The Internet, Mobile Technology and Cross-Cultural Communication

The session was introduced by Bruno Guissani who after stating that mobile devices are really widespread nowadays asked the crucial question of how to use them to change the world.

Premal Shah from Kiva started with three principles that are really important to him and Kiva:

1.       Create an “addictive” user experience.

2.       Be “radically transparent”.

3.       “Crowdsource” against constraints.

Creating an “addictive” experience means to offer a fun and easy webpage. Check out kiva.org to see how well they did on that one!

Then it was Ami Dar’s turn. The Director of Idealist.org observed that we are all connected in many different ways now, e.g. cell phones, skype, facebook, blogs, twitter, etc.

For him the three greates challenges are:

-          Good intentions are hard to realize.

-          We are all divided.

-          Good ideas travel very slowly.

If we were to solve these problems then we would all live in a better world.

Some of the questions asked centered around the “digital divide”: How are we to reach and help the people without internet access? And does the internet help to connect the “real world”? These really seem to be important questions.

The second part of the session with Katrin Verclas from MobileActive.org and Victor d’Allant from Social Edge was about how to tell and how to share stories and how inspiring stories can be: “Share your stories and it will multiply and it will have a greater impact.”

The internet and mobile devices nowadays offer so many means of sharing stories and interacting with others. Use them!