27 March 2002, KL Issue 2

Why the Internet leaves Africa out in the cold...

Several were selected by the ICANN Board. What was interesting is that one company proposed to operate what seems to be in the public interest of Africa -- the dot-africa name. But it was not done by an African company! That begins to suggest a bad-faith application.

Certainly, if you go and search the Net, you see a large amount of information on Africa. But very little is actually being put out from Africa. This makes me question the quality of the information. If you're so far away, it's not easy for me to believe the quality of the information is at par.

At the same time, a large amount (of that which is put out) is not being produced and processed by Africans. Which further weakens my confidence in it. People say there's no African content; my content is not there because other people are busy putting my content out!

Our drive within the continent has to be to produce, keep up to date, our own content. Both in our own languages, and also in international languages.

Q: What is the importance of taking part in discussions over the shape of the Net to come?

Bodies like the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) are crucial.

At this stage, we still don't quite comprehend what the implications could be. It could be severe, in the sense that we're not building up people who understand global policies. These are the very same policies which we will one day have to apply locally. It is therefore important to participate in such issues.

Sometimes, policy decisions could affect wealth distribution. For example, it could decide who gets a chance to operate a top-level domain (TDL). It might also not mean anything. But suppose it does (mean wealth), I wish there was a level playing field so that Africans could have a similar chance in this affair.

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