Mobile telephony - cooperation and value-added are key to further success

The current problems in mobile telephony are leading critics to make overly pessimistic predictions that 3G – the third-generation mobile phone system – will never become profitable. However, the resulting calls not to introduce 3G and instead directly back alternative wireless technologies (e.g. WLAN) are a step too far. Ultimately, a profit- oriented service can only create significant value-added with a mix of both 3G and WLAN technologies. It is notable that no attractive broadband-dependent applications have emerged as yet. The typical user is only interested in the value-added the application provides, not the underlying wireless technology. Although mobile telephony remains one of the most dynamic areas of the economy, euphoria is misplaced. Advanced wireless technologies will on no account become profitable before the start of the next decade. But even that is not a given; this will challenge the entrepreneurial spirit of network operators, mobile terminal manufacturers and service providers alike.ICT, IT, mobile, telephony, UMTS, WLAN

Infrastructure regulation and poverty reduction in developing countries: a review of the evidence and a research agenda

Poverty reduction is a primary goal of development policy. In large parts of the World people have to live on meagre incomes and have limited access to infrastructure services, such as mains water, safe sanitation, mains power supplies, maintained roads and telephones. In response, more and more infrastructure provision has been opened up to private investment over the last two decades and regulatory institutions have been introduced to protect the public interest in the absence of state ownership. In this paper the role of infrastructure regulation in poverty reduction is investigated drawing on the published evidence. The conclusion is that the evidence is both patchy and sometimes contradictory. There is mixed knowledge regarding the extent to which regulators address poverty issues and about the results of regulatory decisions. The paper concludes by proposing a future research agenda aimed at improving our understanding of the ways in which infrastructure regulation impacts on poverty, with the objective of improving actual regulatory policy in developing economies

UN Global Pulse: Annual Report 2013

Through public-private partnerships, innovative analysis and the development of open-source methodologies, Global Pulse is strengthening public sector capacity to leverage digital Big Data for development and resilience. This report provides a brief overview of advances made during 2013

The TESSA OER Experience: Building sustainable models of production and user implementation

This paper offers a review of the origins, design strategy and implementation plans of the Teacher Education in Sub-Saharan Africa (TESSA) research and development programme. The programme is working to develop new models of teacher education, particularly school based training, including the creation of a programme webspace and an extensive bank of Open Educational Resources. This paper identifies key research findings and literature which informed the TESSA approach and activity design. Drawing on participant experiences in different development activities and data generated in development testing activities, I offer a personal account of the programme to date. The paper concludes by suggesting a pattern of resource making and design that could be adopted by other programmes serving parallel development needs

The fostering of innovative eLearning strategies in European higher education

Although there are strong attempts being made by various European observatories and European Commission programmes to identify and disseminate innovative eLearning practices (MENON, 2006), the factors that determine educational effectiveness are, as yet, not well understood. In particular, while an extraordinarily wide range of university-level eLearning programmes are rapidly becoming available from large numbers of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) across Europe, the sharing of good practice requires detailed accounts of successful innovative eLearning strategies. There are many relevant checklists and sets of principles described in EU websites (e.g. elearningeurope.info, 2006) and in the academic literature (e.g. Conole et al, 2004), but it is often only through thoroughly appreciating what others have done that such abstract guidance come alive. However, it can still be difficult for HEIs to learn from others. While there are many media reports of innovation, these typically have to omit the level of detail that would enable optimal understanding by those HEIs wishing to apply such innovations in their own contexts. Meanwhile, case studies presented at conferences and in the academic literature can provide the necessary level of detail, but it can be difficult to collate such case studies into a form that facilitates consistent descriptions across the diversity of European HEIs. By identifying the various eLearning programmes applied by HEIs in a number of EU member states and conducting a detailed assessment of a sample of eLearning strategies found to be effective supporters of higher education requirements, the EC-funded InnoUniLearning project is disseminating a range of eLearning strategy case studies. Where possible this project is estimating the potential impact of the implemented eLearning programmes, but more importantly it will identify and detail the strategies applied by leading institutions and well-known success stories, as well as those institutions that have applied new and innovative eLearning programmes. It is hoped that the dissemination of these case studies will be of assistance to HEIs across Europe in implementing eLearning strategies that meet their own particular curricular and cohort requirements. The study is concentrating on illuminating a range of successful eLearning strategy cases, rather than necessarily determining best practice, which could be argued an impossible task at the moment because of a lack of learner feedback. Nevertheless, most, if not all, organisations that have implemented eLearning have gone through a period of adjustment in order to obtain an eLearning programme that is cost-efficient and effective; so capturing something of the challenges overcome by the HEIs leading this field should assist the wider EU higher education community. This paper describes background and the methodological approach of the two-year study and some preliminary results, which will be elaborated in the conference presentation

The evolution of anti-circumvention law

Countries around the world have since 1996 updated copyright laws to prohibit the circumvention of "Technological Protection Measures", technologies that restrict the use of copyright works with the aim of reducing infringement and enforcing contractual restrictions. This article traces the legislative and treaty history that lies behind these new legal provisions, and examines their interaction with a wide range of other areas of law: from international exhaustion of rights, through competition law, anti-discrimination measures, regulation of computer security research, constitutional rights to freedom of expression and privacy, and consumer protection measures. The article finds that anti-circumvention law as promoted by US trade policy has interfered with public policy objectives in all of these areas. It picks out key themes from the free trade agreements, legislation and jurisprudence of the World Trade Organization, World Intellectual Property Organization, USA, EU member states, and South American, Asian and Australasian nations. There is now a significant movement in treaty negotiations and in legislatures to reduce the scope of anti-circumvention provisions to ensure their compatibility with other important policy objectives