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U

Uvania

University of Cape Town
Masters student
South Africa
I am currently completing my Masters in Intellectual Property in Digital Media at the University of Cape Town. My research involves Open Access in developing nations, with a particular focus on Africa. I am investigating ways to unite emerging technologies in Africa with access to information. Wikipedia Text, developed by the Praekelt Foundation in Cape Town, was launched in Kenya a few months ago and the idea behind this platform is to make access to Wikipedia feature-phone friendly and free. With this initiative in mind I hope to work with developers to make OA journals available in the same way. Open Access in Africa is preceded by difficulties of access and a means by which we could circumvent these cost and infrastructure issues is if we stop trying to aspire to the global-north technological sphere and rather adapt the technologies available in Africa to the needs of people. Access to information is vital, however from an educational perspective access to citable information is more important which is why OA journals need to be functionalised for feature phones. Furthermore, I will be presenting this topic as a workshop at OpenCon this November.

After attending the Berlin 11 Satellite Conference last year I realised that the narrative around OA in Africa is very different to developed nations. My hope to is get a sense of effective technologies in other African countries, as well as the various developing nations present in the room so that we can collaborate on ways to make OA journals accessible via the platforms available to those with the least access worldwide. My role as a member of the Open Access Africa Committee has helped me develop a sense of the difficulties different African nations face in terms of access. My fellow committee members and I will continue to work together to find new ways of solving the problem of inaccess in our various countries, and hope that our presence at OpenCon this year will create awareness around the vast access difficulties faced by African countries and other developing nations.

See you there!

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