RE: Framework Notes

Hello Stephan, Lauri,


> 1) cost of use (compared to the benefits of use) is critical.
that's an interesting point. I'm not sure i agree here. In my view, i 
would believe that the absolute cost of use is not that important.

[Nadeem Akhtar] I agree with Stephan that it's not the absolute cost that's
important. Rather, the kind of service that's being delivered for the price
being asked for that's more important. I recently saw a survey on mobile
banking in India and most respondents were willing to pay relatively large
amounts of money for accessing even simple services such as getting bank
statements, making micro-payments etc.

Regards,
Nadeem

>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: public-mw4d-request@w3.org 
>> [mailto:public-mw4d-request@w3.org] On Behalf Of ext Stephane Boyera
>> Sent: 02 July, 2008 21:58
>> To: Renjish Kumar
>> Cc: public-mw4d@w3.org
>> Subject: Re: Framework Notes
>>
>>
>> Hello Renjish,
>>
>>>   Sorry to interrupt the ongoing discussion on illiteracy 
>> and internet. 
>>> It is indeed interesting but I just seem to get the idea that we are 
>>> again beginning yet another X4D forum with presumptions and 
>>> over-simplifications. As you know, many industry players and 
>> industry 
>>> bodies have ongoing projects and initiatives focusing on 
>>> developing/emerging countries handling different aspects of an issue 
>>> so complex that discussion without a common framework might 
>> lead us nowhere.
>>
>> I would be happy to learn about existing initiatives if you know any ?
>> I know that lots of organizations are funding reports or 
>> projects (just to cite some: the world bank, UN foundation, 
>> GSMA development funds,...), but i'm not aware at this point 
>> of an existing initiative looking at the barriers and 
>> potential solutions of leveraging the number of content and 
>> services available on mobile phones targeted at social and 
>> economic development. So, i would be happy to learn about 
>> related initiatives with who we could cooperate, or at least 
>> as you say avoid reinventing the wheel.
>>
>>> Some of the presumptions that I can gather based on the 
>> discussions here:
>>>  
>>> 1. By default, everyone in the emerging/market is eager to use the 
>>> mobile web.
>> that a strong statement. To the best of my knowledge, the 
>> technological aspect is not key. what i mean here is that 
>> people are eager to use services that are helping them in 
>> their life. Being mobile web, sms, voice,... they don't really 
>> care, as far as the service is relevant, usable and useful imho.
>>
>>> 2. Only issues stopping them from using mobile web or for 
>> that matter 
>>> Web are technological or economics in nature
>> i'm not sure i agree again here.
>> My own vision is that for now, there is not on the Web 
>> informations and services that are either usable, accessible, 
>> or even existing that are really useful for targeted people. 
>> while i guess you could find any bus or train schedule for any 
>> destination in europe, you can hardly find this information 
>> about eg rural areas of Uganda, and this is something that 
>> could surely be useful to people. So, clearly accessing 
>> information is a problem, but availatities of relevant 
>> information is also a problem, and most probably a bigger one. 
>> So clearly leveraging the development of relevant 
>> informations, and empowering people to develop the service 
>> their community need is very important.
>>
>>> 3. Developing/Emerging markets are homogenous in nature with 
>> the same 
>>> economic status, literacy rate, aspirations and culture
>> again i doubt it. just a small example: in latin america, 
>> where most of the population speak spanish, the language is 
>> not a real problem, and for isntance it is quite easy to 
>> develop voice service, because generating spanish prompt is 
>> easy, and doing voice recognition on spanish is also quite 
>> easy. Now if from your observation you state that voice 
>> applications are very powerful, then you move to india or 
>> indonesia you are completely out: no TTS in most local 
>> dialects, no speech recognition and so on. If you move to 
>> Africa, where people are reluctant to talk to a machine, you 
>> have another kind of problem. So i really doubt that emerging 
>> markets are homoegenous for the factor you stating.
>>
>>> I do not know if the MW4D IG is working on a framework or if some 
>>> other forum might have already done this. If not, then we should, in 
>>> my opinion, strive to do the following:
>>>  
>>> 1. Framework: Create a framework document as the first deliverable 
>>> with the following definitions:
>>>                    - defining the scope of mobile web
>>>                    - a classification of the heterogenous 
>> nature of an 
>>> emerging/developing market.
>> For sure, we need to work first, and that's my idea, on a vision
>> document: what this group is willing to achieve, on short term 
>> like 1 year, and on a longer term. It is clear for us at W3C 
>> that this group is the beginning of a bigger activity in the 
>> future, but we need to start small, and really idenitfy the 
>> key apsects to work on, before engging greater forces.
>>
>>> Unless we do this, we cannot have a constructive discussion 
>> that leads 
>>> to tangible results. In other words, we might again end up 
>> being "just 
>>> another project on development" with lots of nice and 
>> informative 200 
>>> page deliverables, but creating little practical change in reality.
>> i completely agree with you, and my own vision is exactly on 
>> practical results, not doing a kind of state of the art, or 
>> yet another report. 
>> The aim of this group is clearly for W3C and/or other 
>> internation organizations to understand what are the key 
>> actions to launch in the future to really exploit the full 
>> potential of mobile phones as an ICT-platform.
>>
>>> 2. Leverage and Liaison: There is already an enormous wealth of 
>>> information generated by other forums such as ICT4D, GSMA, W3C and 
>>> industry players. Leverage the existing literature and liaison with 
>>> ongoing efforts to avoid reinventing the wheel.
>> i totally agree here. If you can provide links to those 
>> forums, i would be happy to list them. That said, my specific 
>> view, which has been largely confirmed during the workshop in 
>> Brazil, is that for now different players have different 
>> views, and are acting in their corner: 
>> international organizations like the World Bank, UN* (foundation, DP,
>> ...) and other at that level, have a specific view (providing 
>> very heigh level platform). industry layers at GSMA for 
>> instance have another view (focused on technological aspect), 
>> NGOs who are trying to have an impact at a smaller scale have 
>> other kind of views.
>> I've the hope that in this forum we could gather people from 
>> all these different communities in order to build a shared 
>> vision of the future, and a shared understanding on what need 
>> to be done. Each actor has its role to play.
>>
>>> So, we should not be disappointed if a similar rate of 
>> adoption is not 
>>> seen for the mobile Web/ Fixed Internet unless there is one such 
>>> killer app. Also, we should resist the temptation to 
>> prescribe killer 
>>> services/applications to the population. This will only add 
>> to the failure.
>> i again totally agree here. I don't believe there will be a 
>> killer service or application. But i believe that it is 
>> possible to create an enabling context for relevant services 
>> and content to appear.
>> I don't believe honnestly that the problem is connecting 
>> people only, but again is for them to have relvant information 
>> that would justify investment in time, in learning and in 
>> cost. I don't think there is content today on the web that 
>> justify these investments from targeted people.
>>
>> Stephane
>>
>> -- 
>> Stephane Boyera		stephane@w3.org
>> W3C				+33 (0) 4 92 38 78 34
>> BP 93				fax: +33 (0) 4 92 38 78 22
>> F-06902 Sophia Antipolis Cedex,		
>> France
>>
>>

-- 
Stephane Boyera		stephane@w3.org
W3C				+33 (0) 4 92 38 78 34
BP 93				fax: +33 (0) 4 92 38 78 22
F-06902 Sophia Antipolis Cedex,		
France

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Received on Tuesday, 8 July 2008 04:21:39 UTC