We recently compared the many mobile apps out there for using mobile phones for data collection and surveying - one of the promising areas in which social researchers and NGOs are using mobiles.

Here is an updated version of our overview that includes the newly-released FrontlineSMS forms client, and Nokia Data Gathering, a mobile data collection tool designed for social researchers and NGOs. Here is the summary:

FrontlineSMS

The FrontlineSMS forms client was released last week. It adds basic data collection functionality to the SMS messaging tool. The forms client is a Java application, with all data transfer done via SMS.  The workflow for FrontlineSMS forms is as follows:

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Today is International Women's Day and we are celebrating by featuring innovative women in the MobileActive.org community who are making a difference by using mobiles for social impact. Many of these social innovators are indeed focusing their work on improving the lives of women - their health, incomes, and social and political well-being.  We salute you all! 

Melissa Loudon is a research officer at the Centre for Spatial Data Management at the University of Capetown in South Africa. She is also a talented mobile developer who used to work at Cell-Life, and she has written extensively for us, testing applications. Her most recent review of mobile tools for social development focused on data collection using a mobile phones.

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MobileActive's Mobile Tech 4 Social Change barcamp was the first event of this sort that I have been to. I've never experienced this style of event planning where you pick a theme, arrange a place, invite a bunch of people to come and then let them decide what the sessions would be that day. I have to say, there are elements to it that I really liked, and things I might do differently.

If you'd like to read more about my thoughts on barcamp style conferencing, check out the extended version of this post at The Morningside Post. In the meantime, here are my experiences at the sessions i went to.

FIRST SESSION  - UNICEF's Rapid SMS Projects

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There is a slew of new challenges (disclosure: I am a judge on some of them) and a few other opportunities for MobileActives.  Take a look - and thank you to David Sasaki for compiling! 

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Originally published on the PBS blog Mediashift.

Mobile phones are everywhere. They have long surpassed the Internet in number of users, and in some parts of the world, mobile phones now rival television in reach. The mobile tech economy (at least until recently) was booming with telcoms and handset manufacturers fiercely competing in emerging markets, and software giants like Microsoft and Google entering the mobile industry in earnest. There are now somewhere between 3.5 billion and 4 billion mobile subscriptions worldwide, with the fastest growth happening in developing countries.

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We are looking for your mobile application!  MobileActive.org is collecting detailed information about mobile applications used for health, social development, advocacy, education, civic media, human rights, and other civil society areas.

If you have or are developing a mobile application used in social development, please complete this survey!  There is currently no comprehensive database of mobile applications for social development available and we want to change that.

So, we need your help in building as-close-to-complete Mobile Applications Database, and learn more about your mobile apps used for social development.  Here is the survey!

We will share all applications widely on this site with organizations, press, and interested donors.

P.S.  Feel free to forward to relevant organizations, lists, and individuals! 

Photo: Mobile application at MobileActive08

The ITU released its latest edition of Measuring the Information Society. The report includes the ICT Development Index, aimed to capture the level of advancement of ICTs in more than 150 countries worldwide.  The Index also measures the global digital divide and examines how it has developed in recent years.

The report features a new ICT Price Basket, which combines fixed, mobile and broadband tariffs for 2008 into one measure and compares it across countries.

Here are some key findings:

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Mobile fundraising is taking off -- or so at least hope nonprofits hard hit by the economic downturn. Organizations are looking for a new channel for people to give on the spot, wherever they are, with their phones and a quick text message.

Mobile giving via SMS in the United States and many other parts of the world, has been out of reach because of high carrier charges - up to 50% of a donation would go to the telcom -- unacceptable to most charities.

But this has changed in the last two years.  Mobile donation campaigns in the United States that go through the Mobile Giving Foundation are not subject to the high carrier fees.  The Mobile Giving Foundation charges a smaller percentage fee -- currently 10%.  As a result, in 2008 the field of mobile giving in the U.S. attracted the attention by organizations large and small, including by such brands as UNICEF, the Salvation Army, and the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

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In 2006 alone, aid organizations such as the Measles Initiative and UNICEF distributed almost 20 million bed nets to prevent Malaria submission in ten African countries, including Ethiopia, Kenya and Nigeria. The distribution and supply management of bed nets, and the follow-up surveys of recipients of bed nets --insecticide-treated nets that can reduce malaria transmission of as much as 90% in areas with high coverage rates--is a daunting logistical challenge.

