3rd IDIA Conference 2009
Digitally Empowering Communities: Learning from Development Informatics Practice
The 3rd IDIA Conference examined what development informatics practitioners had learned from real-world deployments of ICT in low-resource communities. The conference drew on case studies and theoretical contributions from researchers across Africa, Asia, and beyond.
Key Themes
- Community empowerment through digital access
- Lessons from telecentre and public internet access programmes
- Mobile technology adoption in rural communities
- Participatory design in ICT4D projects
- Sustainability challenges in development informatics practice
Important Deadlines (archived)
- Abstract submission: 14 March 2009
- Full paper submission: April 2009
- Notification of acceptance: June 2009
Legacy & Current Relevance
The questions IDIA 2009 posed about community empowerment through digital access remain as urgent today as they were fifteen years ago — only the geography has shifted. The telecentre model that dominated early ICT4D practice has largely given way to mobile-first and broadband-at-home approaches, but the underlying challenge of translating infrastructure investment into genuine community benefit is identical.
In North America, the $42 billion BEAD (Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment) programme faces precisely the sustainability questions IDIA 2009 researchers were wrestling with: how do you ensure that communities with newly built fibre networks actually adopt and benefit from broadband, rather than simply gaining proximity to infrastructure? The participatory design principles and community empowerment frameworks developed by IDIA researchers inform the most effective digital equity programmes operating today.
Conference Series
This was the third IDIA conference. See the full archive for all years. The next conference, IDIA 2010, was held in Cape Town.