DAY ZERO fever

By Brenda Zulu

I asked people about what they learnt on Day Zero Web 2.0 fordev conference and what they where going to take home.

Prince Deh
GINKS Assistant Network Coordinator
Ghana

I am planning to host local language videos and translate the text in English because I realise that many people get my stories and information from the blog. Video blogging has enhanced my knowledge and sharing skills.
As you see people are attracted by video and they want to see and hear at the same time. I have learnt how to use delicious, wikis and tagging. One thing is that if you don’t tag your work not so many people will read about it.


William Eziniwa Nwangwu
Africa Regional Center for Information Science, Lecture
Nigeria

I have been wondering why Web 2.0? Isn’t it a new word for an old thing?
I have discovered how it is being used and sometimes it worries me as an academician. Some Universities in the USA have banned students giving reference to wikis as one of their sources of researched information. In wikis who is the author? Is the information peer reviewed? In my institution I limit the reference of wiki copies.


Makelesi Gonelevu, Anju Mangal - Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC), Fiji

We learnt about the potential of RSS feeds, wikis, tagging, blogging and the most interesting of all was the farmer blogging where farmers shared agricultural knowledge amongst themselves and also between experts. In the Pacific, we at SPC are trying to get farmers to access online agricultural information and have expert’s answers queries from the farmers.
Web 2.0 will enable us to implement the various ways of information sharing and collaboration between farmers and stakeholders. In the Pacific, we have to deal with accessibility issues and one of the main issues that we face is connectivity. Web 2.0 is an amazing tool; however, it may not work in the Pacific if we have accessibility issues. Low bandwidth is an issue and using vlogging can be a problem in terms of accessing online videos. We have discovered a lot on day zero and we hope to fully utilise Web 2.0

www.spc.int/lrd - SPC Land Resources Division website.

Mirjam Schaap, Wageningen International
I learnt about real relevant use of Web 2.0 tools for grassroots people (farmers, traders etc), the potential of bridging gaps between farmers / researchers. It was also interesting to have the impression that some people are concerned about a threat of use of Web 2.0 tools by ‘amateurs’ for the ‘professionals` (concerns about taxonomies, about traditional video professionals etc). I also learnt that some of the names I have come across online, actually are real people …, that they also exist outside cyberspace … Very nice to meet people in real life.
I loved the ‘online presentation’ and desktop sharing from Wageningen, and I got to know some handy tools which are used by others (desktop sharing, good cheap hosts, wordpress plugins etc.)
I really liked the energy during the day, and the willingness of everyone to share experiences.
I am still looking for tips on how to infect my colleagues with the Web 2.0 virus, how to convince my friends to share info using Web 2.0 tools, how to convince my colleagues to not just use text to communicate but also use video and audio. So on how to mainstream Web 2.0 tools use in my organisation and among our partners.
But we’ll have another 3 days of working together, and sharing and learning.