Kampala digerati meetup

This weekend there was something of a meetup of the Kampala "digerati" (digerati |dijəˈrätē| plural noun: people with expertise or professional involvement in information technology. Origin 1990s: blend of digital and literati.) at the monthly Kampala Linux User Group (LUG) meetup. This included many passionate Linux and Open Source users and its organizers, who, as I understand it run a couple of web-hosting companies. Very cool, interesting people, with a lot to say (very little of it complementary...) about the state of ISPs in Uganda, the UCC's (Uganda Communications Commission) running of the country's Internet Exchange (IX), which is evidently located in their building's basement/parking garage, on the level where the vehicles are washed. It's dusty, humid, and ill-maintained–not all that unlike a lot of things here, but a pretty crucial part of the country's communications infrastructure.
Additionally, we were told that much of the country's fibre infrastructure is laid approximately 20cm below the surface, as opposed to the recommend 1m.

So that was all quite informative, and we had a wonderful and wide-ranging conversation about these local issues to broader issues of Internet governance.

But the real stars of the show, the people I was most excited to meet, were Erik Hersman and TMS Ruge. Erik was born in Kenya but is now based in the US, and writes the tech-oriented blog WhiteAfrican and founded and writes/edits for AfriGadget. Both are excellent and are must-reads for anyone interested in technological innovation (and not exclusively information technology) in Africa.

He's also very involved in the FLAP bag project, which is a durable messenger-style bag produced by San Francisco-based Timbuk2 with a solar panel integrated into the flap. This isn't a totally new idea, but one designed for the rigors of the developing world is.

TMS Ruge ("Teddy") is one of the co-founders of Project Diaspora, an attempt to channel the success and relative wealth of the African diaspora into meaningful development in Africa. He's also a brilliant photographer and journalist, and seems like a really nice guy. The other co-founder, Tracy Pell, was there too, and has been traveling with Teddy. I hadn't really known of her before, except from the Project Diaspora blog (which I don't read as regularly as many) but she's also very interesting and it was great to meet her as well. Her non-development day job didn't sound very generous with time off, and she was very excited to be able to come to Africa (it was her first time here).

All in all it was a great experience to get to brush elbows with some people who are very respected and influential in this space, and who are experimenting with some really neat stuff.

In other news, I'm sorry it's been so long since I've had much to say here, but it's been busy. Mainly I've been concerned with developing a training manual for other people training future Question Box operators. A number of friends of mine's birthdays were this and last weekend, and one of my best friends here is just leaving for the States, and a few others are preparing to. It's all added up to be a hectic couple of weeks.