Ushahidi in Haiti: What's Needed Now

www.haiti.ushahidi.com

My main experience with disasters comes from working at an international development organization in El Salvador and happening to be the only senior manager who wasn't on annual vacation when a huge earthquake struck almost exactly 9 years ago, on January 13, 2001.  The rush to act was immediate, and it was a lot of learning by doing.  I got handed the responsibility by fate I suppose and didn't do such a bad job of it, if I do say so.  At that time we were pretty unprepared; something that has certainly changed since then in the organization where I work.  We now have country level disaster plans at hand and support a lot of disaster risk reduction and preparedness work with local communities and governments.  Continue reading here at Wait... What's new home!

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I saw the future of geovisualization... before lunch

I saw the future of geovisualization... after lunch

Is this map better than that map?

Is This Map Better than That Map?

I come up against a nagging question when I’m thinking about mapping, when I'm talking about the projects I'm involved in, or when I'm working directly with staff and youth in rural communities using participatory mapping methodologies....

Why is this kind of map:

(source:  MapKibera, on Wikipedia)

better than this kind of map? 

(Source:  Plan project in Kwale, Kenya)

Well... is it actually better?  And if it is better, when is it better, for whom and why?  

I understand how useful mapping information is for big picture decision making, trend spotting and knowledge sharing at different levels.  Mapping in various forms is incredibly useful for program and advocacy work, and there are many examples of how crowd sourcing, digital mapping, and information geo-visualization can be done successfully (mapping stockouts, elections monitoring, human rights incident reporting, crisis management, public health). The potential is huge and exciting.

But when I’m sitting around with a group of people in a rural community without many services, it can be pretty hard to remember or to explain the benefits of digital mapping over low tech map making. Why should people make a digital map if they only have sporadic electricity and internet access (if at all) and not many smart phones.  How will they access that digital map on a regular basis once they make it?  Does the fact that they could make a digital map, necessarily mean that they should? 

I guess my key concern is around how digital mapping is directly useful for the folks who are inputting the information, building the map.  The "what's in it for them" question.  

As I was pondering this nagging question, @NiJeL_mapping posted something on Twitter that caught my eye and helped spur along the idea of working through these thoughts.  He was at the Mobile Data for Social Action in the MidEast conference, hosted by UNICEF Innovations and MobileActive.  He tweeted:  "what data are we going to collect, how will we collect it, and from whom?" Then he tweeted:  "Again, the push for technology w/o any knowledge of the intended outcome is frustrating" And a last tweet "overhearing whispers about how we need to focus on the technology, but impossible w/o knowing info to collect".  This really reminded me that you need to have clear objectives and reasons for collecting data before you decide what cool new technology will be used to do it.  A few days ago I read JD's blog post giving an overview of the whole conference. The key point for me was that the 'target' population delegation "felt overwhelmed by the host of tools and projects presented to them and were unsure how any of this could benefit them". Luckily, he said, the conference organizers realized this and quickly altered the course of the event.

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Well, if you have ever asked yourself a question, it's pretty likely that someone else has asked it too, and you can find some answers online. So I went digging around for thoughts from 4 initiatives that I've been following over the past year or so: Ushahidi, MapKibera, Wikimapa, and now NiJeL too.

In very quick summary, Ushahidi is often (but not exclusively) used as a crisis mapping tool for rapid crowd sourced information, decision making, and trend analysis. Map Kibera and Wikimapa both use mapping and user-generated media for social inclusion, community voice, community media and community planning. NiJeL works with participatory mapping, bringing it to the web for a variety of geo-visualization uses such as planning, resource allocation, impact visualization and advocacy.  

Mine must be not be a unique query, because I found that Erica from Map Kibera answered it pretty directly a couple weeks ago in a blog post called Maps and the Media "...the question about benefit to those who aren’t online misses the point. The digital divide is a fact and needs to be addressed, but when it comes to community information there is also a need for expression outward and collaboration within Kibera. Something like the Kibera Journal or Pamoja FM allows Kibera to talk to itself, while putting facts and stories online allows it to speak to the rest of the world (including wired Nairobi, politicians, national press)." 

