Comments for LIRNEasia

Comment on “Do You Hear Me?” We need voice-enabled technologies for disaster management by Mrinal K Nath

Mrinal K Nath — Wed, 23 May 2012 17:07:34 +0000

It is indeed a very good initiative. I have been working for earthquake risk mitigation and preparedness. What I have experienced that after disaster like earthquake the mobile phone towers are not going to work and after any disaster due to heavy traffic of voice calls there is going to be network jam. And in that situation it will be not possible for anyone to use the telephone facility and in this regard I have a little bit doubt about the functioning of mobile phone. In that scenario may be the radio facility will be better. Thanks. Mrinal K Nath, New Delhi

Comment on “Do You Hear Me?” We need voice-enabled technologies for disaster management by Nuwan

Nuwan — Tue, 22 May 2012 02:08:41 +0000

Mark –

in my peer-reviewed articles, I did touch on the voice congestion problem, as a result recommended that such an IVR solution proposed for community-based humanitarian organizations would better serve beyond the acute phase of a disaster such as for activating first responders and then on the return path receiving situational reports. It is also envisioned that these systems can be used by organizations in small scale events that may not be subject to acute levels relative to a national magnitude disaster.

I fully support the 4G efforts or even 3G. Your thesis idea of broadcasting audio clips would be amazing, please do keep us informed. Moreover, the situation reports arriving over data channels with MP3 quality compression would be more conducive to Automatic Speech Recognition, with less noise, for supporting categorical analyses of text-based information.

Comment on “Do You Hear Me?” We need voice-enabled technologies for disaster management by Nuwan

Nuwan — Tue, 22 May 2012 01:57:19 +0000

Mark – thanks for the complements; I’m pasting the descriptive comment you left in the questionnaire which has many valued points:

Mark wrote – “The question of how to reach populations which do not use the standard languages and fonts that are supported by GSM, is one which needs a lot more development. I am pleased that such a lot of progress is being made in this area. My studies show that voice communications has very serious problems dealing with network overload, in the acute phase of the disaster, this is why there is much emphasis on the use of text based, store and forward system such as SMS, or Cell Broadcast. However its abilities are not fully developed yet, so reaching populations who don’t use the languages and fonts supported by these methods is still an issue. However 4G systems do not have such a severe limitation as regards capacity, so it may be possible to broadcast voice clips to smart phones in the very near future. This is the subject of an MSC Thesis which i am just about to start working on, so learning from your experience will be very valuable.”

Comment on “Do You Hear Me?” We need voice-enabled technologies for disaster management by Mark Wood

Mark Wood — Tue, 22 May 2012 01:39:33 +0000

I have reviewed the video, nice job!! I hope that we can work together more to explore some of the new options that will emerge with the opportunites that 4G creates.

Comment on “Do You Hear Me?” We need voice-enabled technologies for disaster management by Nuwan

Nuwan — Tue, 22 May 2012 01:03:01 +0000

Dr. Ranga – one of our initial attempts was to further develop the business practices around WorldSpace satellite radio with Sarvodaya hosting a radio channel and Sarvodaya community developed content on the grounds of citizen-journalism.

Possibly more so than enabling the technology, the challenge was with developing a Sarvodaya program that could sustain the channel with adequate content that is always new and not always recycled. Incentivizing the community members to provide content would need to go beyond voluntarism, possibly on a citizen journalism angle with a revenue share model.

I agree, pairing the WorldSpace satellite radio with mobile phones proved to be the best complementing redundant solution for a community-based alerting and situational-awareness system. Mobile phones with a short-text to be followed by an audio broadcast with a detailed localized voice message.

The solution with the use of interactive voice for situational reporting, suggested in this video, would still be catalyst to incident reporting aspects during the rescue and relief operations.

Comment on “Do You Hear Me?” We need voice-enabled technologies for disaster management by Ranga

Ranga — Mon, 21 May 2012 19:54:13 +0000

Dear Nuwan,

WorldSpace satellites and technology is now bought over by Yazmi and the receiver technology has further matured in the intervening years. Now we can have the receiver as an USB dongle and be able to distribute voice messages recorded by the Disaster Management Agency just as needed and to whom it is needed.

I will reopen dialogue with the other agencies which have contributed to the research project which is choreographed excellently

Comment on From mobile-use data to creditworthiness assessment by Udaya Ilangasinghe

Udaya Ilangasinghe — Mon, 21 May 2012 18:17:19 +0000

Exactly Correct, “The way you use your phone is a proxy for your lifestyle”. But, I was observing the usage of mobile phone during last couple of years. Usability of Mobile Phone at BOP is very poor. They do not get the maximum utility out of these devices. If we check the mobile phone bill, BOP is paying a big amount in compared to there earnings and that may be because of the high consumarism.

