Hello / नमस्कार (namaskar)
sitting at my desk in my Richmond Hill home, listening to the peaceful noises outside of rustling leaves and birds, frantically preparing for what awaits me…
A week from now, life as I know it will be left behind to be replaced by a new cultural reality–that of Bangalore, India.
But first, namaskar user of the internet!
You may be accessing this page from your laptop, cellphone, tablet–who knows maybe by the time I finish writing this you may have internet access on your digital camera. We are amidst a digital age (at least I think we are) in a knowledge-based society that fits within a high-tech global economy and that strives to, among other things, redefine what it means for humans to communicate with one another in an efficient and convenient way. Advancements in the delivery of information and how the service sector operates is what keeps us looking forward to the next iOS software upgrade and an ever increasingly seamless communication experience.
But here’s the catch: users around the world do not have equal opportunity to engage in this wonderful digital age. Take India for example. Its markets are flooded with emerging mass-marketed communication technologies, fundamentally changing the way an increasing number of Indians access information and especially because of plummeting prices. However, the average Indian is able to access such technology due to this niche market’s not-so-legitimate nature. The structure of this global economy does not do much to accommodate potential users from a low-income setting due to norms such as restrictive patenting, further preventing Indians from accessing affordable technologies legally for the reason that they are not to manufacture it in the first place as a means of protection for those who initially developed the product.
But I couldn’t tell you anything more.
While in Bangalore, India, I will be fulfilling my co-op placement for my International Development Studies BA program at the University of Toronto Scarborough Campus (UTSC) and working for a non-profit research organization called the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS). The organization strives to tackle policy issues that impede upon the equal access and participation, and in turn, livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of people in marginalized settings.
I know that my work will be within the realm of better understanding pervasive technologies, those technologies that are the most accessible to the typical Indian (Lannon, 2012). Four months ago when I read jargon as such in my placement description, terrified is what I felt for my approaching work term. As I learn more and more about the interactions of worldwide users within this global system and its implications on things like accessibility and innovation, extreme excitement doesn’t do me justice.
I hope that you will come with me on my journey to India’s Silicon Valley over the course of the next 12 months! I invite you to share your thoughts, criticisms, insights, personal experiences and curiosities with me because after all, what’s the internet without the sharing of information?
I have had this coming at me for three years now…
and now it’s here!
Until next time! Namaste,
Samantha