Dear GKD Members, Although GKD is still on vacation (until Sept. 15), we felt that List Members would want to know that the GKD Database has just been launched. This database is a compendium of all messages posted to the List since its beginning, in March 1997. It is a unique resource of all the invaluable ideas, cases, opinions, strategies and experiences that you, our List members, have contributed to date. All messages are now searchable by author, date, subject and/or category. Multiple search criteria are supported. In addition, the entire database is now full-text indexed, so that any particular phrase or word can be searched on. We hope that members will help spread the word about this new 'knowledge base' for development. Please visit the site <http://www.GKDknowledge.org> and let us know what you think by taking the brief survey; this will help us continue to improve the database in the future.
You will find below a press release announcing this new information resource. Sincerely, the GKD Moderators ******************************************** Online Global Community Offers Insights for Developing Countries NEWTON, MA: The wisdom of thousands of people around the world and their efforts to use information technologies (IT) in developing countries is now available and accessible on the Web. For the past six years, people have turned to an online forum, Global Knowledge for Development (GKD), created by Education Development Center, Inc., as a free, trusted, and moderated email discussion to learn from others' experience on how best to use IT to improve education, health and economic development. Now, these valuable discussions, including thousands of messages, are readily available and easy to find at www.GKDknowledge.org "It's hard to find out what people are doing with IT in developing countries," says Janice Brodman of EDC. "Many organizations spend enormous amounts of money trying to get that kind of information. On GKD, thousands of people from over 120 countries have been sharing information for free, for years. Everyone knows how valuable the information is, and with the new database, these messages are accessible." With support from infoDev, a program managed by the World Bank to help developing countries overcome obstacles to effective use of IT, EDC developed software that made it easy to code the GKD messages. "It's often a lot more valuable for someone in Uganda, say, to get information from someone in the Philippines on what they're doing with computers, than from someone in New York or Paris," says Stuart Klein, one of the GKD moderators. "Now that kind of experience and knowledge is permanently available to everyone." Here are some examples of the kind of help available from the new GKD resource: * Villages without electricity or phones learn how to get connected to the Internet. Fantsuam Foundation of Nigeria explains how they use mobile community telecentres to bring IT to poor, rural communities in Nigeria that lack electricity and telephones. * Entrepreurs can learn how to benefit from E-commerce and online training: A Peruvian company E-Connexions describes how it helps Peruvian businesses use e-commerce and get online training. * Schools in developing countries can access good computer hardware: World Computer Exchange (WCE), a US-based nonprofit organization, has had over 40 responses to one GKD message where they presented their used computers collected from US companies, outfitted with modern software, and shipped to schools in developing countries. * Volunteer Opportunities: GKD posts messages from the United Nations Volunteers organization, guiding interested volunteers towards opportunities in poor countries. * Learn about people's struggles with governments and international organizations: In the GKD "controversies" section, participants from China talk of their experience with government censorship. People from Mexico to Malaysia promote "intellectual property rights" that serve the poor. Many in developing countries turn to GKD as a primary tool to connect with the rest of the world. Email is their most economical source of information and they know they can trust the information on GKD. "GKD has helped us network," says Dorothy Okello, President of The Women of Uganda Network (WOUGNET), who post their newsletter monthly on GKD. "Through GKD we've been able to collaborate with other women's networks around the world, from Senegal to Romania." EDC hopes to continue building the GKD resource well into the future. "We know from the thanks we receive how important this resource is to those in developing countries," says Brodman. GKD is testimony that if two heads are better than one, thousands of heads offer an unparalleled source of knowledge. ******************************************************* Global Knowledge for Development (GKD) is an online forum where thousands of people around the world share knowledge and experience about the role of information technology in sustainable development. The GKD database provides a user-friendly resource of cases, guidelines, and lessons-learned, which can be easily accessed by query. Visit the GKD resource at www.GKDknowledge.org Education Development Center, Inc. (EDC) is one of the world's leading nonprofit education and health organizations, with more than 350 projects around the globe. EDC brings researchers and practitioners together to create tools and conditions for learning, reaching people of all ages, backgrounds, and abilities. For more information, visit www.edc.org infoDev is a global grant program managed by the World Bank to promote innovative projects on the use of information and communication technologies (ICT) for economic and social development, with a special emphasis on the needs of the poor in developing countries www.infodev.org ------------ ***GKD is solely supported by EDC, a Non-Profit Organization*** To post a message, send it to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd Archives of previous GKD messages can be found at: <http://www.edc.org/GLG/gkd/>
