Our Blog — FrontlineSMS

Online Discussion: Using Mobile Phones for Citizen Media

img class="alignright" title="Newtactics2" src="http://www.frontlinesms.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Newtactics2.png" alt="" width="213" height="70" />New opportunities are increasingly opening up for citizens to actively share information, produce media and participate in journalism. Later this week, from 27th July to 2nd August, FrontlineSMS will be taking part in an online dialogue hosted by the New Tactics in Human Rights project on the subject of “Using Mobile Phones for Citizen Media.”  We would particularly encourage any FrontlineSMS users interested or active in this field of citizen media to participate in the discussion during the week to share your insightful contributions. FrontlineSMS team members, Amy and Sean, are looking forward to taking part in this discussion as they join a plethora of resource practitioners to share ideas about how to open opportunities for citizens to actively participate in journalism. In particular, FrontlineSMS are interested in how citizens are able to contribute to the media by utilising tools which are likely to be already in their hands: their mobile phone. We hope to draw on the experiences from the many FrontlineSMS users who operate in the media sector in order to share examples and case studies with the forum. Examples we have heard of include collection of SMS news tips at BreezeFM radio station in Zambia, journalists already reporting via SMS in Indonesia and the use of SMS to contribute to a TV series which tackles HIV in the Democratic Republic of Congo in a project called Rien que la Vérité (Nothing but the Truth).

This discussion is very timely, given the recent announcement that FrontlineSMS will soon be developing tools to enable digital news gathering using mobile phones, made possible by a $250,000 grant awarded through the Knight Foundation's News Challenge. Over the next two years we will be developing two key products for journalists and broadcasters: one to facilitate participatory journalism, interaction and collaboration from community members and audiences, and one to enable journalists to use their simple mobile phones as powerful reporting tools. As this new and exciting project takes off, we hope to utilise the opportunity of this week’s online dialogue to collect ideas and lessons learnt from other actors in the field. This will help us to gain perspective as we shape a customised tool which we hope will assist journalists and broadcasters to harness the power of their mobile phones.

Other participating resource practitioners:

  • Melissa Ulbricht (co-facilitator) - MobileActive's staff writer, United States
  • Becky Hurwitz - Project Manager at MobileActive and currently working on the SaferMobile project, United States
  • Rich Jones of the Open Watch Project
  • Mong Palatino - one of the founding conveners of TXTpower, Philippines
  • Brian Conley and others of Small World News
  • Sean McDonald and Amy O'Donnell of FrontlineSMS
  • Alix Dunn - applied researcher in the role of digital tools in activism, Egypt
  • John (Kipp) Kipchumbah of InfoNet, Kenya
  • Sam duPont - Field Fellow for Dimagi, author of Global Mobile blog at at DC think tank NDN, Thailand and Philippines
  • Patita Tingoi and others from Fahamu, Kenya
  • Boukary Konaté and Eddie Avila from Rising Voices, Mali and Bolivia

You can follow and contribute to the discussion here from 27th July

M4Data: Beyond Mobile Security - a FrontlineSMS event in Washington, D.C.

The 'Mobiles in Malawi' project

As more and more people recognize the power of the connections that new technologies, and especially mobile phones, facilitate, there has been an increasing amount of concern. These concerns range from the safety of people using these technologies to the quality of the information traveling through mobile and Internet systems. At the same time, an increasing number of government agencies, medical clinics, and other holders of sensitive information are using new technologies to communicate with their stakeholders.

This event takes a step beyond security, instead focusing on the ways that people can design programs, their own behavior, and the information they send to reduce risks to themselves and their programs. In order to give mobile users, and the international development community, a framework to begin answering these questions, FrontlineSMS is releasing a User Guide focused on data integrity- namely, how to make sure that mobile projects are designed to produce high- quality information without posing undue risks to participants.

Internews, FrontlineSMS, and the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies Africa Program welcome you to the release of the FrontlineSMS User Guide: Data Integrity. M4Data: Beyond Mobile Security will feature discussion from practitioners, technology designers, and international development professionals about tools, approaches, and best practices to implementing quality mobile programs.

Date: Tuesday, August 9, 2011 Time: 10:00- 11:30am Location: SAIS Bernstein-Offit Building room 500, 1717 Massachusetts Ave, NW Washington DC

Speakers

  • Jon Gosier, metaLayer, Inc.
  • Paul Goodman, Development Seed
  • Sean Martin McDonald, FrontlineSMS
  • Kristen Batch, Internews (moderator)

Download a pdf version of the invite here.

FrontlineSMS brings mobile tools to new audiences

caption id="attachment_7443" align="alignright" width="300" caption="'Doing' the FrontlineSMS empowerment logo \o/ "] Our latest FrontlineSMS e-newsletter is out now, and shows that it has been another packed few months at FrontlineSMS!

Our newsletter comes out every few months, and provides an update on FrontlineSMS community news and our upcoming activities. You can subscribe to our e-newsletter on the right hand side of the screen, and you can now read the latest edition online, which includes:

Take a read of our latest e-newsletter here to find out more. And don't forget, you can subscribe to our e-newsletter on the right hand side of the screen, if you'd like to receive our updates straight to your inbox!

