3rd Social Good Summit, An event to discuss about technology and ideas to solve the challenges took place on 22 to 24 September all over the world. UNDP Bangladesh and Access to information, mostly known as a2i, were jointly organized the event here in Bangladesh this evening where we, me and Taher Chowdhury Sumon, CMO of DevsTeam Limited participated. The event was held in Karabi Hall at Prime Minister’s office.
Stefan Priesner, Country Director of UNDP Bangladesh kicked of things with a presentation which amongst issues talked about innovation for human development. Over 200 thought leaders, entrepreneurs and practitioners from the ICT and new media arena/sector gathered on this event to debate, discuss and share their thoughts around one common theme. Some participants shared their own ideas on how to tackle development problems using technology and social media to solve the challenges we, the Bangladeshis are facing for decades.
The Stage!
Photo collected from instagram, from Rezwan Bhai’s account!
Policy Adviser of Access to Information Anir Chowdhury said on his presentation, there are over 30 Thousands freelancers in Bangladesh who are earning over 20 million dollar every year. He mentioned Bangladesh is in top 3 outsourcing country and we are doing great on this billion dollar sector. (I personally glad to know the information, as we are working to create freelancer from Bangladesh!)
Fahim Mashroor from BASIS discussed about a very important topic, the lacking (and scope!) of business ideas behind most of the social initiatives. He exampled on content providing business over mobile phone (Which can be problem solving way!), we have only ringtones (Mostly the music or videos) and wallpapers (picture of hero heroin!) to grab over cellular network! Why we don’t have enough contents? The problem is, we don’t have any business scope on this sector. Content developers are only getting 10 percent of total revenues, where 90 percent revenues are being grabbed by mobile operators.
Jana from Somewhereinblog is talking about their platform. This photo is collected from Arif Nezami’s twitter!
There was also a lively and interactive open discussion where people shared their views and opinions on technology, ICT, Social Media, E-Education, E-Health and The new media. I liked the presentation of Riyad Hossain from Root Marketing; a smart guy presented the future impact of social media here in Bangladesh (Though he showed wrong information on how many people are searching for a specific keyword on Google from Bangladesh!).
Beside from the main event, I personally enjoyed the gossip with Zakaria Swapan Bhai, Nazmul Chowdury Sharun, Asif Anwar Pathik, Gulshan Ferdous Jana, Nurunnaby Hassib, Akramul Haque Shamim and so on. It was really an awesome day for me, also for Sumon Bhai!
About Al-Amin Kabir
Thanks Al-Amin Bhaiy for mentioning you liked my presentation. As far as the inaccurate information is concerned, my guess is that you meant when I said there are 300,000 searches per month from Bangladesh for the keyword Pregnancy. I agree with that! I said “the keyword pregnancy” but in my presentation it said “pregnancy related searches”. So pregnancy related searches can be thousands of different keyboards and that is actually 300,000 as I mentioned. But it was my slip of tongue for saying “the word pregnancy” 🙂 Well done for picking up on it 🙂
“Content developers are only getting 10 percent of total revenues, where 10 percent revenues are being grabbed by mobile operators” – maybe the second figure will be 90% 🙂
Corrected bro! Thanks for your comment! 🙂
Really Awesome..Missed it..I wish i could be there..But Every time the same reason Another City..Hope Some of these ideas they shared in the program will be implemented..
thanks for writing on the event. Two points from your post has drawn my attention . First “Why we don’t have enough contents on the web? ” Actually what types of content is meant here? Web content on mobile? or so called mobile content like ringtones, background etc?
If it is meant for web content , then it is we who have to create that. Our web is not yet matured . Hardly you will find information on the web that are created for local search by local web entrepreneurs . When we browse on the web we read staff created for all or for a specific region .
My second intake from your post :
I think the reasons why web is so matured in countries like USA , UK, Canada or other top countries from Asia as you will a lot of efforts from individuals . There almost everyone tries to be web entrepreneurs – either publishing his blog, creating a niche site or taking his offline business online . They create a lot of content for their target audience which make the web is very much created for web.It is true e-health , e-gov, or anything is good but not enough for having a web that are made for local.
Thanks for your comment Kashem Bhai. Here is answer for your mentioned topic.
1. It’s mobile content, which we can download from mobile operators wap portal or accessible via sms.
Yes, Agreed! They create lot of contents, And now we should create some awareness to do the same here in Bangladesh. I think you can take some initiative from BASIS to build awareness amongst youth generation. Of course we will be with you 🙂
can you please upload more pictures of the event.
Good and resourceful content for the web requires proper care. The local companies looking for the web contents want good contents in a short time. Informative contents need research and require reasonable time. There always should be a balance between key words repetition and the quality of the content. The payment they make is not very attractive that can inspire a content writer.