April 2009 Archives

Last year while discussing the first edition of the Connectivity Scorecard, which revealed how inefficiently governments around the world were using their ICT infrastructure, Professor Leonard Waverman, told me that one big reason for that was, "there isn't a CIO (Chief Information officer) at the federal level."

According to Waverman (and other experts also), while it is a fact that there are CIOs at the agency or state levels in almost all governments, almost no government has a centralized CIO. This is true across all types of economies; whether it is a developing economy or a developed one.

Having gone into the depths of Singapore's eGovernance pursuits after the country won a recent award, I can't help but appreciate the wisdom of that observation of Waverman, a professor of economics at London Business School as well as the Dean of Haskayne School of Business at Canada's  University of Calgary. He is considered as one of the most influential men in the global telecom industry.

Indeed, Singapore has demonstrated how far and fast can a country forge ahead with its eGovernance initiatives when it is led by a federal level CIO.

In the 2009 Waseda University International e-Government Ranking, announced a few weeks back, Singapore overtook United States to the top, making it the first time that an Asian country has taken pole position in the study. In third position was Sweden, followed by the United Kingdom and Japan.

The Waseda ranking covered 34 countries. The study analyzed the development of web sites and ICT at governmental level, as well as the relationship between governments and their stakeholders.

Singapore ranked within the top three for almost all the research parameters including network preparedness, the availability of user-friendly and secure electronic services, the integration of ICT to facilitate management, the quality of the national portal, and above all, how well the role of Chief Information Officer in Government is defined and developed.

"Human resource, particularly Government Chief Information Office (GCIO) leadership has been seen to be one of the key factors to the success of Singapore's e-Government," says OBI.

Singapore realized the importance of a GCIO-led e-Government way back in 1996 when it established a GCIO wing to plan and oversee the development and integration of civil service-wide IT applications. Today the country even has a whole department called Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA) that acts as GCIO.

This department provides technical advice, master-planning and project management services to Ministry of Finance, which is the country's e-Government owner, and government agencies. In addition, it identifies and conceptualizes e-Government programs and projects. And finally, it drives the development and implementation of e-Government programs and projects.

Obi says that success of Singapore's GCIO-driven eGovernance initiatives is evident from the fact that almost 98 percent of the country's public services are available online  -- a feat which few countries have achieved -- with the majority of them being transactional in nature. Citizens of Singapore do almost everything online, from filing and paying their taxes, to managing their pensions and mortgages, to registering marriage, birth, and death over the Internet.

Businesses in Singapore too have full access to the Government. They can submit tenders online, renew and apply for license or permits online, as well as file patents, trademarks, etc, online.

Singapore's GCIO-led eGovernance process also makes evolution of e-Governance easy, says IDA. For instance having achieved its objectives of focusing its e-Government initiatives at the public agency level, the Government is now shifting it focus to the citizens. From merely providing services to establishing virtual spaces, IDA is now working on allowing citizens to participate in policy-making, it says.

Commenting on general e-Government trends over the past five years, Obi says that Governments have become aware that it is not enough to introduce ICT to the existing internal processes; ICT must be used together with other e-Government initiatives.

"Moreover, e-Government is becoming increasingly important in a scenario characterized by the global financial crisis, as well as growing concerns over environmental issues. ICT can be used as tools to address these issues as governments work towards a citizen-oriented state," Obi says.

French lawmakers in the National Assembly on April 9 may have defeated the bill that would have given French authorities the power to disconnect Internet connection of those who download music or copyrighted materials illegally. But authors, musicians and all other owners of Intellectual Property in France are optimistic that the illegal download bill will ultimately go through when it is presented again in the next parliament session before summer.

Sources say that given the huge interests of the music, movie and the publishing industry riding on the illegal download bill, France will ultimately have to pass the bill even if it is a watered down version of the one originally proposed.

"The French National Assembly may have defeated the bill on Thursday but the process is not finished," said a source from a powerful lobby of Intellectual Property owners pushing that bill, requesting anonymity. "We have been assured by the Government that the bill will be presented again in the parliament before summer and the present Government is also working on a revised version."

The source added that even though the bill contained some controversial and "tough measures", it was defeated more because of sparse attendance in the parliament rather than real opposition to the bill.

"The bill was defeated by 21 (against) to 15 (for), which means that there were just 40 members present that day," said the source. "Being the day before Easter most others who would have supported the bill were on a holiday."

The bill championed by the president, Nicolas Sarkozy, was supported by the influential association of authors, composers and publishers SACEM, as well as French Union of Phonographic Producers, which represents 48 French producers including giants like Universal Music and Sony BMG.

The proposed law was supposed to grant new powers to monitor Internet users and report illegal downloads to a new copyright protection agency, called HADOPI (Haute Autorité pour la Diffusion des Œuvres et la Protection des Droits sur Internet). HADOPI would have had the power to trace via IP (Internet protocol) address of all Internet users illegally downloading copyrighted materials. After three warnings HADOPI would have also had the power to severe the Internet connection of the offender for up to a year. Offenders nevertheless would have had to keep paying for their internet connection despite it having been cut off.