The objectives of Map Kibera seem similar to those of the YETAM project, the initiative that has taken up most of my work hours over the past couple years. YETAM's  main goals are engaging youth in the local development process and helping them develop the skills and tools to communicate and advocate for their rights and their ideas with local, national and global audiences.  The project starts off with map making to visualize community profile, community history, community resources, and risks to child rights and protection. Group discussions ensue, issues are prioritized by the youth, and they then create art and media around those issues. The arts and media materials that youth produce throughout the project are shared with community members, district officials and national authorities to generate dialogue. They're also plotted onto a digital version of their map and uploaded to the web for the global audience. 

Since the local audience is the main one for the media and arts that youth produce during YETAM project activities, followed by district, national and global audiences, it would seem then that the same is true for the map. It must first speak to the local audience, to the community.  It should be first useful to users and producers of the information, as a learning/discussion tool and as a decision making tool, and secondly be useful to a national and then a global audience. Perhaps this will be the case for many of the initiatives that Plan supports and facilitates, given Plan's child-centered community develop approach and the fact that we use participatory mapping methodologies in our community work all the time. So we need to find a way for the hand-drawn map to be transformed into a digital map (this is what we've been doing up to now in the YETAM project), or find a way to make a digital map attractive and useful to local people. Or we could also keep doing both the low-tech and the digital versions.

[Update:  "Paper rocks!"  Mikel from Map Kibera (read his comment below) shared some additional tools that Map Kibera uses to ensure that information collected is available in the community.  One is called Walking Papers.  It is a paper based GPS where you print the map, re-draw it or add details, scan the new version and it automatically geo-rectifies the paper.  They will also be printing and distributing paper maps, and considering forums around the paper maps to increase participation from people who don't use computers.  Also Mikel commented that drawn maps like the one in the image above can be stored and/or made available to the community using Map Warper.  Here you scan and upload a map, set control points, and then get a geo-rectified version for use online.  Excellent.  This gets better all the time.  :-)]

The Wikimapa Brazil project (paraphrasing from their website) aims to promote social inclusion using virtual and mobile mapping in low-income areas and slums, since available mapping services have not offered information from these marginalized areas.  The project aims to democratize access to information and raise low-income youth's social participation from simple consumers of information to providers of information and change agents promoting local development and broadening perspectives and creating new cultural and geographical reference points.  In this case, the project goals are similar to YETAM and Map Kibera, but the project is primarily aimed at reducing marginalization and exclusion within available mapping services.  Therefore it seems relevant that on-line mapping is chosen as the mapping methodology.  It may also be the case that residents in the project area have easy access to internet, meaning they would be able to continually use and benefit from the on-line maps.

Patrick Meier from Ushahidi and the Harvard Humanitarian Institute talks specifically about the concepts of participatory mapping, social mapping and crowd feeding during this 30 min video. He comments that the information that's collected via "crowd sourcing" needs to go right back to ‘the crowd’ who provided it (crowd feeding).  One way that Ushahidi is doing this in communities that do not have regular access to internet is by allowing people to subscribe to SMS alerts when a crisis event hits a particular area where they have a special interest.  Another way to ensure that map makers have information returned to them, he says, is to use transparencies in a manual approach to GIS where information is made more compelling by laying thematic transparent layers over a base map to show dynamic changes and trends.

Patrick points to Tactical Technology Collective's Maps for Advocacy booklet which documents a number of different mapping techniques and mapping projects and how they have been used for advocacy.  So, I would conclude that in the case of Ushahidi and crisis mapping to see trends in time and space, to have immediate and up to date information, and to manage a broad set of information for crisis decision making, it also is logical that an online map is the primary mapping methodology.  In this case, the information is crowd sourced, so it comes from many, and it's processed and aggregated on Ushahidi to go back to many.  Because the information in a crisis situation is changing rapidly, it would be difficult to use a static map, a hand drawn map or one that is updated less frequently.  

