Bloggers block - Here I am

I have not written in over two years. I dont know why. I have attempted to write but given up everytime. Is it because I am trying too hard to impress with my next blog post. I wont try too hard this time. This will do . Baby steps

Egypt asks mobile firms to bar anonymous users

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egypt has asked mobile phone companies to block service to anonymous subscribers as a public security measure, and at least two firms have begun efforts to comply, Egyptian officials and mobile firms said on Monday . Read more

Nii Quaynor receives the prestigious Jon PostelAward

Dr. Nii Narku Quaynor has laboured as a General in the
ICT Army in Africa over two decades providing
leadership, vision, foresight, strength and the best
of field commandship - in his own words, "a strike
against techno-colonialism. A lot of us have learnt
from his fortitude, tenacity and sense of commitment
to cause that sometimes is not as well recognised but
yet the only hope for generations to come.

Nii'a efforts has resulted in great strides not only
in the technical community but in the other
disciplines and stakeholder manifestations across
board. It is important to underscore his great work as
one of the pioneers also of the building of
institutions for the knowledge economy in Africa of
which AfriNIC is a classical example of great gain.
Not to talk about his building of systems, people,
spaces and opportunity.

Please join me in congratulating a five star General,
Nii which means in our local dialect, Chief.....

Eric here

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Dawit Bekele"
Date: 6 December 2007 05:09:37 GMT+03:00
To:
Subject: [AfrICANN-discuss] Nii Quaynor receives the
prestigious Jon Postel Award
Reply-To: bekele@isoc. org, africann@afrinic. net

Hi all,

I am happy to announce to you that, today, this year’s
prestigious Jon Postel award has been awarded to Nii
Quaynor. Lynn St.Amour, CEO and President of ISOC
handed the presentation crystal of the award to Nii
Quaynor at the IETF meeting in Vancouver, where more
than 1,000 participants were present.

You all know how much Nii has contributed for the
development of Internet in Africa, which is why we are
all happy that he has be given this award that he
fully deserves.

To know more about the Jon Postel award please see
http://www.isoc.org/awards/ .

African Satellite & Wireless Broadband Conference & VoIP Forum

African Satellite & Wireless Broadband Conference & VoIP Forum

EAST AFRICA: Safari Park Hotel, Nairobi, 11-13 July 2007
WEST AFRICA: Muson Centre, Lagos, 21-23 August 2007

"Broadband bridges across Africa: First and last mile solutions"

SPEAKERS INCLUDE THE FOLLOWING INTERNATIONAL INDUSTRY LEADERS:
Keynote: Efficient bandwidth delivery mechanisms
Peter Gbedemah, MD, Gateway Communications, UK
Keynote: Next Generation Networks: Selecting the right migration path
Renato Goodfellow, Solutions Manager, ME & Africa, BT Global Solutions,
UK
Keynote: Creating wireless communities
Paul Munnery, CEO, Wireless Digital Cities, UK
Optimising satellite services in the region's approaching new fibre era
Joe Luel, Market Development, SkyVision Global Networks, UK
Fiber optic vs. satellite-based connectivity: Do they compete or do
they
complete?
Avihu Bergman, Executive VP Sales & Marketing, Gilat Satcom, Israel
DVBS2: Its role in trunking
Malcolm Brew, Director, Bushnet, Uganda
Developing wireless skills
Gary Chalmers, CEO Africa, Torque-IT, South Africa
Rural Wireless: The role of WiMAX, WiFi, CDMA and hybrid technologies
Badru Ntege, Director, Big Dish, Uganda
VoIP survival strategies for telcos, ISPs and cyber cafes
Russell Southwood, CEO, Balancing Act, UK
Build vs. buy: VoIP solutions for Africa
Colin Blou, Director, Reseller Group, deltathree, USA
Providing a VoIP service over a WiMAX network
Yves Desmet, Senior Vice-President, Worldwide Sales, Verso, Belgium
Maximising international VoIP services
Mawuli Tse, Director for International Sales - Africa, iBasis, Ghana

MASTERCLASS:
Building Wireless Communities - Paul Munnery, CEO, Wireless Digital
Cities,
UK

Help. Internships wanted.

