Tag Archives: Internet Age
Applications now open for LIRNEasia Young Scholar Tutorials, hosted by NUS, Singapore. Click here for info on how to apply.
Book censorship in Sri Lanka?
LIRNEasia’s first book was launched at a ceremony at IIT Madras in December 2007. Three months later, the book is not yet available for sale in a Sri Lankan bookstore. Why?
According to Sage India, a respected academic publisher, the book is held up at Sri Lanka Customs. The problem is that it came in the same shipment as a book by an English scholar teaching at the Colombo University which had the word militarization in the title. So Customs or whoever are reading the entire shipment to see if it any of the books have anti-state content. This has taken several weeks, leading us to wonder whether they are reading all the copies, unaware that reading one is enough.
Now I have no objection to the Customs or whoever getting educated. I’d be happy to personally donate a copy of our book along with the classic critique of book censorship, Fahrenheit 451, to their library. But as far as I know they have no right, legal or moral, to censor books in a democratic society (I have evidence that this book censorship is occurring on a broader scale ..read more
The trials and tribulations of connecting Rwanda to the WWW
How the technical, political and business realities in Africa hinder technological development and connectivity there.
Africa, Offline: Waiting for the Web
Attempts to bring affordable high-speed Internet service to the masses have made little headway on the continent. Less than 4 percent of Africa’s population is connected to the Web; most subscribers are in North African countries and the republic of South Africa.
A lack of infrastructure is the biggest problem. In many countries, communications networks were destroyed during years of civil conflict, and continuing political instability deters governments or companies from investing in new systems. E-mail messages and phone calls sent from some African countries have to be routed through Britain, or even the United States, increasing expenses and delivery times. About 75 percent of African Internet traffic is routed this way and costs African countries billions of extra dollars each year that they would not incur if their infrastructure was up to speed.
Usability of University Research in the Internet Age
Creation of new knowledge by universities is typically assessed in terms of publications and citations in scholarly venues, and the same measures are used to assess capacity for future contributions. As the production and dissemination of knowledge becomes increasingly mediated by the Internet, the Internet presence of researchers is becoming a more valid and relevant measure of knowledge capacity than the conventionally used publication and citation data. This article proposes a methodology that includes the use of the scholar.google.com search engine to supplement the conventional indices for knowledge capacity in a policy-relevant field of knowledge. The methodology addresses presence as well as validation. The proposed approach is explicated through a study of Information and Communication Technology infrastructure reform relevant knowledge capacity in East, South East and South Asia. University research is viewed within the context of the larger body of knowledge available to users over the Internet and a greater usability of university research through a higher Internet presence is stressed.
From Capacity to Presence: Enhancing the Usability of University Research in the Internet Age (PDF format, 112Kb)
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