Aid organizations everywhere are discovering that mobile phones are an essential part in managing supplies and distribution of nets, food, and other aid.  Rapid Android is a new tool now being tested in Nigeria by UNICEF for the distribution of bed nets.  Rapid Android is a supply chain management and data collection tool built on Android, the open source operating system developed by The Open Handset Alliance and Google. 

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Using mobile phones has enormous potential for increasing access to healthcare for poor people aroundd the world, and for improving clinical outcomes.  Now a new association, the mHealth Alliance, has been launched to support this emerging field and increase the scale and impact of the many small prokects around the world. 

So new, the Alliance has so far no website, press release, or organization yet, it was announced to the BBC as part of the GSMA World Congress in Barcelona.  The mHealth Alliance is currently under the auspices of three foundations, the UN and Rockefeller Foundations in the United States, and the UK-based Vodafone Group Foundation.  

Deploying mobiles in health care in developing countries is not only promising for health outcomes, it is also a hot and potentially lucrative business area. There is enormous interest by NGOs, donors, telcoms, mobile vendors, researchers, and governments in the the use of mobile phones for increasing healthcare for the poorest people in the world. 

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Jeffrey Sachs, the noted and at times controversial development advocate, spoke to All Africa about the significance of mobile phones in Africa.  Sachs is also the director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University in New York which runs the Millennium Villages in 12 locations across Sub-Saharan Africa.  Sachs' assertion  that has often been repeated is that "the cell phone is the single most transformative technology for development."  Asked by All Africa about this claim, he noted that rural poverty especially has been characterized by isolation. Mobile phones have 'broken that isolation', as Sachs notes. 

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One of the more interesting mobile apps that I saw at TED, a prestigious tech and design conference in California, projects information from the phone onto any surface -- augmenting information from the web with real life and physical spaces.

The prototype -- dubbed Sixth Sense -- showcased at TED includes a webcam and a battery-powered projector, a small mirror and an internet-enabled mobile phone.  The device hangs around the wearer's neck andallows her to summon data and information from the Webat will on any surface. 

Pattie Maes of the lab's Fluid Interfaces group said in her presentation that she and her students are seeking a "new digital "sixth sense" for humans.  In the short clips below, Maes' student Pranav Mistry who developed the device, showcases the potential for social interaction and impact. 

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MIT is the first university to offer a graduate class exclusively focused on how mobile phones are used for social action.  Call4Action!, the brand-new seminar, asks: How can mobile networked devices be used for social change, politics, and expression?  From the course description:

Each week we will review existing tools for social change, cover techniques for mobile hacking, and piece together new experiments. International speakers ranging from Zimbabwean activists to telecommunication experts will discuss the problems with existing ICTs, and suggest parameters for new systems. We'll review protocols, systems, and packages like VOIP, GSM, SMS, and PBX to look at how they may be reused or reconfigured, and explore handset development and alternative communications systems.  We will learn to set up, develop for, and hack with systems and open source packages like Symbian Series 60, Android, Openmoko, Django, Asterisk.  Through hacking and technical exercises, we will demystify the field and build springboards for future work.  By the end of the class, we hope to collaboratively create new repertoires for social change and technical activism.

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On November 3, 2007 Pakistan's President Musharraf declared a state of emergency and martial law in Pakistan, suspending the Pakistan constitution.  During the next three months, during the short-lived emergency rule, Bhutto's assassination, and the general election in February of 2008, there was an unprecedented outpouring of citizen media, organizing and information sharing facilitated by new media -- blogging, mobile phones, and online video.

Huma Yusuf, an astute and eloquent journalist based in Karachi, has reported now on the convergence of old and new media during the 'Pakistan emergency,' as it is most often referred to in the country. It is a must-read document for anyone interested in citizen media, particularly in times of political turmoil, for the wealth of insights it provides on the current uses of digital media and the opportunities for future work in this area.  