From the desk of Dr. Osei Darkwa, Principal of Ghana
Telecom University College.

36 students from GTUC will be completing a one year
certificate course
in Information Technology by mid April. The training
requires the
students to complete a three month attachment with a
reputable IT
company. This will provide them with the opportunity
to practice their
newly acquired skills.

I am wondering if your company/organizatio n could use
the students.

Among others, the students completed the following
IT-related courses over the duration of their study:

Information Management System
Computer Systems and Application
Finite Mathematics
Web Design Authoring and Publishing
Microcomputer Operating Systems
Communication Skills

Kindly communicate with Ms. Evelyn Asiedu at
evasiedu@ghanatel. net if you are interested in the
proposal.

March 14: G-50 International Seminar for IT & BPO Firms

The Ghana @ 50 Secretariat, in collaboration with GCG,
the Washington-based Xalles Limited and the Ghana
Multimedia Incubator Center, will present the 1st International Seminar for
Information Technology and Business Process Outsourcing firms in
Accra.

Date: March 14, 2007
Venue: Golden Tulip Hotel, Airport City, Accra

PRESENTERS
Thomas W. Nash, Chairman & CEO, Xalles Limited,
Washington, DC
Kwasi Adu-Gyan, Managing Director, Ghana Multimedia
Incubator Center, Accra
Corporate Presentation by Microsoft Corp.
Corporate Presentation by Cisco Systems, Inc.

REGISTRATION
No Charge ~ the event is sponsored by Microsoft,
Cisco, GMIC, GCG, Xalles and the Ghana @ 50. To register, please
contact:

AFRICA
Yaw Owusu, GCG Investments Ltd, Airport City, Accra
yowusu@ghanacybergroup.com +233-246-531- 380

NORTH and SOUTH AMERICA and EUROPE
Rui Lopes, Xalles Limited
rlopes@xalles. com
+1-202-595-1299

ASIA
Antony Widjaja, Xalles Limited
awidjaja@xalles. com
+1-202-595-1299

The Ghana @ 50 international marketing seminar (IMS)
will provide Ghanaian and African companies with practical tools
and information needed to prepare them for cross-border expansion and
entry to new product markets. It will guide the participants
through global opportunities available with practical and competitive
business management, financial readiness, product development,
and business intelligence. The program would also provide global
firms (e.g. Microsoft, Cisco, etc) with an opportunity to share
their experience in international markets and how their presence and
growth in Africa will help facilitate the growth of the hi-tech industry in
the region. The full day version of the seminar includes a facilitated
workshop session for participants to begin crafting strategies suited
to their companies and unique market situations—a new approach that will
direct their actions towards areas critical for successful
international marketing.

Xalles will provide a full day, customized version of
its IT/BPO marketing seminar to all participants as a group. The
program also includes a workshop on individual marketing
strategies—i. e. personalized business coaching for entrepreneurs and
companies.

Seminar Objectives
• Identifying international opportunities by region
• Discovering requirements for global expansion
• Determining organization’ s—as well as its
product’s—readiness for
global expansion
• Developing an international marketing strategy

HANDOUTS
For all participants, the seminar will provide the
following companies to continue applying the techniques and concepts from
the seminar in
subsequent weeks.
• International Partner Guide
• International Business Plan Preparation Guide
• International Marketing Plan Preparation

The IMS will cover:
• Business Management
• Financial Readiness
• Product Development and Packaging
• International Marketing
• Distribution and Pricing
• International Business Intelligence
• Culture and Language

INVITATION TO OFFICIAL LAUNCHING - GHANA ICT AWARDS 2007

The government continues to place emphasis on the
potential of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to provide a foundation for building an information and knowledge society
and has accordingly integrated the Ghana ICT Policy for Accelerated
Development, as driver and enabler, within the three-pronged GPRS II
development strategy.

