Fwd: On the roadmap v2

Dear all --

I have been on this mailing list with great interest looking at the  
development of the impressive Roadmap. Unfortunately, due to a  
standing commitment on Monday mornings I have not been able to partake  
in the calls that you have had.  As you are wrapping up the final  
document, here are my comments and corrections.

Corrections:

The MobileActive.org wiki is no longer available - we have migrated  
all still relevant content to the mDirectory, the most comprehensive  
database of tools, research, case studies, and how-tos on mobiles in  
development and mobiles in social change.  Please update all links  
accordingly as they will be/are dead links.  The link for the  
mDirectory is http://mobileactive.org/directory.

Current dead links on the roadmap are:  an analysis of the different  
tools in that domain and another List of tools for data collections,  
and http://www.w3.org/2008/MW4D/wiki/Stories/


Other comments:

Relevant to MobileActive.org

6.2.1 "Knowing what others are doing / have done" and "Potential  
Actions to address this challenge" under Content-Providers Challenges.  
It is probably worth your while to look at mDirectory and  
MobileActive, and mention us, since that's exactly what we are doing,  
both online and offline.

9. Conclusion
"Support Actions"
Point 1 "Raising awareness on potential of mobile tech in entrepreneur  
and NGO comm"
Point 4 "Developing a further comprehensive repo of resources with  
stories of use-cases ...." That is, actually, the mDirectory we  
developed.

"Recommendations"
4.1"Share, cooperate, collaborate...."  that is what MobileActive's  
about.

A few things that that might be misleading:

-- On the author-end chart: 
-> SMS / Tech Requirements. On chart "At least PC + GSM Modem" should  
be modified to "PC + GSM modem, or Web connection + Subscription to  
Bulk SMS provider." You mention clickatell, etc, later, but seem to  
not know about it here.
-> USSD / Cost. You should look into ZA. Specifically, its not free in  
ZA.

-- 6.1.3 Under "Increasing the number of languages supported"
You say SMS should support Unicode. But need to note that this will  
reduce # of characters even further.

-- Voice vs. SMS
Your general thinking is that Voice is more expensive than SMS. You  
point out that 10 seconds to 30 seconds of Voice, on average, is what  
an SMS costs. 10s of voice rivals  (and maybe conveys more info than)  
one SMS in terms of info delivery.  In other words, the situation is  
much less extreme than you point out -- especially when you look at  
India.

I think it's also critical to point out that SMS is extremely  
expensive as a data delivery mechanism, esp with menus that go back  
and forth between user and content provider (you point out this is  
difficult, programmatically, but not that its costly).

General thoughts

In general, this is still very much focusing on SMS. You downplay  
voice and mobile apps in particular, in terms of what they can do, and  
give them less coverage than SMS. In other words, the roadmap is very  
SMS- oriented without noting that the field has been changing over the  
last few years and that there have been some shifts. It's worth noting  
that mobile apps let you communicate more cheaply, in some instances,  
with the same offline capabilities as SMS (note MxIt, for example).   
While I see your point in regard to volume of SMS sent globally,  
shifting trends are noteworthy here and should be mentioned.


Thanks!



Katrin Verclas
Co-Founder and Editor
MobileActive.org
katrin@mobileactive.org
+ 1 413 687 9877
skype: katrinskaya


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