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The Human Rights Center at the University of California, Berkeley is announcing the Human Rights Center Mobile Challenge. The deadline for submission of applications is March 13, 2009. Winners will receive cash awards of $15,000 (first place), $10,000 (second place), and $5,000 (third place) to implement their ideas.

While there have been few implementations of mobile technoogy so far in human rights work, recent innovations have the potential to be used to expose war crimes and other serious violations of human rights, and disseminate this information in real time throughout the world. Mobile phones, combined with GPS, cameras, video, audio, and SMS are transforming the way the world understands and responds to emerging crises. Handheld data collection devices, such as PDAs, provide researchers with new ways of documenting mass violence and attitudes toward peace, justice, and social reconstruction in conflict zones.

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Allyson Kapin from Women Who Tech asked me to respond to some excellent questions about mobile campaigns for advocating for specific social issues.  As I just received two  text messages from NARAL and the Planned Parenthood Federation of America promoting two campaigns they are running, I thought I take the opportunity to answer Allyson's questions publicly, drawing on my experience and observations of the last few years of mobiles in advocacy, illustrating what works and what is better avoided in using mobiles in advocacy campaigns.  This is, by nature of the question, somewhat US-centric.  A follow-up article will focus on mobile campaigning in the Global South to differentiate some of the key issues. 

How can integrating mobile technology benefit online advocacy campaigns?

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The ongoing debate over the value of cheap and open laptops for users in developing countries as opposed to mobile phones continues, most recently with a post from Cory Doctorow in the Guardian UK. The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) initiative, the most visible and audacious of the low-cost laptop projects, has been in the news recently for cutting half its staff and severely scaling back and refocusing its operations.  OLPC had originally promised to promote economic development by distributing free computers to two billion children in developing countries.

Doctorow in the Guardian argues what we all believe in -- that information technology is an essential ingredient to economic development. He notes:

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Data from Informa indicates that by 2010 half of the planet's population will have access to the Internet through a mobile device.  Should you make your website mobile?  We have heard recently from a number of organizations contemplating whether they should build a mobile site.  Following is an overview of some points to consider and resources to draw on as you consider a mobile web presence.

A bit of background: There are now  4 billion mobiles phone subscribers around the world, according to the ITU, far outpacing Internet users worldwide.  GSMA, the industry group for telecom companies, reports that more than 80% of the World population is currently covered by a GSM network.

This means that mobiles have become the most ubiquitous communication device in human history. It also means that a majority of the world's population will access the web via their mobile phones. And this means that organizations around the world need to think about what this means for their users, audience, and websites.

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Our field has discovered that mobile phones are useful tools for collecting data in the field.   As a result, there is an abundance of mobile data collection applications and projects.

Unlike bulk messaging and general information services that are targeting the general public as recipients of standardized messaging, mobile data collection applications are often used internally in an organization, customized to fit with existing organizational processes.

This may mean using services or applications that are not part of most people's day-to-day experience of mobile use. Add a liberal sprinkling of jargon (and the mobile world's plague of acronyms) and you have a recipe for much technical confusion. 

This overview by our colleague Melissa Loudon demystifies mobile data collection applications.  It gives an overview of defining information requirements  and outlines how to choose the most appropriate technology strategy for a specific organizational context and communication environment.  We also review a selection of commercial and non-commercial tools.

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We are very privileged to co-host MobileTech for Social Change New York, a barcamp on February 21, 2009 in New York.  We are especially pleased to co-organize the event with Hunter College's Integrated Media Arts Program.

The second in the MobileActive barcamp series, we'll explore mobile tech to advance social development and social change goals. Expect this to be highly participatory and interactive, and cover anything you wanted to know about using mobiles for social change. MobileTech for Social Change New York is open to anyone with passion and interest in the topic and since it's a barcamp, bring your ideas, innovations, products, tools, projects, and organizations!

And if you want to be an angel and sponsor the event, contact us at info at mobileactive dot org! 

Registration and info again is here.