In connection with this, the Ministry of Communications is planning
to organise the 1st Ghana Information and Communications Technologies
Excellence Awards for 2007 in partnership with industry players in the
private sector to commemorate the 50th Anniversary Celebration of
Ghana's Independence. This initiative is designed to serve as a key
catalyst for government and the private sector to drive the programme
of using ICT for accelerated national development.

The main objectives of this Awards scheme are:

- To create greater awareness of the role of ICT
in public services
and the development process within the framework of
the Information
Society.

- To motivate other stakeholders in effective
utilization of ICT for
citizens services.

- To ensure that ICT professionals are provided a
benchmark for
recognising and validating outstanding contribution.

In view of the above, you are kindly invited to
participate in the official launching ceremony scheduled as follows:


DATE: 23rd FEBRUARY 2007

VENUE: GHANA INDIA KOFI ANNAN CENTRE OF EXELLENCE IN
ICT

TIME: 10 A.M PROMPT

Offshore Outsourcing blossoming in Ghana

The Ministry of Communications with the support of the World Bank carried out a study last year to establish Ghana's idealness for Business Process Outsourcing and Information Communication Technology (ICT) enabled services in the country.

Even before the study’s final report was made public, a major US based BPO operator has began operations in Ghana with an initial staff of 25 employees. International Outsourcing Service with plants in Mexico, Slovakia, India, France and Germany is set to make a mark in the $300 billion outsourcing market in sub-Saharan Africa. The company with the assistance of a Ghanaian resident in the United States started pilot operations in December 2006 under the name Novel Solutions, Ltd. This was after it conducted its own private study of the BPO market in Ghana. read
more

Workshop on ICT for dev't for African institutions opens

Professor, Jophus Anamuah-Mensah, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Education, Winneba has called for the institution of a special fund to be named ICT Trust Fund for the establishment and equipping Information Communication Technology Centre in all basic and secondary schools in the country.
He said if the fund is established, it would make every school child in the country to start the learning of computer from the basic schools, adding that by the time the child would enter the secondary cycle institutions, he or she would have become very good at ICT and conversant on the computer. Read more

Internet: Will the sector ever remain the same?

This is one question that comes to mind looking at developments in the communications sector which makes it very possible now for phone users to be on the super highway even on their mobile handsets. Fixed Wireless Operators now bundle internet along with their lines making it possible for subscribers using their lines to do internet without extra headache. In a way the operations break the norms because traditionally people used to pray for a fixed line to be able to do that kind of service.
article

Workshop on "Mobiles and Development: The Contribution of Mobile

Workshop on "Mobiles and Development: The Contribution of Mobile
Devices to
Development"
Wednesday 16th May 2007
Development Informatics Group, University of Manchester

This is a call for abstracts and first announcement of a workshop of
the UK Development Studies Association "Information, Technology and Development" study group on the relation of mobile devices to socio-economic development.

According to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), there are
now more mobile subscribers than fixed line subscribers, and mobile teledensity
rates continue to outstrip fixed teledensity in every region of the world.
ITU statistics show a global increase from approximately 740 million mobile
subscribers in 2000 to 2.2 billion subscribers more than one-third of
the world's population by the end of 2005. With one million new
subscribers every day, it is estimated that almost four billion people will have a mobile phone by the end of 2010.

Rising uptake of mobile phones is indicative of the huge potential
mobile devices have in reaching significant portions of erstwhile excluded
populations. This workshop will bring together field evidence on the
use of mobile devices in delivering development objectives in a range of
developing and developed countries. It will explore the application of mobile
devices to health, education, economic and social empowerment, human rights,
commerce, etc.

Interested presenters should in the first instance submit an abstract
of no more than 300 words to abi.jagun@manchester.ac.uk. Please include "Mobiles
and Development Workshop" in the Subject field of your email. Paper
submissions should be sent to: Dr Abi Jagun, Development Informatics Group, IDPM,
School of Environment and Development, Precinct Centre, University of Manchester, Manchester, M13 9QH, UK. Abstracts should be received no later than
Wednesday 28 February 2007.

