Grandiose Parlor

ICT in Africa: Seeing a Half-full Cup

December 6th, 2006  |  Published in Africa, ICT  |  3 Comments

The White African blog has this map depicting IP per capita (internet protocol address ownership) worldwide. Expectedly, several African nations occupy the lowest rungs of the ladder.

An interesting map nonetheless, but it tells me nothing new. Moreover, the analysis is statistically biased against Africa because what drives IP ownership is national Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and purchasing power parity (PPP), unfavorable indices since African nations have the lowest GDPs in the world. A more accurate analysis will adjust for the disparities in GDP and PPP, not that this will change the findings much, but at least, makes the playing field level.

Rather than getting unduly depressed, one can look at the picture from a different perspective: Even though there exist an estimated 33 million Internet users in Africa - low by global standard - Africa registered a 625% growth in Internet users between 2000 and 2006; the highest in the world! This, I can work with.

Responses

1. hash says:
   

   December 4th, 2006 at 8:21 pm (#)

   Rather than getting unduly depressed, one can look at the picture from a different perspective: Even though there exist an estimated 33 million Internet users in Africa - low by global standard - Africa registered a 625% growth in Internet users between 2000 and 2006; the highest in the world! This, I can work with.

   Agreed! That is a BIG and important number. Large scale change on the web is in order in Africa and will be on its way in the next couple of years. Things are definitely looking up.

2. Noli Irritare Leones » Blog Archive » African ingenuity blogwatch says:
   

   December 6th, 2006 at 11:52 am (#)

   […] Grandiose Parlor on ICT in Africa: Seeing a Half-Full Cup (a response to that IP per capita post that I had linked earlier). […]

3. Grandiose Parlor » Blog Archive » Thoughts on African Media and Blogosphere says:
   

   December 8th, 2006 at 1:45 am (#)

   […] First, African bloggers to read more blogs from Africa and link accordingly. Not using links in the blogrolls, but using links to discuss other blogs stories/entries they find interesting and relevant to their cause. Not an easy task, but a worthy one nonetheless. Secondly, there is need for media infrastructure tailored to our needs, basically web applications of the Web 2.0 kind. These applications must be built to accommodate for the unique characteristics (socioeconomics and technical) of region. Africa-related media outlets (news blogs etc) are being overlooked simply because available indices measuring scope and depth of these media do not look good. […]