I've just spent the last three hours participating in two breakout sessions on e-inclusion. I was the first speaker of the afternoon; I gave a history of the Digital Divide Network, as well as an overview of the November 2003 E-Government for All conference I coordinated, including a preview of the conference report, due out in a couple of weeks.
There were several interesting presentations during the afternoon. A representative from the Polish city of Gdansk talked about a program created by Poland's 12 largest cities, in which city governments are opening community e-government centers, or Internet Gates. These centers offer public Internet access and are staffed by people who can help local residents navigate e-government, such as applying for a license, pay taxes online or other government transaction. We also heard from representatives from the city of Ronneby, whom have developed a series of initiatives to provide public Internet access and local training, as well as making government websites accessible for people with disabilities. Like the government of Hong Kong, they're experimenting with an e-gov portal that has text-to-speech capabilities built into the website.
The most exciting session of the day so far was actually done by a pair of teenagers who work on a project called Youth Tech. It's a Swedish association of young people who want to use their Internet talents for social good; they do computer problem solving for senior citizens, as well as offer training seminars for policymakers so they have a better understanding of young people and their use of ICTs. One of the two teenagers talked about a related project called Girl Tech, in which girls who are intimidated by the high ratio of boys in technology clubs can participate in a girls-only program, learning skills ranging from digital animation, radio webcasting and video editing.
Now we're having a coffee break, and in a few minutes I'll be speaking during a plenary roundtable session. More later.... -andy