[Arise-rural] Learning from mistakes

[arise-rural@lists.sn.apc.org]

Dear all,

This is a message from Klaus Stoll, klaus@chasquinet.org, on the main 
telecentres list 
(telecentres-l@lyris.idrc.ca), based mainly on his experience with
Latin American telecentres.

He basically says that after all these projects we still don't have an 
answer 
(a perfect model), and should should be more honest, learn from mistakes 
and work
together.

So, are there any better experiences we can point to in Africa?
Or could people please give examples of things that do NOT work - let's 
learn 
from our problems as well.

Best wishes,
Peter


Dear Friends

I think that all our discussions about Telecentres, E-Gov, Cabinas 
Publicas, Cybercafes, (in short public ICT access points, PIAP's) 
in so many different list at the same time is no coincidence.

Let's be honest. We have now some years of experiences with all 
kinds of Piap's, so many pilots, projects and initiatives that have 
come and gone, but serious, nobody has found the Holy Grail or 
even got near to it. My feeling is that all Piap's are in some kind of 
crisis of some kind or another and that is why we feel we need to 
talk. Also the funding agencies that are behind a lot of PIAP 
projects don't know what to do any more, the good thing is that 
some are now aknowledging the fact and are opening up to the real 
world.

We have the experiences, we have the knowledge but we have no 
solutions. Its either problems with connectivity (we should be 
ashamed with ourselves that we didn't solve this one after all this 
time and money that went in), or sustainability (political, social, 
technical, financial), or, or, or........

A number of projects have found answer to particular questions 
questions but never have been able to fill the full picture. The only 
solution I see is that it is time to talk and act together. Together we 
can make it, divided we are guaranteed to fail. First we need to find 
a multi-lingual open forum to do this and then we should start not 
by talking about how wonderful our particular projects are but by 
talking about our real problems. We need to learn from another 
otherwise we all fail. I understand that in the positions and 
situations many of us are in admitting that we need to learn is 
difficult, but can you see another way out of the Piap's disaster. 
We are in the middle of a ICT revolution and its no time to be 
selfish its time to be responsible.

Whose ready to take on the challenge, it will be hell at some times 
but it will be worth it. We have to stop living illusions, we have to 
work together.

Yours

Klaus