Sources say that this was the most controversial feature on the proposed law that attracted a fair amount of criticism. Civil liberties campaigners and members of the opposition Socialist party for instance said that the new surveillance powers were tantamount to "the criminalization of an entire generation".

Some also feared that the proposed law could end up punishing, for instance, parents whose children download in secret, or employers whose staff use computers at work to break the law.

"We are aware that the Government is now working on the law to smoothen out the rough edges so that it could be introduced again in the next parliament session," said the source. "While it is true that some of the measures in the proposed bill were harsh, it is also true that illegal Internet download is seriously harming the music, publishing and the movie industry."

In an internal document circulated to members consiting of over 124,000 authors, composers and publishers, to garner support for the this law, SACEM that acts as a not-for-profit company to collect royalties, rights and fees, said that despite the huige revenues generating power of the Internet, its "revenues from exploitations on the Internet or mobile phones increased only by $4.4 million, rising from $3.4 million in 2003 to $7.76 million in 2007.

But in 2008, its earning from the "Internet was next to nothing."

"Collections from multimedia, including the Internet (at $12.3 million) remain at abnormally low levels," said SACEM. It added that illegal downloads have actually resulted in a reduction of its total collection for 2008 which at $998 million represents a 0.4 percent fall over the previous year, 2007.

"Although the fall in total revenues (in 2008 compared to 2007) were minimal it is deplorable considering that the Internet is supposed to increase revenues for the Intellectual Property owners," said the source.

What's more, SACEM predicts the growing menace of illegal downloads could make its total collections fall by a further 2.8 percent in 2009.

According to SACEM then, it is urgent that France has a law that bans exploitation of Intellectual Property owners through the Internet. It argues that just like traditional distributors of audio and audiovisual content like cable operators, satellite platforms, and the likes, the Internet too should contribute to the remunerations of Intellectual Property owners.

"It is essential that the public authorities understand the disastrous financial consequences of the crisis affecting the music sector in recent years. Combining the considerable loss of revenues from the phonographic market and the constant devaluing of works on the Internet resulting from a decade of free file sharing, it has become illusory to think that rights holders will be able to straighten out this situation or benefit from appropriate remuneration in future years," SACEM said in its private document to its members.

It was just five years back, in the general elections of 2004, when Internet was used in Indian politics for the first time ever. And back then, that use was limited to things like  propaganda through text messages, emails, and the use websites for dissemination of information. But besides the usual political bickering, and the antics of the political parties, if there's one aspect that makes India's general elections 2009 different from all others, -- these start from tomorrow and go on until early May -- it is the way the Internet has moved into the mainstream of Indian political life.

Starting from a tool for an identity makeover, to mobilization of public opinion, to fund raising, and to even almost forcing democratic participation of the reluctant section of the Indian voters, the Internet-in a few short years has suddenly emerged as the most powerful tool as well as a driving force behind India's democratic politics.

Taking a cue from Barack Obama's stupendously successful strategy of using this medium to give him the winning edge, the Internet is not only at  the heart of the election strategy of almost all political parties now. Some are also using it rather innovatively to cross the online frontier to reach out to voters.

Take the instance of the website (http://www.tdpuk.com) created by the Telugu Desam Party for U.K.-based nonresident Indians. (his opposition party desperate to come back to power in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh)

On that website, not only has N. Chandrababu Naidu, the TDP chief, morphed his face into an image of Barack Obama, he has also copied Obama's tactic of using the website as a channel to garner campaign funds. For U.S.-based Indians he has even crafted a catchphrase: "Move over Bush, it is Obama's time ... it is our Babu's (short of Chandrababu) time."

If the TDP has excelled in online creativity, the leftist Communist Party of India (Marxist) is not too far behind either. This political party, which had little enthusiasm for digital technologies (since it replaces human labor) until recently. But now it has shown a clear preference for cyberspace-enabled propaganda for their election strategy of 2009.

While launching their election website for the first time ever, the CPI (M) admitted that since 54 percent of Indian voters are youths, the Internet is the best medium for reaching out to them.

"The increasing use of IT in Indian elections is changing the focus of many campaigns in India," says Ravi Singh, the CEO and co-founder of ElectionMall, the Washington, D.C.-based company that pioneered Internet-based IT applications for elections and campaigns, and was perhaps the biggest contributor to the IT-based election strategies of almost all the politicians in the last U.S. election.

According to Singh, following Obama's successful use of the Internet, the Indian political parties have woken up to the need to appeal to younger urban voters, who have a natural inclination toward new technology and its innovations. "Indian [youths] love their cell phones, which offers a great opportunity for mobile campaigning, like the sort just witnessed with Obama's successes in text messaging," says Singh.

The fear of terror attacks is playing a role as well.

