algorithm. Science, Technology, & Human Values, 45(5), 903–933.

AO: This paper seems relevant to read in preparation for our macro chapter as it focuses on the racialization of Indian software engineers in the US and Germany. Does Amrute's concept of "race-as-algorithm" hold in the Nairobi context and help to explain the digitcal economy in Nai? What is...Read more

Zachary, G. P. (2008, July 20). Inside Nairobi, the Next Palo Alto? The New York Times.

This article written in July 2008 is particularly interesting to me because of when it was written. It predates the slew of international media coverage on tech development in Nairobi (most of which was written in 2010 - 2012) and the article also touches on some of the cultural orientations...Read more

Ushahidi's principles of "witness, respond, act"

In this post, Ory articulates Ushahidi's founding principles of "Witness, Respond, Act" to argue that the same principles need to be applied to a situation...Read more

MACRO: What laws and economic drivers produce (or undercut) qualitative data infrastructure, access, work and capacity in this setting?

Okolloh, O. (2017, July 11). No Sacred Cows. Medium.

Analytics Across Scales and Systems: Qualitative Data Capacity

Friederici, N., Wahome, M., & Graham, M. (2020). Digital Entrepreneurship in Africa: How a Continent Is Escaping Silicon Valley’s Long Shadow. The MIT Press.

AO: This recent Open Access monograph publication by Friederici et al. is particularly relevant for the macro and nano chapters in that they describe Nairobi's technology ecosystem and the entrepreneurs who work...Read more

AOk. Nairobi "as a test-bed for tomorrow’s technologies"

This quote touches on what becomes heavily popularized discourse in the early days of the iHub (~2010-2013) that because of the numerous limitations present in the everyday lived experiences...Read more

META: What discourses shape the way people in this setting talk about and conceptualize qualitative data infrastructure and capacity, right-to-know, freedom of information, the potential of expanded public participation, and so on?

Zachary, G. P. (2008, July 20). Inside Nairobi, the Next Palo Alto? The New York Times.

Analytics Across Scales and Systems: Qualitative Data Capacity

Macro readings

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