Life beyond IT
We all technocrats love to live, love and laugh about the technology and it has gone to the level where we try to find every answer for the impending issues through technology.
I am pursuing the IT from last 12 years and with the initial excitement of few years, I started questioning myself - How much of IT is enough? Don't we as human being need to think beyond technology? Don't we need to look at the impact of technology in the life of millions who are victim of digital divide - farmers still does not have water or electricity to grow crop, billions of people sleep hungry in nights, today i read in Time magazine that 70% of Indian earn below $2!!!
Why dont we think for technology that can answer the above problems?
Why dont we work beyond the 15" screen, CPU, monitor and keyboard and contribute in whatever small or big way to show the life to millions who still waiting at street block for someone who can give better answer for their problems?
Do you want to join with me in this social movement and I will call this group as Garbage technolgoy for common man (GTCM)?
Please let me know your thoughts and feelings and lets collaborate.
Ishwar Jha
Ishwar, It is good see that seasoned IT professionals have now started to feel that there is life beyond those screens. I am already into such work with technology itself. If we could get the lower level of the pyramid exposed to IT it could turn out to be a great transformation for them to increase their reach and thereby contribute back to their local area. Let me know if there is anything I could do for your initiative.
Cheers,
Rajesh
http://samooha.sourceforge.net
Ishwar,
Many thanks for posting this. I'm very excited about the prospects for using technology to address the issues faced by those in our society who have the least. One key area where I believe we can make great strides is the use of the Internet to provide information to farmers in very poor areas. They could then use this information to increase yields, deal with pests, use crop rotation to protect the quality of the soil, etc.
The use of grid/mesh technology in mobile telephony is another area that promises much. There are technologies that allow each handset also to be a router of traffic, such that there is no longer a need for masts and base stations. This would allow mobile telephony to be deployed in rural areas where it would otherwise be prohibitively expensive to provide a service.
I believe that, with a few meetings of like-minded people, we could generate a large number of ideas, some of which may well prove to be quite easy to implement. For those that are not, it's probably a question of publicising them, so that technology companies with a social conscience can take up the challenge.....
All the best,
Patrick
Dear Patrick,
Thanks for your quick response and I am sure we can together do something concrete for those who really need IT but cannot afford to spend the mega bucks.
Let me get some more people with similar zeal and inclination towards this special venture and then I will let you know with the workaround and our future plan.
Regards,