If You Are Still Collecting Data on Paper, You Are Wasting Everyone’s Time
Way back in 2001, Satellife pioneered the use of PDA’s for health-related data collection in Uganda and Kenya. In the 15 years since, Satellife became the...
Innovations to Accelerate Universal Internet Adoption
Mobile and internet services have the power to transform lives, offering life-enhancing financial, health, and many other services, as well as the simple ability...
Stop Funding Data for Superman Systems!
The data revolution is well upon us, with the total data produced doubling every two years. Organizations are processing of an over-abundance of data using a variety...
Universal Internet Access for the Next Four Billion
Despite remarkable increases in connectivity over the last decade, less than half of the world’s population currently has access to the Internet. For the development...
How IoT Early Warning Systems Can Help Save People From Mudslides
Floods and mudslides regularly devastate El Salvador. Villagers can identify impending floods and mudslides, but they are unable to warn others in time. Rugged...
4 Requirements for Technology Project Sustainability
I am often called in to help when a technology project has gone awry. For example, once a partner organization gifted a network-attached storage server (NAS) to...
Please Help USAID Develop Responsible Data Practices for Digital Development
Are you managing personally identifiable data? Have you struggled with the need to share, yet protect sensitive data? Do you worry about privacy risks and want...
Does Informed Consent Really Matter to a Poor Farmer?
One of my first tasks at IRRI is to develop a consent form we can use across our agricultural extension service tools that at a minimum will inform end-users, usually...
How We Fought Ebola with Information
In December 2013, a little-known viral hemorrhagic fever in West Africa was detected in a forest region of Guinea. It was soon confirmed to be Ebola Virus Disease,...
We Can Now Fingerprint Children at 6 Months Old, But Should We?
In 1899, Sir Francis Galton first captured ink-on-paper fingerprints of a single child from birth until the age of 4.5 years, manually compared the prints, and...