[kictanet] Sir Tim Berners-lee web inventor on K24 Capital Talk on Monday 30th

Thu Nov 26 10:35:39 EAT 2009

Hi Mr Mureithi:

i still feel the rest of the media, i.e print journalists, were not given sufficient time to interview and seek views of Prof Barnes on saturday and during the whole trip.

the first communication we'd from DFID was that there'd be a media briefing at 9am on saturday, then the time was pushed to 11.30am, then 12.30pm. then after Barnes was done with Jeff, the rest of us were only given 10 mins for our interview, 5mins of which were still spent on setting the ground rules for the interview like the number of questions to ask, how not to take photos and the like.

as much as i agree that Jeff (K24) needed the almost 2hours he'd for his 'capital talk' interview, the rest of us should also have been considered, and the appropriate ans sufficient time accorded to us so as to enable us to also inform our readers about Prof Barnes visit to the country.

thanks.

Michael Ouma
Journalist
Kenya
Tel:+254-725-537823

"There are risks and costs to a program of action, but they are far less than the long-range risks and costs of comfortable inaction," - JF Kennedy.

--- On Wed, 11/25/09, muriuki mureithi <mureithi at summitstrategies.co.ke> wrote:

> From: muriuki mureithi <mureithi at summitstrategies.co.ke>
> Subject: [kictanet] Sir Tim Berners-lee web inventor on K24 Capital Talk on Monday 30th
> To: benomnta at yahoo.com
> Cc: "KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions" <kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
> Date: Wednesday, November 25, 2009, 11:59 AM
> 
> 
> 
>  
>  
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  
> 
> 
> 
> Hi
> all stakeholders of the web  
> 
>    
> 
> Sir
> Tim Berners-Lee, the www inventor in 1989 and Time magazine
>   member
> of  100 Most Important  People of  the
> 20th  century
>  honoured Kenya by a visit last week facilitated by
> KICTAnet. On the
> conclusion of the trip, he gave a wide ranging
>  one-on-one interview to
> K24’s Jeff Koinange  Capital Talk to be aired on
> Monday 30th
> at 2000 hrs and 2200hrs. Make a date to hear first hand the
> inventor of the
> www. 
> 
>    
> 
>  In
> his  itinerary, he met and interacted with the
> cross-section of Kenyan  web
> stakeholders – government, parliament, academia,
> techies, industry 
> and civil society. This was a fact finding mission to
> understand  how his
> invention is being exploited. He also profiled  Web
> Foundation (www.webfoundation.org
> ) that he launched
> in Sharm el Sheikh  IGF  on 15th Nov,
> Web Science Research
> Initiative (www.wsri.org) and clarified
> some
> of the  outputs of www consortium (w3c)  in
> standard setting especially
> for the virtually impaired. 
> 
>    
> 
>  He
> met government  officials led  by
>   Vice President  Hon
> Kalonzo Musyoka, Permanent Secretary Dr Bitange Ndemo and
> CCK DG Mr Charles
> Njoroge among others over lunch, had an interactive session
> with Parliamentary
> committee  responsible for ICT led by Hon Eng James
> Rege. He also gave a
> one hour lecture  to the academic community 
> (view the video lecture
> at www.kenet.or.ke)  and
>  met
> Skunkworks at  Strathmore University as well as 
> TESPOK.   A
> recurring theme    was the  opportunity
> provided by the www
> but can only be fully exploited by the  development of
> content –
> just do it, put data on a  web page and contribute to
> the growth of the
> web now estimated at 10 raised to power 18 pages and
> growing rapidly. 
> 
>    
> 
> From
> the high and mighty,  Sir Tim went to the grassroots.
> First stop was first
> hand interaction  with the virtually impaired at the
> Kenya Society of the Blind.
> Yes, the blind who constitute up  to 3% of the Kenyan
> population need to
> access the web and software to help them is available both
> for the computer and
> the cell phones. According to the virtually impaired ,the
>  cost was a
> barrier, good  pc software cost about $500 while for
> the cell phone cost $300,
> and  open source was not as good. Equally, most of the
> Kenyan web
> developers  do not incorporate features for
>  virtually impaired.  
> 
> In
> addition, Sir Tim saw applications of the web as a social
> intervention to
> create jobs, reduce crime and organise a neighbourhood
>  by the excellent
> work by  Kimathi Information Centre,  and the
> power of the community radio
> to extend the power of the web to those in the slums as
> ably illustrated by the
> SIDAREC radio – Ghetto 99.9. To crown  the visit
> to  SIDAREC,
> he talked live on Ghetto 99.9 FM and  praised 
> the efforts of the
> SIDAREC to empower the poor with information.  
> 
>    
> 
> His
> visit comes at time when Kenya has just plugged into
> submarine optic fibres
> cables and  a repealed Kenya Communication Act
>   chaperoning Kenya
> to the  information society era. From the many
> interactions in his
> itinerary  it was clear that  all sectors 
> of the society are
> highly sensitised  on the opportunities created by www
> and ways  to
> exploit the web.  The only way to honour Sir
> Tim’s visit is to ACT  now. 
> 
>    
> 
> Cheers
>  
> 
> Muriuki
> Mureithi 
> 
>    
> 
>    
> 
>    
> 
>    
> 
>    
> 
> ----------------------------------
> 
> 
> Summit
> Strategies Ltd  
> 
> ICT  consulting and
> research  
> 
> Land
> mark Plaza 13th floor 
> 
> P O Box
> 62454  - 00200  
> 
> Nairobi
> Kenya  
> 
> tel +
> 254-20- 3673925 
> 
> Cell
> +254 722 520090 
> 
> email -
> mureithi at summitstrategies.co.ke   
> 
> www.summitstrategies.co.ke
> 
> 
>    
> 
>    
> 
> 
> 
>  
> 
> 
> 
> -----Inline Attachment Follows-----
> 
> _______________________________________________
> kictanet mailing list
> kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke
> http://lists.kictanet.or.ke/mailman/listinfo/kictanet
> 
> This message was sent to: benomnta at yahoo.com
> Unsubscribe or change your options at http://lists.kictanet.or.ke/mailman/options/kictanet/benomnta%40yahoo.com
> 