Comment on LIRNEasia disaster management action research: Video on using voice in local languages by COL SANJAY SRIVASTAVA

COL SANJAY SRIVASTAVA — Mon, 21 May 2012 17:31:13 +0000

Its a wonderful tool for Disaster Management specially in alert, search and rescue and recovery phase.It would yield better result once it is integrated with all that communication, Police, Response Force, Sarvodaya , Administrators and emergency service providers say medical ,water food and supplies etc.

Comment on “Do You Hear Me?” We need voice-enabled technologies for disaster management by Naomi Krogman

Naomi Krogman — Mon, 21 May 2012 16:48:03 +0000

Dear Nuwan,
This is a very well done video in my opinion, and can really help those completely new to voice messages and SMS to understand the potential usefulness of these systems.
Everyone is well-spoken in the video, especially you.
For the part on how people can be alerted to a disaster, it would have helped to enact out as well the receiving of the messages (put text at bottom of screen to show messages that arrived) and how that initiated another chain of interactions that help protect people.

Comment on Digital cigarettes by brendan

brendan — Fri, 18 May 2012 12:46:19 +0000

There is evidence of harm to the brain development of children who use mobile phones heavily, but nothing conclusive yet (despite many studies) of significant harm to adults. We may yet find mobile-frequencies harm adults somewhat, but it is unlikely to outweigh their benefits; and will never be found to be as silly (real damage with almost no benefit) as smoking. We adults are bags of complaints and, all too often, careless blame-throwers; equally likely to blame an un-powered cell tower or wi-fi access point for an ill as a working one.

Comment on Digital cigarettes by brendan

brendan — Fri, 18 May 2012 12:29:50 +0000

I agree with some of these observations, but wish to correct other assertions. First, alcohol /is/ universally considered addictive, though not as quickly habit-forming as nicotine or opiates; mostly users of any of these do not become addicts, however. Second, mobile phones have both addictive properties (especially smart phones) and externalities. A substantial and growing body of studies show nuggets of info, and even sugar, trigger the brain’s reward centre quite like any other drug. And, even if one imagines oneself immune to the focus-sapping and conversation-hobbling effects of one’s own phone chimes, the chiming of others’ phones and is shout-into-the-mic habits of those around one are noise pollution (an externality). Finally, no evidence supports significant ill effects for those near an outdoor smoker; and evidence against second-hand smoke is even scant for less-confined, less smoke-dense indoor spaces than small, hazy pubs. I still support smoking bans indoors, though. It’s unhealthy even at moderate use and — while not in fact at all damaging to clarity of thought — nearly as annoying to a non-smoker as not cleaning feces off one’s shoes.

Comment on Facebook = Internet? by Nirmali

Nirmali — Fri, 18 May 2012 08:26:03 +0000

That’s quite interesting. This finding is an example of how important it is that survey questions are formulated and structured in such a way to best aids respondents’ understanding of it. E.g. questions about specific uses of services that require Internet connectivity (such as Facebook, etc) may be a more accurate gauge of internet use (although the finding that respondents are not aware of the term “Internet” is useful in itself as well).

Comment on Facebook = Internet? by Lakshaman Bandaranayake

Lakshaman Bandaranayake — Thu, 17 May 2012 08:19:46 +0000

I am not surprised if you find similar responses from youngsters for lower middle class families. They use second hand 3G handsets to watch Youtube videos and visit FB. Given there is limited local language content it is surprising their internet usage is restricted to YT and FB.

Comment on Multi Agency Situational-Awareness tools a way to dilute Interagency Rivalry by Natasha

Natasha — Sat, 12 May 2012 00:12:07 +0000

It should be also noted that the (US) Department of Homeland Security has made inquiries of LIRNEasia’s study on Cell Braodcasting for Public Warning in the Maldives in recent months as background research and input into the development of the Common Mobile Alert System (CMAS) soon to be deployed country-wide in the United States as its uniform provider of presidential alerts and disaster warnings. This goes to show that the research on the issue of mobile alerting is lacking in the developed world, but that organisations like LA in Sri Lanka have made greater progress on this front into which they are seeking to tap into. It would behoove every country to take note of this trend, especially the Sri Lankan government, and get on with instituting a comprehensive warning solution. For more details on CMAS see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commercial_Mobile_Alert_System.

Comment on Myanmar is last in telecoms: What can be done by Acetate

Acetate — Thu, 10 May 2012 05:47:08 +0000

One of the main issues in Myanmar is the ridiculously expensive cost of SIM card (previously USD3000 per SIM and now about USD500 per SIM, or higher in the black market) but there have been talks to reduce the cost to over USD300 (or lower) as government plans to sell 30 million SIM cards in 5 years. This cost should be brought down (preferably by competition) so people can own mobile phones. Aside from infrastructure, introducing real competition down at the retail level should also be a clear focus of the government.