Participants wishing to attend should complete and return a
registration form to the address above no later than Monday 30 April 2007. Details of the workshop and a copy of the registration form can be found at:
http://www.sed.manchester.ac.uk/idpm/research/events/mobile.htm

Attendance is free of charge and some support for within-UK-only travel
costs may be available to presenters who are members of the Development
Studies Association:

please contact Richard Heeks
(richard.heeks@manchester.ac.uk)
convenor of the I,T&D study group in advance of the workshop.

Africa: 'Microsoft is Imperialistic' Says Open Source Advocates

Microsoft Corporation's products have been locked out of the on-going World Social Forum (WSF) in Nairobi Kenya.

With over 300 computers provided for participants and the press, organizers of the WSF have preferred to provide open source software products and blocked all Microsoft related products for the forum's usage and its related activities.

Participants attending WSF, which for the first time is entirely taking place in an African country say that this was a gesture done as a way of promoting the free social movement at the same time also as a way of fighting Microsoft's 'imperialistic tendencies.' read more

MTN Nigeria raises the stakes, acquires VGC Comms

THE year 2007 forecast by industry analysts predicted great hope for the telecom sector in Nigeria based on growth trends and urban-rural penetration expectation. And with only few weeks into the year, surprise is the one word to describe renewed investment flow into the sector, first with the Middle Eastern firm Mobadala, expending a princely 400 million dollars for a unified telecom licence and now, the country’s leading telecom provider MTN Nigeria Communications’ successful acquisition of a 100 per cent shareholding of VGC Telecommunications Limited, from erstwhile owners, Modern Communication Technologies Inc. (MCT) Gilbratar, Tele- communication arm of Globe International Holdings S.A. Read more

NCC confirms 30m subscribers, as Mubadala pays $400m

MIDDLE Eastern telecommunications provider, Mubadala Development Company of the United Arab Emirates, UAE has made good its promise to be part of the telecom revolution in Nigeria as it paid 400 million dollars last week to the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) for a Unified Access Service Liscence operation. read more

Thieves Destroy 400 Phone Lines In Kumasi

About 400 telephone lines belonging to Ghana Telecom customers in some parts of Kumasi and its environs have been disrupted since the beginning of this year due to the stealing of underground and overhead telephones cables. read more ..

Nigeria set to displace SA as Africa’s largest mobile market

Nigeria is on course to be Africa’s largest mobile market. With a mobile subscriber base of some 25 million at the end of September, it is closing in on its biggest rival for the title, South Africa according to a survey by GSM World Focus Online. read more .

IT-ROADMAP: ICT development trend and forecast for 2007: Challenges and opportunities for Nigeria

Data centre is often a candidate for outsourcing-20% of this activity is outsourced, with 22% planned for 2007 - but much less frequently for offshoring..
Lean principles also apply to the IT organization most of all, leading to an increased uptake of outsourcing and offshoring. Third-party services and internal head count account for 11% and 24% of the total, respectively. Over a third of respondents plan to increase their spending in both categories next year. For respondents that plan to decrease spending in these areas, 25% said they’d reduce internal head count, while only 19% said they’d reduce the use of third-party services.Even though budgets for 2007 are growing by 3% on average, doing more with less is a fact of life for enterprise IT departments. Save for the 5% increase in the amount of application management that will migrate offshore in 2007. read more

NITC Bill, a sore after taste

The recent passage of the National Information Technology Commission (NITC) Bill 2006 appears to have left a sore after taste in the mouths of investors in the nation’s telecommunications industry. read more .

With Mubadala, NCC serves notice for a great 2007

For the regulator of the telecoms industry, the Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, reinventing the industry comes quite easy. Just when you think the industry has got to its wits end then another thing comes up to keep the fire of hope alive and give some real good feeling that we are capable of doing something good and match the speed of the world in any field. read more .

Internet Users warned against circulating virus e-mails

Government on Thursday warned the general public, especially Internet users, to beware of opening any attachment or document sent to them through the Internet with the heading "Invitation".

"Opening any such e-mail immediately unleashes a virus that can totally damage the hard drive of your computer", a statement said in Accra. Read more .