Enter our blog contest for your chance to win!

[Munira Morshed Munni]

So, you think you know something about ICT4D and can write? Now you can prove it. telecentre.org has launched ther first ever blog contest on our English-language website. The contest closes May 31st, 2009.
YOU NEED TO TELL PEOPLE WHAT THEY CAN WIN HERE TO HOOK THEM IN

This is your chance to win exciting prizes, recognition for your work as well as some much deserved bragging rights. Whether you’re a novice, a constant blogger or have never put electronic words to screen before, we want to hear from you. Participating is fun and easy.

Here’s all you have to do. Simply share your telecentre story on any of the 12 themes listed below:

1. Telecentres and Disability
2. Telecentres and Education
3. Telecentres and Environment
4. Telecentres and Governance
5. Telecentres and Health
6. Telecentres and Socio-Economic Development
7. Telecentres and Inclusion
8. Gender and Telecenters
9. Technology and Telecenters
10. Telecentre Sustainability
11. Telecentre Success Stories
12. Telecentre Best Practices

Background and Objectives

The telecentre.org community has grown tremendously over the past few months. Membership on all four language sites (English, Spanish, French and Arabic) now numbers nearly 2000, with more than 1000 signed up to the English site alone. Our members have been interacting a lot through blogs, groups and online forums with many participating and contributing content to our websites on a regular basis.

Blogs are a major form of knowledge sharing. In an effort to further engage our telecentre.org community and reach out to potential new members, we’ve decided to launch the blog contest. We want to:

o provide an incentive for and give due recognition to active and deserving bloggers;
o encourage and inspire the rest of the community to share their stories at the telecentre.org website; and,
- entice potential new members to join.

You can enter our contest if you:

Are
A registered member of the telecentre.org English community and at least 18 years of age;

Are Not
community facilitators, officers or staff of telecentre.org and its social investors.

To participate in the contest, entries must be posted onto the telecentre.org website and must include the words Submitted as an entry to the telecentre.org Blog Contest at the end of your submission in order to be properly identified as an official entry.


Don’t forget to follow these instructions:

A member may submit only one contest entry. In case where more than one entry is received from the same member, only the latest submitted entry will be considered for evaluation.

telecentre.org reserves the right to reject entries that are incomplete, invalid, or that contain any inappropriate information (e.g. spam and other controversial or offensive material).

Blog post must be between 400 and 1,000 words in length.

Blog entry may be accompanied by a maximum of two images. Images used must not exceed 500 pixels in width and in height. While images are not required, having them in the blog entry is an added advantage.

Blog entry, including accompanying images, must not in any way violate any intellectual property right. By submitting a blog as a contest entry, the member certifies that it is his or her original work and that the same does not exist in any other publication, blog or website.

By participating in the contest, member automatically grants telecentre.org the right to use, copy, adapt, transmit, distribute, publish and display the submitted entry, whether whole or in part, and this will be applicable worldwide and in perpetuity.

All contest entries must be posted at the telecentre.org website by 5pm GMT on Sunday, May 31, 2009 .

All contest entries will be subject to validation by telecentre.org. The short listed entries will be evaluated by a distinguished panel of judges to be appointed by the former. The decision of the panel of judges is final.

Evaluation of entries will be based on:
o Content
o Organization
o Relevance

Based on the above criteria, the panel of judges will determine the top three blogs from among the contest entries.

Winners will be announced through the telecentre.org website by the end of June. They will likewise be notified via email.

Winners will each receive special tokens from telecentre.org. Winning entries will also be featured in publications such as the telecentre.org newsletter and the Telecentre Times, among others.

[Mathias Walwana]

This is a very great and good idea, we shall have bigger contributions from minded people all through the world

[Bidya Nidhi Lamsal]

Telecentres are now the focus of much attention in rural development discourse, hailed as the solution to development problems by providing desperately needed access to information and communication technologies (ICTs). “Telecentre” is a generic term and there are a great variety of telecentres.
My study focused on characterizing the implementation status of the telecentres in Nepal and documenting the extent of and barriers to further development. I visited most of the sponsors of telecentres, and many of the telecentres themselves, interviewing people, observing the telecentres at work, and filling up the questionnaires. The goal was to use this information to develop strategies and actions that could be taken to overcome digital divide barriers and increase the development of telecentres in support at rural level in Nepal. I used ArcGIS 9.2 to create a complete database (spatial/non-spatial) and a thematic layer of telecentres as an overlay on a digital map of Nepal. This was used to analyse the telecentres’ locations, coverage and the population they serve.
I found that more than 50% of the telecentres in Nepal are in a critical condition and at risk of closing. The critical influencing factors for sustainable rural telecentres are technological barriers, socio-economical dynamics, IT education and the geographical placement.

My study critically reviews a number of themes and issues and suggests a technical framework for the implementation of the sustainable telecentres in rural areas of Nepal.

[Cuchie Echeverria]

Dear Weerasinghe,

We will be happy to know about the work you are doing at the grassroots level. The blog contest will indeed provide additional motivation for sharing your story with the community.

Good luck!

[Cuchie Echeverria]

Hi Fuatai.

Glad to hear that. We will be looking forward to your participation in the contest.

Best regards.

[Fuatai]

This is a great idea of promoting information sharing between like minded people from around the world. After all, telecenters are a tool for any government that is serious about bridging the digital divide between urban and rural and between countries. I certainly will take part to share with you the telecenter development in a small island. Looking forward to read lots and lots of entries!!

[Francis Mwathi]

That would be great Weerasinghe. I hope other members have taken note of this.

[W. M. C. R. K. Dissanayake]

Dear Munira, we think this is a good opportunity to us, Now we are doing some works in grassroot level so by publishing a blog about it, we can know the ideas of others also.
Thanks & Regards,

[Laia Fauró Gual]

The deadline has changed! Now you can post your contributions until the 31st of May!

[Marco Figueiredo]

great idea.

[Sandra Nassali]

Can i submit one :-) jokes Munni...this is good though...