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Researching FrontlineSMS use at radio stations in Kenya

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Re-posted from FrontlineSMS:Radio blog

FrontlineSMS:Radio is being developed and deployed in collaboration with the Centre of Governance and Human Rights (CGHR) at the University of Cambridge. This partnership represents a unique opportunity to gather evidence about how audiences interact with radio stations via SMS and how these interactions can affect their participation in public affairs. CGHR are utilising this opportunity to research whether and how innovations in Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are enriching citizen-led governance in Africa, in particular through the combination of radio and SMS.

Entitled, New Communications Technologies and Citizen-led Governance in Africa, the two-year CGHR research project is now well into its operative phase. Between July and September, CGHR’s research team will start conducting fieldwork in Kenya and Zambia to critically analyse how technology is being utilised on the ground. Working closely with local radio stations, the project will seek to capture how information flows through local networks and how new communication technologies, such as mobile phones, interact with older ones. It will also set out to analyse how the hybrid of mobile phones and the radio fit together in long term patterns of use of communication for political participation.

Read more on the FrontlineSMS:Radio blog

allAfrica.com: Climate Information Alerts Boost Poor Farmers in Zambia

allAfrica.com has published a guest post today, by Riedner Mumbi and Polly Ghazi, about the work of RANET (Radio and Internet for the Communication of Hydro-Meteorological Information), who are considering use of FrontlineSMS in Zambia.

Below is an extract of the post. To read the full post visit allAfrica.com.

"As climate change intensifies, bringing more extreme weather, as well as seasonal and longer-term changes, effective adaptation for rural regions of Africa will depend on timely and accurate advance information. Early warnings will enable farmers to shelter their animals and protect their income and families. In addition, the collection and distribution of local rainfall information can help smallholder farmers to adjust their crop production methods to changing seasonal precipitation patterns.

The Zambian government has been one of the first in Africa to recognize this need. Through its RANET (Radio and Internet for the Communication of Hydro-Meteorological Information) Project, the Zambia Meteorological Department is tapping remote communities across several provinces to collect climate information. In the past four years, some 3,060 farmers have been provided with rain gauges to take rainfall measurements which are then fed back to the meteorological service's local weather stations through mobile phones. Farmers are also encouraged to report other local weather observations. To motivate farmers taking part, RANET periodically recharges their phones with free airtime, and project managers are now testing the FrontLine SMS software to help minimize the service cost."

Read the full post at allAfrica.com.

Kelly Sponberg from RANET has previously written a guest post for the FrontlineSMS blog, about RANET using FrontlineSMS in their work. Click here to read this post.

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Innovation in practice: Family planning via SMS

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Florence Scialom, FrontlineSMS Community Support Coordinator, speaks with Esha Kalra, Georgetown University’s Institute for Reproductive Health (IRH) Programme Associate

It is difficult to bring an innovative idea to life, without first proving its potential in practice; there is a need to demonstrate on a small scale that something actually works before it can make a big difference. FrontlineSMS can be used as a tool in this process - as a free and easy to use software it can be used to test a concept before an investment is made in any costly software development.

Georgetown University’s Institute for Reproductive Health (IRH) is a global organisation dedicated to improving reproductive health worldwide, and they have been able to test the value of their latest m-health initiative using FrontlineSMS. This m-health service, called CycleTel™, empowers women by providing accessible reproductive health information via SMS. I recently spoke with Esha Kalra, India-based IRH Programme Associate, to find out more about CycleTel, and the value IRH gained through using FrontlineSMS.

As IRH explains, “CycleTel facilitates use of the Standard Days Method® (SDM), a fertility awareness-based method of family planning based on a woman’s menstrual cycle. Appropriate for women who usually have menstrual cycles between 26 and 32 days long, SDM identifies days 8 through 19 as the fertile days. To prevent pregnancy, the couple avoids unprotected sex on these days.” By making this fertility information accessible via SMS, CycleTel empowers women to have more control over their reproductive health. “We found the process straight forward and easy to explain to women who participated in testing the service,” Esha told me, explaining her experience of managing one of CycleTel’s testing phases.

IRH used FrontlineSMS to support two phases of manual testing of the CycleTel concept, in Lucknow and New Delhi, both in India. For the first phase in Lucknow, 30 women were selected to participate in the trial, and in the second phase in New Delhi the number of participants rose to 90 women. Esha was responsible for managing a number of the study’s components, including operating FrontlineSMS during the second phase in New Delhi. Esha explained to me that she very quickly picked up the variety of FrontlineSMS functionalities which could serve the needs of the project. “I do not come from a technical background, but I found messages easy to organise and send, using the group and key word functionality. In addition, the data we collected was easy to manage because we were able to regularly export it from FrontlineSMS,” Esha explained.