Listen to what Suman R., outreach coordinator of the Janaagraha Center for Citizenship and Democracy, a Bangalore-based not-for-profit institution that started in 2001 to encourage people's participation in public governance, has to say:
 
"After the Mumbai [terror attack] incident, many are scared to participate in the political process like attending meeting and rallies, since such events are big terror threats," he says. "So, using IT makes sense because we have seen that when a political process is turned into an e-module, more people want to be a part of it."

Through a specially created website, www.jaagore.com (meaning wake up) Janaagraha is also spearheading a countrywide  political awareness campaign that urges reluctant Indians to cast their votes.

However, it is the cost effectiveness of the Internet which may be most driving the new IT political culture in the India.

"A candidate who uses IT in his/her campaign cuts down his expenses due to the ability to reach many more people efficiently," says Singh. "As a result, the candidate can spend more time with voters, and less time worrying about whether or not the potential voters can easily access information about the candidate."

"The reality," he adds, "is that voters are moving rapidly toward relying almost exclusively on the Internet for political information. If candidates do not move in the direction in which voters are moving, namely toward an increase in the use of technology, then the only one left in the dust is the candidate who does not alter his approach to better reach voters."

Ravi also predicts that it is not just India that is following the realization of the power of Internet that the US elections displayed, "More and more countries within the world are adopting this new technology for politics, and soon the standards for campaigning will begin reaching new levels. The trend we see within global democracies is a continual demand for available political tools and the proper integration of these political technologies directly into political campaign infrastructure."

Talk of a website purely for the Muslims and the first reaction is, "is it another one that rattles mostly about the Islam and spreads radical thoughts"? Click on the URL http://muxlim.com, however, and what attracts is its refreshing content. Although it only concerns Muslims, it is interesting enough not only to remove some of the misconceptions one may have had about Muslims and Islam, but also prods one to go deeper to know more about them.

Formed in 2006 in a different avatar before morphing into its present state early this year, Muxlim is the only and biggest online community on Muslims that enhances Muslim lifestyle instead of talking about purely religion or rambling politics, claims Mohamed El-Fatatry, its creator.

Muxlim's biggest contribution to the Muslim community, is that unlike all other social networking websites that provide people-centric service, it provides a content-centric services, which help in uniting the widely dispersed and fragmented Muslim population to one virtual venue.

"Most Muslim websites generally come in two types; either they are marriage websites, or those that are purely religious. There's another category though that talks only about politics. But if you are looking for a wholesome Muslim lifestyle experience that includes, Muslim fashion, Muslim music, movies, and everything that an ordinary Muslim does on a  daily basis -- which may not necessarily be related to religion but definitely based on its belief -- there's none barring Muxlim," says El-Fatatry.

Muxlim, he claims, fills the urgent need for a separate online community for Muslims, particularly against the background where in others (like You Tube Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and the likes) "there's always someone dictating what Muslim values are, and the type of content that is acceptable or not."

Muxlim on the other hand, gives power to the people; "its users decide what content should be allowed or not, while they have all the power to ensure the content is accurate and closest to Muslim values," he says.

The users in Muxlim also ensure that Muxlim has no place for sex, crime, or drug use-related content, neither is there a place for illegal content or content that spreads radicalization.

This Finland based venture, which says El-Fatatry "is growing from strength to strength", currently has over 160,000 registered users (that leapfrogged from 100,000 three months back) and already reaches several million Muslims around the world.

"Muxlim is not only a source of information about Islam but it also helps connect like-minded Muslims around the worlds," says a young student user who along with her friends prefers to log only into Muxlim instead of MySpace or Facebook. "It kind of brings the entire rationalist Muslim community in one place," she says.

El-Fatatry claims 55 percent of Muxlim users are females, which is opposite to most other online sites. "The power is truly in the community's hand while the community feels very safe and empowered by using this site," he says.

Having grown in strength the next focus of Muxlim is "to pursue more service and more features that [besides maximizing its shareholders' value] make the world a better place," says El-Fatatry.

And now, El-Fatatry aims to use Muxlim as a channel to spread global awareness about social development projects that help Muslims around the world.

The website announced this week that it was selected to be the exclusive social media partner for Gaza 100, a 100-metre relay race attempt to break the world record, which is taking place in London next month. Gaza 100 aims to set a new Guinness World Record for "the most people running 100 meters in a 24-hour relay" and is seeking 4,000 participants to take part in the run at Mile End Stadium on May 23rd and 24th

This campaign aims to raise British ₤400,000 from all the participants in the run (every participant needs to either raise or contribute ₤100) for Gaza Aid project, that Save the Children, an international social development organization is organizing to help the children of the Gaza region.

According to Dalia Association, a leading Palestinian Community Organization, "Gazans need an estimated $1.9 billion just to repair the physical damage caused by the recent war".

"The Gaza 100 aims to raise a humble sum towards this desperately needed aid, and we are delighted to be able to help them spread the word and garner additional support through our community, as part of a diverse and all-inclusive world," says El-Fatatry. "Social media in general and Muxlim in particular are very effective channels to spread global awareness about such projects. We hope to use the Muxlim community as a launch pad for wider social media activities that either attract attention to the fund raising effort, or help directly through sign-ups to the campaign."