[kictanet] Tech Spectator Syndrome ?

Wed Mar 13 13:20:34 EAT 2013

Just been told of this big announcement in a church and I added a line or
two,  I think it should be put our email footers :)

Do not ask If someone is going to do it... someone Died a while back.. , so
if your are not going to do it, its not going to get Done..

:) I had to share that one.

On Wed, Mar 13, 2013 at 9:04 AM, Mark Mwangi <mwangy at gmail.com> wrote:

> Why is there speculation and trickling of information? Aren't the details
> of procurement a public affair? I thought only the Defense department was
> allowed to be secretive about buying boilers?
> I recall someone inviting hackers to have their go at the IEBC systems,
> did anyone try to penetrate and I assume they must have had some sort of
> access to it.
>
>
>
>
> On Wed, Mar 13, 2013 at 8:25 AM, Rad! <conradakunga at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Which in itself should raise alarm bells.
>>
>> IEBC's competence is conducting elections and not developing software.
>> That is as peculiar as staff who run a nuclear reactor deciding they can
>> build one themselves.
>>
>> Why did they take such a risky decision? And who approved it?
>>
>>
>> On Tuesday, March 12, 2013, Brian Munyao Longwe wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Sam,
>>>
>>> For the little bits and pieces of information that keep trickling out,
>>> it appears that a company called "Next Technologies" bid and won. This is
>>> the company that had previously provided the system that handled various
>>> by-elections and the referendum for the new constitution. They never got
>>> round to implementation because IEBC decided to do the RTS development
>>> in-house and called on Next for support as an external contractor.
>>>
>>> So in this case I guess we could (sort of) say that "they" is IEBC's IT
>>> team. But having said that, we are not absolved from the responsibility of
>>> being as much a part of the process so that instead of being retrospective
>>> we can be proactive.
>>>
>>> Best regards,
>>>
>>> Brian
>>>
>>> On Tue, Mar 12, 2013 at 7:08 PM, Sam Gichuru <gichuru at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Please allow me to post this as a new thread...
>>>>
>>>> Added - My concern has been our reactions to the IEBC system failure, I
>>>> applaud the doers in this country, I applaud those who bid and lost and
>>>> those who won the contract to implement the system, I applaud them for
>>>> their failure which means we are still alive and crawling but we will soon
>>>> learn to talk and say baba and mama as the tech industry in Kenya, but my
>>>> major concern is the rest of us...
>>>>
>>>> What I am seeing and I stand to be corrected is the spectator syndrome,
>>>> when everything is ok and the international press highlight Kenya as a tech
>>>> destination, Mpesa is praised, Ushahidi and startups with all our Mvitus,
>>>> we celebrate, claim our team (#teamtech/ICT) is winning and write long blog
>>>> posts and gazillion tweets etc
>>>>
>>>> This only last as long as nothing goes wrong, but when it does,
>>>> suddenly the conversation changes from "we" to "them", they have failed,
>>>> they dint consult, they dint test, they... not us. This is what most
>>>> football fans/Spectators do, they love their football team only when its
>>>> winning, which basically makes one wonder are we players or are we fans of
>>>> this game?
>>>>
>>>> But to bring this home, we have a bigger problem, if this community
>>>> started asking about the procurement process, the system architect and the
>>>> companies that were selected to implement  the IEBC system only after it
>>>> failed, we are not engaging enough, are we saying that nobody in this list
>>>> bid for this system? nobody tried? ... doesn't that mean we are just
>>>> talking ..... and talk is cheap.
>>>>
>>>> I would like to challenge the community to engage more with an aim to
>>>> problem solve, to tender and bid for local contracts, to build more open
>>>> source solutions, to fundraise with an aim to seed fund startups, if we
>>>> dont... we are going to be running around in circles and then move to
>>>> Rwanda and guess what we will all say ..... they dint do xyz...
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Let ask Ourselves ... who is they?
>>>>
>>>> PS: I will stick to shorter posts in the future :)
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Warm Regards,
>>>> ------------------------
>>>> Sam Gichuru
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> twitter: | @samgichuru <http://twitter.com/samgichuru>
>>>> Blog: |  www.samgichuru.com
>>>> Facebook: | Sam.gichuru <http://www.facebook.com/sam.gichuru>
>>>> Skype: Sam.gichuru
>>>> Cellphone: | +254-722-730565
>>>>
>>>> Co-founder/ Director /Nailab Incubation
>>>> Location: | Nairobi
>>>> Website: | www.nailab.co.ke
>>>> twitter: | @thenailab
>>>>
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>>>
>>>
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>>
>> The Kenya ICT Action Network (KICTANet) is a multi-stakeholder platform
>> for people and institutions interested and involved in ICT policy and
>> regulation. The network aims to act as a catalyst for reform in the ICT
>> sector in support of the national aim of ICT enabled growth and development.
>>
>> KICTANetiquette : Adhere to the same standards of acceptable behaviors
>> online that you follow in real life: respect people's times and bandwidth,
>> share knowledge, don't flame or abuse or personalize, respect privacy, do
>> not spam, do not market your wares or qualifications.
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Regards,
>
> Mark Mwangi
>
> markmwangi.me.ke
>
>
>
>
>
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>
> Unsubscribe or change your options at
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>
> The Kenya ICT Action Network (KICTANet) is a multi-stakeholder platform
> for people and institutions interested and involved in ICT policy and
> regulation. The network aims to act as a catalyst for reform in the ICT
> sector in support of the national aim of ICT enabled growth and development.
>
> KICTANetiquette : Adhere to the same standards of acceptable behaviors
> online that you follow in real life: respect people's times and bandwidth,
> share knowledge, don't flame or abuse or personalize, respect privacy, do
> not spam, do not market your wares or qualifications.
>

-- 
Warm Regards,
------------------------
Sam Gichuru

twitter: | @samgichuru <http://twitter.com/samgichuru>
Blog: |  www.samgichuru.com
Facebook: | Sam.gichuru <http://www.facebook.com/sam.gichuru>
Skype: Sam.gichuru
Cellphone: | +254-722-730565

Co-founder/ Director /Nailab Incubation
Location: | Nairobi
Website: | www.nailab.co.ke
twitter: | @thenailab
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