Bridging Communications Bridging Communications Across the Digital DivideAcross the Digital Divide

Bridging Communications Bridging Communications Across the Digital DivideAcross the Digital Divide

Edwin Blakeedwin@cs.uct.ac.za

Collaborative Visual Computing LaboratoryDepartment of Computer Science

University of Cape TownSouth Africa

William Tuckerbtucker@cs.uct.ac.za

Bridging Applications and Networks GroupDepartment of Computer ScienceUniversity of the Western Cape

South Africa

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Communication Across the Digital Divide

The issues we intend addressing:

1. Changes in the way we design innovative IT based systems and services the South African Digital Divide as a springboard

2. The notion of bridging central to developing communications systems

3. Putting the user at the centre

4. An abstracted communications system: SoftBridge

5. Showing what we did so far, and what we learnt

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

Local South African Digital Divide

• Population 45 million

• 45% rural

• Mixed developed and developing world

• 14 million mobile users, 4 million landline

• 2 of 3 sharing handsets or using community phones

• 50% of households have no phone in dwelling

• 10% have no access to a phone at all

• Legacy of differentiated access

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

The Phone Gap

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

Bridging the “Digital Divide”

DD = growing gap of access to Information Society

Bridging ≠ “bringing the underdeveloped up to speed”

• social dynamics as well as

• technological tools that support social interaction

Community-centred approach• build new artefacts

Change government policy that impedes development

cultural bias gaps in educationpersonal handicap poor digital infrastructurelack of appropriate computer equipment

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

IT Application and Contents Design MethodologyUser/Community centred

Critical Action Research

• facilitating change byfacilitating action

• cyclical software development: participatory design + prototype evaluation.

Flaws

• users don’t appreciate technological possibilities

• software designers must bridge cultural gaps

“human access points”

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

Social Intelligence Design

Nishida: two aspects of Social Intelligence as1. an individual’s capacity to act wisely in accordance with

social rules (“conventional”)

2. the ability of a system to manage complexity of interaction

This corresponds to 1. ability of designers to discover and operate within the

rules of the community our community-centred method

2. design a system to deal with some of the complexity our SoftBridge abstraction.

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

Automatic Communication Bridges: SoftBridge

Embodiment of Social Intelligence Design

both an actual implemented Computer Artefact

and an Abstraction of all operations beyond current technology

Abstracted social communication platform that bridges

• variation in network access

• different end-user devices

• interfaces to the user

• various communication modalities

• between people with different capabilities and needs

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

Delay or Latency

First result: the necessity of delay• processing inherent in SoftBridge

• delay from poor infrastructure: Power outages common Phone lines down

• the way people use the system

Dealing with delay

• switch between synchronous & asynchronous

• our current user based research

• maintain Co-Presence

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

Quality of Communication (QoC)

Generalization of the notion of Quality of Service (QoS)

• ability to support communication by bridging between different user abilities, sensory and media modalities, human computer interfaces, and end-user devices, and infrastructure capabilities

In terms of “Social Intelligence”

• users conduct meaningful exchanges in spite of limited technology and macro delays “where there is a will there is a way”

• system adapts automatically to user & system capabilities

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

The SoftBridge

Semi-synchronous• Synchronous when possible

• Asynchronous otherwise

• Inspired by Instant Messaging, SMS and email

Quality of Communication measures effectiveness

DeviceInterfaceModality

User

NetworkDevice

InterfaceModality

User

Network

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

Nurse Doctor

Text, image, Audio, video

GUI

PC

WLAN, solar

Text, image,audio

Hardware

Handset, digicamwebcam

WLAN, solar

Cuban SpanishXhosa

A softbridge for tele-consultation

• Nurse needs to consult doctor remotely for patient referrals

• Rural clinic serves community of 60,000

• Nearby rural hospital with single doctor serving 200 beds, out-patients, maternity ward, and emergencies

• Main delays: power & network outages, Dr.’s schedule

• Short term: add links to other clinics, and possibly to Internet with satellite uplink

DeviceInterfaceModality

User

NetworkDevice

InterfaceModality

User

Network

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

Deaf User Hearing User

voice

audio

handset

Telephone

text

GUI

PC

Internet

Spoken EnglishWritten English

A softbridge for Deaf Telephony

• Semi-automated relay with an Instant Messaging delivery system Converting Deaf text to speech for the hearing user with Text-to-Speech (TTS) and

Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) Learned to use Wizard of Oz (WoOz) instead

• Pilot in the laboratory

• Field trials under way in the Deaf Community of Cape Town

DeviceInterfaceModality

User

NetworkDevice

InterfaceModality

User

Network

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

Conclusions

• Lessons from the developing world apply

• Design: Community-centred methodology (microcosm)

• Development: SoftBridge as concept and artefact

• Measurement: user as part of the system (QoC)

• Learning from field trials

• Influencing society at large (macrocosm)

Edwin Blake & William Tucker {edwin, btucker}@cs.uct.ac.za SID 2004, University of Twente

Acknowledgements

Supported by many organizations and people• Community members

• Our students John Lewis and Marshini Chetty

Resources were provided by• NRF: South African National Research Foundation

• Telkom SA

• Siemens SA

• SANPAD: South Africa Netherlands Research Programme on Alternatives in Development

• CSIR: Council for Scientific and Industrial Research

• bridges.org