Web Native follows websites that are shaping the world.
Also focuses on :
- developments in the web space
- people who are shaping the web
- how people&organisations are using the web
I’m one of 4,5 million followers of Obama’s tweets on Twitter if there’s any truth in the number of his followers. According to Newsweek Obama is inflating the number of his followers on Twitter. The report lists other politicians and celebrities who are guilty of the same crime. Whether these reports are true or not it’s irrelevant, what matters to me is that they provide us with lessons & insights on how not to use social media channels such as twitter and facebook.
1st Lesson: Do It Yourself In the beginning of this year President Obama was searching for a Twitterer to manage his account, hence his tweets are so impersonal and probably less followers than reflected on his twitter account.
The best approach is to manage your own social media accounts, this will lead to more people following you and you will not need to inflate the numbers of your followers.
2nd Lesson: Be True to yourself Social Media is supposed to provide users with intelligent insights and draw attention of those who matter to you. Inflating the number of your followers will only deceive you and lead to inaccurate intelligence. REMEMBER : there’s a difference between followers and quality followers, on social media one should strive for quality followers. Adding more friends to your Facebook account does not necessarily lead to quality friendship instead it invites trouble in your life. Social media if used properly by leaders can provide intelligent insights and keep them in touch with the people and supporters.
The recent reports by the Sunday Times on the ban of the Former President of South Africa Thabo Mbeki on SABC makes me wonder whether SABC understands that it is not the only communication channel and that we live in a different era. There was a period in time when world leaders were only able to communicate with the citizens and the world community through the national broadcasters television and radio stations. I would like to call that period Communication 1.0 era. Now we are living in a period where leaders do not necessarily need to communicate with the citizens through the national broadcaster. We live in the Communication 2.0 era, where tools such as Facebook, Twitter and Youtube makes it possible for leaders to communicate with the citizens and the community without being censored by state institutions or any organisation. Obama has shown other leaders that they can communicate without the National Broadcaster, during his election he used platforms such as Facebook and YouTube to spread his message. He continues to use it in the White House to communicate with the citizens and the world. It's about time that SABC wakes up to the reality that we live in the digital era and that television and radio as we know it is no longer the only platform for communication.
The long queues that we witnessed on the 15th April 2010 at the ticketing centres of the 2010 Soccer World Cup got me thinking about the urgent need for bridging the digital divide in South Africa.This experience should serve as the wake up call to all (government, citizens, civil society and business community) , it should move us to take action in bridging the digital divide.The counter sales idea was a bad one and it should never be repeated. In order to avoid this embarrassing experience again, I suggest that we embark on a serious technology education campaign across the board
primary,
secondary,
tertiary,higher ,
consumer and
adult education :
EDUCATION
Primary Education
There’s a Xhosa saying that goes like this: “Umthi ugotywa usemtsha” which basically means to bend the tree while it’s still growing, we should apply the same approach in educating our young people about the web. The use of technology and particularly the web should be inculcated at a tender age if we want to seriously bridge the digital divide.
Secondary Education
Currently our education system is designed in such a way that learners in schools take technology as a subject, in fact, in some cases learners have a choice not to take technology as a subject.
This is part of the problem in the sense that this leads to a situation where learners only come across the web at higher education institutions.Technology education should never be a choice it should be mandatory.
Higher Education
It’s sad to say that in this day in age we still produce graduates who can’t use the computer or use the web effectively. Once again, the problem lies in the fact that technology is still seen as the engine instead of the oil that makes it possible for the engine to function. The fact of the matter is that technology should be seen as an enabler to education. Each graduate should have used technology and the web to enable the education process during the academic period.
Consumer Education
My mom recently bought the Nokia 5800 and she’s using it mainly for sms and voice communication and never to access the web or email. The same is true for many other South Africans and I think in order to turn this situation around the mobile phone providers should educate their consumers in using mobile phones. This will go a long way in improving the penetration of technology in our country.
Adult Education
Lastly, senior people in our country hide behind the notion that technology is for young people and yet they use mobile phones and they are expected to be active participants in the economy. I think as young people we should take an active role in educating our grandmothers and grandfathers in using technology.
Education is just one of the tools that we can use to bridge the digital divide and I’m sure there are many other interventions. We all need to turn this situation around to avoid another embarrassing episode that we witnessed at the 2010 World Cup ticketing centres.
Another critical intervention is the development ICT Infrastructure in townships, more about this in my next blog.
Author : Wesley Diphoko
Wesley Diphoko is the Web Architect at the University of the Western Cape, he is very passionate about bridging the digital divide through the web. He is an active ICT player in the Western Cape, he currently serves as the Secretary General of the Black Information Technology Forum in the Western Cape region, he also sits on the boards of the Cape Information Technology Initiative (CITI) and Career Discovery Planet.