A notable step taken by IRH to get staff accustomed with FrontlineSMS was to create a project manual ahead of using the software. This manual drew content in part from information in the FrontlineSMS help files, but it was tailored by IRH to suit CycleTel’s programme needs. Esha described the value of this, stating that, “it really helped to have everything documented before the start of project; the manual laid out how to use FrontlineSMS to meet our project requirements and made project management much easier.” It was this forward planning on the part of IRH, combined with ease of use of FrontlineSMS that led the project to its initial success.

There have been positive proof-of-concept results from this test phase – with the majority of test users saying that they would like to continue to use the service and would recommend it to a friend. The formative research using FrontlineSMS, and especially the feedback from test users, was absolutely essential to determine the potential scope of the CycleTel service. As a result of CycleTel’s formative research results, IRH decided to pursue customised software development to automate the service. For IRH, being able to test CycleTel using FrontlineSMS proved to be a critical step in the iterative process they are now taking from concept to scale.

IRH are currently working with us to produce a full case study on their use of FrontlineSMS, so keep an eye on our blog for further details on this coming soon!

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Malaria Outbreak: An Interactive FrontlineSMS Simulation at George Mason University

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span style="font-weight: normal;">Guest post by Will Chester, TechChange

“TJ said his body feels like it's on fire! Hurry!” Shouts like this one echoed through the halls of George Mason University as ten School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution (S-CAR) students participated in a simulated malaria outbreak as part of their Technology for Peacebuilding course facilitated by TechChange. The goal of the simulation was to provide students hands-on experience using FrontlineSMS software.

Simulation

TechChange staff built the simulation around an existing case study of a FrontlineSMS implementation currently underway to track the spread of malaria in Cambodia. The staff sought to mimic many challenges present in the field in order to get students to think critically about both the great advantages and limitations of using technology like FrontlineSMS in crisis response.

Students were given a basic overview of malaria symptoms and risk factors and then the class was broken into three groups. Each group was equipped with a computer running FrontlineSMS using a GSM modem, which allowed them to send and receive text messages. Groups were responsible for engaging three sick residents, performing an assessment of each resident's situation, and deciding on an overall treatment plan specifying which patients should receive medication (and in what order) based on information the group was able to collect from those residents or a public health worker in the field.

Residents

The three residents were spread out on a different floor from the groups and were instructed to convey varying degrees of sickness and proximity to water (a known risk-factor for malaria transmission) to the groups. All residents in the simulation had access to cell phones.

  • Resident One – High risk – Resident One lived near a water source, complained of a fever and a headache, but was unwilling to provide information to the health workers. He was only marginally literate, but would take medicine if it was administered to him directly.
  • Resident Two – Medium to high risk - Resident Two lived near a water source, complained of a fever, but not of a headache. He was willing to share information with the health workers, and would take medicine only if the health worker observed him taking it.
  • Resident Three – Low risk – Resident Three did not live near a water source, did not have a fever or a headache, but had severe gastrointestinal (GI) pain. He was very communicative and would take any medicine administered to him.

Under ideal circumstances groups would administer medication to Resident One and Two, but not Resident Three. This variation was built into the simulation to challenge the groups to think critically about their responses rather than simply medicating as many residents as possible. This is especially important for diseases like Malaria that have drug-resistant strains, and in situations where the treatment itself can be harmful or where medicine might be in short supply.

Strategy

Text messaged reports from the field began rolling in as groups developed surveys and strategies to determine the health status of each resident. Groups also communicated with their public health worker to assess their progress and alert them to any information they received from the residents directly.

Groups quickly recognized their need for a set of guidelines and best practices for their use of FrontlineSMS. One group decided to focus on preventive education and sent welcome texts to the residents encouraging them to abide by good health and sanitation practices. Another group sought to streamline their communications by introducing a numeric scale for fever and pain that shortened the text messages and made them easier to process.

In the end, Resident One received medication from only one group, meaning two groups’ approaches were unable to treat the highest risk patient effectively.  All three groups successfully treated Resident Two, but also decided to treat Resident Three, the lowest-risk resident. Although none of the groups reached the optimal solution for the simulation, they all gained valuable experience with FrontlineSMS and the complexities of program design.

Reflections

Simulations are great platforms for learning tech – After the simulation, students expressed that they greatly enjoyed the activity because it was a practical, hands-on, and interactive way to learn about FrontlineSMS. They all appreciated learning how to use the software in a fun engaging and intense manner such as this.

Technology does not obviate need for good program design – All of the groups were able to leverage FrontlineSMS to enhance their programs, rather than relying too heavily on the technology alone. Students did a great job following up with residents after sending text messages and ensuring that FrontlineSMS was used to streamline communications, but not replace the human element of their program.

Parting Thoughts

As this was TechChange's first live-action FrontlineSMS simulation there were many lessons learned, which we are looking forward to incorporating into future simulations (Read about our Ushahidi Afghanistan Election Monitoring Simulation). Free lesson plans will be available on the TechChange website in the coming weeks. TechChange is excited to design and deliver more simulations as part of workshops or courses to organizations and universities. For more information visit http://techchange.org/

TechChange also has three online certificate courses this fall for those who want to learn more about FrontlineSMS and other tech strategies and tools: