Presenters
Nikhila Nandgopal, Founder
Social Entrepreneurship Club
Professor Charles Schweik
Jeremy Smith
Scott McCullough
Pamela Eisner
Danielle Bermingham
Brittany Leland
Time: TBA
Location: TBA
Description
Over 4 billion people do not have any access to the internet. Numerous organizations emphasize the role of the internet in providing information that can improve economic development and entrepreneurship in an economy. However, governments are faced with high costs and a lack of infrastructure when attempting to provide internet access to their residents.
This presentation demonstrates a work-flow designed to improve educational resources into areas of the world that lack internet access, as well as offers the opportunity to utilize technology implemented in Malawi through an interactive workshop. The World Librarians bridges the digital divide by providing open access information through a process titled Commons-based Peer Production. Peer Production means that people from a variety of organizations can participate in our project. World Librarians partnered with ShiftIT, a Malawi based non-profit and World Possible, a global non-profit, to develop a work-flow based on a Requester, Courier, and Searcher model, which allows institutions with internet to share content with those that do not via an entity in the Requester’s region. World Librarians believes that the sharing of educational resources through a democratic demand-based information sharing system is the solution to the digital divide.