In the case of Plan, as part of the Violence Against Children (VAC) project we are planning to pilot incident reporting by SMS of violence against children and subsequent mapping of the situation in order to raise awareness among families and community members, and to advocate to local, national and global authorities to uphold their responsibilities and promises in this aspect.  The question here will be how to make both crowd sourcing and crowd feeding something that is easily accessible by the participating youth and communities as well as to the other audiences in order to have the desired impact and reach the desired outcomes. The participating youth have already been trained on violence against children (VAC), its causes and effects, and ways to advocate around it.  Now the key will be training them on the technology so that they can discover and design ways to use it  to meet their goals.  A key point will be evaluating whether the outcome is a reduction in VAC.

So in conclusion I would have to say that one map is not better than the other map.  They are both amazing  tools and need to be selected depending on the situation. There is no one size fits all. It goes back to the point of having defined objectives and outcomes for the initiative, knowing what information will be collected, why, with whom, by whom, and for whom first, analyzing the local context as part of that process, knowing about what tools exist and finding the right tool/technology/information management process for the goals that people want to reach based on the context. It's also about keeping the end-user in mind, and ensuring that those who are producing information have access to that information. I think I will have to keep my question in mind at all times, actually.

Almost vacation time...

Only 2 days left and I will take my first real vacation since over a year ago. Strangely enough this is a real challenge for me. I've become such a work and laptop addict that the idea of not working for 2 weeks is pretty stressful. I need it though to come back fresh and relaxed for what will be another packed year.

Mika and I worked on the workshop follow up yesterday morning and we are thinking that instead of doing a long workshop report, we could make the whole report a blog. We will go back and post a day-by-day summary of it with links to the presentations and where hopefully people can comment. Then we can use the blog as a follow up and sharing/discussion tool as people more forward with their ideas and implementation. Hopefully we can develop some readership within Plan for the blog and it can become a platform for active (and interactive) sharing and learning. Of course we'll make traditional report too for those that may want it...

Since the workshop, just in the 3 days this week, we've seen a lot of stuff happening within Plan. I think the week really motivated people. A few people started their own blogs. We've been getting the personal action plans back from participants saying how they will incorporate social media/new technology/mobiles into their work plans this year. I also shared the idea of using Frontline/ Ushahidi for humanitarian organizations with a few people inside Plan in terms of how we could be more organized after a disaster.

In the US office, I heard that the health advisor is looking into incorporating mobile applications into a new group of proposals on child survival.

I am working hard on proposals for this calendar year and all that goes along with that... budget, action plan, program planning, etc. Plus we are trying our hardest to get the website up and running. Let's see what I can get accomplished in 2 days still!

Much to be done, but all fulfilling!

ooof SM4SC and what next!

Wow what a week. My head is spinning from all the discussions and possibilities from our workshop in Kenya. So it's 3 a.m. and I'm back home, and here I am again at the computer. My New Year's resolution is to work less, but it's not New Year's yet... and I'm still on Kenya time, so fell asleep at 6 and woke up at 1.30. So why not grab my coffee and get going. Photo: one of the 'take aways' on the last day.

I have a zillion ideas and things to think about. How to support the different people and offices present at our workshop to build in more social media and technology to improve our programs and reach/impact.

The last couple days were amazing, with presentations by/about youth and how they are using blogging, mobiles and other technology for health and learning. We talked about citizen journalism and thought about how to apply it to our programs and communications. And there was a LOT of discussion about how organizations need to open up to embrace new kinds of media or they will become irrelevant.

One key thought (originally stated by Ken Banks from FrontlineSMS.com and then taken up by everyone) was that it's easier to ask for forgiveness than for permission. That people should just do it, just try things, instead of asking for permission to innovate and be creative.

We learned from one participant how blue tooth was used during the Kenya election crisis to get information out to the public... and at the airport on the way home heard about arrests of activists in Nairobi and increasing media censorship.

We talked about how organizations need to modernize and open up new ways to engage the public in their work based on concepts of social media. We used SMS to send messages and talked through specific ways we could use Frontline SMS (http://www.frontlinesms.org/) to make it easier for children to get birth certificates and access their rights at citizens. Imagine instead of having to trek miles to the district capital if mobiles could help communicate and ease that process. We looked at specific existing projects and thought about how to use SMS and other social media to improve them.

We presented and discussed the YETAM project, and heard things like "every country should do this" and got great feedback for making the project more relevant and to increase its impact from the local level upwards. I had a lot of time to brainstorm with Mimi (the link between YETAM and Nokia via Plan Finland) for once about the project and to start working out the action plan for next year. Photo: Me and Mimi

We heard so many opinions from everyone, and the French translation and bi-lingual nature of the workshop meant that we heard from everyone there, whereas often those who speak French keep quiet since English is the 'official working language'. Photo: PapaSidy and Bedo.

Our external experts stayed with us the whole week and added so much to the conversation.

Really an amazing time. We tracked the workshop on a collective blog (http://sm4sc.maneno.org/eng/) so people could practice, and posted photos on Flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/whiteafrican/sets/72157610896848364/.

Now Mika and I will do the report. We asked people to state a few concrete ways they will follow up on the workshop and then our job along with the different offices involved is to support their work and help address any challenges or obstacles that come up. Photo: the fearless Mika!

(And we had a "Bush Dinner" with a fire and music the last night")

So our work is cut out for us next year.... and it's about 90% sure that I'll get to extend my secondment for another year to focus on YETAM's next countries and SM4SC follow up.

Yippeee!

YETAM, WCIII and Kenya coming up

OK almost another month has gone by already since I got back from Rwanda, and I've been bad at blogging.... things are chugging along with YETAM. I'm still waiting on the external drive with all the materials on it from Rwanda, but Julie's gone to Mali to start the training there, and the Senegal films are all finished now also. They need translation still though.

We have selected the YETAM website provider and they are going to start working on designing the new pages. In the meantime we finally finished the 4 virtual visits at www.planusa.org/maps so now Togo, the DR and El Salvador are up there. We're waiting on the DVD that will be sent out to schools to be finalized -- it has the 4 virtual visits that are ready along with the curricula that we developed around them. We sent a mailing out to 9000 current events teachers about the virtual visits and DVD/curriculum and got about 500 responses back - which is quite good!

I also sent an email out to people about the 4 completed ones and we had really good feedback. More and more countries want to do something similar or to post them on their home office websites, so that is cool.

On top of the YETAM project, the main things I've been doing are working on the Child and Adolescent Participation Commission for the World Congress against Child Sexual Exploitation happening in Brazil in November. I'm going to Brasilia next week to meet with UNICEF, ECPAT, Save the Children, etc. to plan for that, and then will go back in November to Rio for the actual Congress.

The other thing, which is really exciting, is the workshop we've been planning for in Kenya Dec 8-12. We've been thinking, dreaming, planning and now it's all really coming together. All the funding came through, and in the past week our list of external speakers has become an amazing group of minds. We will have Ken Banks from Frontline SMS http://www.frontlinesms.com/, Daudi Were from MentalAcrobatics http://www.mentalacrobatics.com/think/, Juliana Rodich from GlobalVoicesOnline http://www.globalvoicesonline.org/ and Ushahidi http://www.ushahidi.com/, and Erik Hersman from White African http://www.whiteafrican.com/ and Ushahidi. We're also trying to see if we can visit Google Kenya and have a speaker from there as well. There will be about 25 Plan staffers/partners and 2-4 Kenyan youth as well. So I'm really looking forward to the week. I think we are going to learn and plan so much.... really excited.

In the process, we are going to work with Ushahidi to pilot some of their technology and use it for our programs. Their platform combines SMS with mapping and they created it during the election violence in Kenya last year. There are lots of uses for it in the work that we do that we can begin to explore, and I think it will be really amazing!

Another project that is coming along is Plan's participation in the 6th World Summit on Media for Children www http://www.wskarlstad2010.se/. I wrote a proposal outlining how the child and youth participation and protection could be managed at the Summit, and they liked it a lot. So we are in negotiations now about how we can make it happen and secure the necessary funding and human resources to do it. In the proposal, I also submitted ideas together with Media Snackers on how to build in the whole social media angle of the Summit and they liked that too. I'm going to meet with DK from Media Snackers http://www.mediasnackers.com/ in New York this Saturday on my way to Brazil to discuss more and then we'll talk again with the chairman of the 6WSMC to see how to move it along.

So once again I think I have too much on my plate, but it's all tasting very good.