Technology: the relevance of web2.0 in Ghana

I did a presentation on web2.0 today in Ghana and thought it would be quite web2.0 to blog some parts of the discussion before sharing it with my colleagues... :)

Web2.0 was seen as very interesting, new and mindboggling. It comes with some preconditions: having the equipment, being connected and willing to communicate in an open, transparent way. Lots of ghanaians miss the skills to convert their thought into prose, which is needed to be an active contributor to the conversations on the web. Blogging could be a nice way of practising and nurturing that skill in my opinion or you may think of podcasting/webcasting.

The discussion about the relevance of web2.0 quickly shifted to a discussion about learning how to use technologies. Mostly people learn it via their peers, relatives and other groups they belong to. It was said that men might have an advantage when they tell eachother the new tricks over a beer. Learning has to be linked to a purpose and a personal interest, and then you may be able to be a self-learner via the web; yet most people are not able to do this. Experimenting with the web2.0 tools is most useful if linked to a real, useful purpose (but to know the usefulness of a tool you have to experiment with it, so it's also chicken and egg).

Talking about mobile phones, we ended up learning something very practical about the possibility of sending an email using Areeba's SMS service...(sms the email address space and the message and dial 1313!)