I can only share similar stories. I've visited a few of these rural kiosks/cafes and some common things are evident - the people that run the places 'monopolize' them. I found that students in a school just behind one of these centers did not have access to the center (yes it was expensive for the rural community since prices almost mirrored an urban cyber). But even aside from the cost - the students were not welcomed in as a pro bono effort to sensitize the community on the uses of the net. It seemed like the people who worked at the centers were experts, and the others were very scared of them :) - the equipment gets run down ... in one place, they had bought all the computers, but had no power supply - had been cut off for months. The committee was waiting for someone somewhere to turn it back on - the original donors I believe. In the other place, 80% of the computers were not working, and there was noone around to fix them. - they were not making enough off the center to sustain power, bandwidth costs etc. I personally think 3g is the answer to rural internet woes ... phones can be your first exposure to the net eg email and IM ... and automatically people will upgrade to other devices as necessary (torrents and HD video streaming ;) ----- Original Message ----- From: "Jared Koyier" <jaredkoyier@gmail.com> To: "Skunkworks Forum" <skunkworks@lists.my.co.ke> Sent: Monday, December 28, 2009 7:33:43 PM GMT +03:00 Iraq Subject: Re: [Skunkworks] Ideal christmas gift Crystal This kiosks idea reminds me of the PostaSurf project that was spearheaded by Posta Kenya.Though Postasurf was infrastructurally poorly planned with one complete VSAT kit supporting 3 computers,fax n a phone.The biggest challange was the inability of these units to sustain themselves. The collections then were paltry and as such most of them were running in losses.None of the units were able to break even. Intersat charges about 55k.for 128bw per month...atleast the last time i checked. That means 2k per daycollection.Assuming you charge 1bob a min,it translate to2k min.If you are lucky 20 people will visit the kiosk in a day.So each must spend 100bob,I highly doubt if thats tenable in Khayega for instance. This is a cost that cannot be realised in rural areas. Take time and explore why Posta failed on this front. On 28/12/2009, ashok+skunkworks@parliaments.info <ashok+skunkworks@parliaments.info> wrote:

On Mon, Dec 28, 2009 at 4:10 PM, Crystal Watley Kigoni <crystal@voicesofafrica.org> wrote:

...

It seems as though it is easy to try to find faults and poke holes, but what tangible solutions have others on this list come up with? I can answer questions all day, no problem, but honestly people love to complain that there is high unemployment, high poverty, and a lack of local content, but when someone is trying to resolve the issues all we get is more complaints. Not very encouraging, now is it?

I am neither complaining nor criticizing, I am just curious to understand how you plan to make this work, since if the model works it could be something useful for everyone. I have seen very many projects propelled by good intentions but didn't last more than a year or two because the funds ran out.

...

Would you refuse to own a car just because it has a risk of being stolen? This is also what insurance is for.

Unfortunately human nature is a bit selfish about ownership. If I paid for the car out of my pocket i have a greater interest in sustaining ownership by servicing the car, buying insurance etc. I dont know if all the communities these kiosks are meant for will feel like owners if things are handed to them, since as you say they dont understand what the internet is about. _______________________________________________ Skunkworks mailing list Skunkworks@lists.my.co.ke http://lists.my.co.ke/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/skunkworks ------------ Skunkworks Server donations spreadsheet http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AopdHkqSqKL-dHlQVTMxU1VBdU1BSWJxdy1f... ------------ Skunkworks Rules http://my.co.ke/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=94 ------------ Other services @ http://my.co.ke Other lists ------------- Announce: http://lists.my.co.ke/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/skunkworks-announce Science: http://lists.my.co.ke/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/science kazi: http://lists.my.co.ke/cgi-bin/mailman/admin/kazi/general

_______________________________________________ Skunkworks mailing list Skunkworks@lists.my.co.ke http://lists.my.co.ke/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/skunkworks ------------ Skunkworks Server donations spreadsheet http://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AopdHkqSqKL-dHlQVTMxU1VBdU1BSWJxdy1f... ------------ Skunkworks Rules http://my.co.ke/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=94 ------------ Other services @ http://my.co.ke Other lists ------------- Announce: http://lists.my.co.ke/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/skunkworks-announce Science: http://lists.my.co.ke/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/science kazi: http://lists.my.co.ke/cgi-bin/mailman/admin/kazi/general