ITWeb recently reported that two South African Internet connectivity projects – Project Isizwe and Zenzeleni – made it into the semi-finals of Mozilla's US$250 000 Equal Rating Innovation Challenge, a global competition which seeks innovative ideas to bridge the digital divide across the world.

Mozilla is the non-profit organisation behind the open source browser Firefox. Its Equal Rating Innovation Challenge is an international initiative to help provide access to the open internet.

The organisation announced that South Africans Tim Human and Dr. Carlos Rey-Moreno, both residing in Cape Town, were two of the five semifinalist team leaders announced. Furthermore, Steve Song, a born South African who is now living in Canada, is among the final five.

Katharina Borchert, Mozilla's Chief Innovation Officer, and Marlon Parker, Founder of Reconstructed Living Lab (RLabs) and part of the Challenge's panel of judges, announced the semifinalists and discussed the trends that were seen across submissions at an event held at RLabs in Cape Town on 17 January.

Borchert provided ITWeb Africa with some insight into the level of innovation and key characteristics of projects and solutions submitted for the competition.

She said digital literacy featured prominently as did consideration for the unbanked and undocumented,

"There seemed to be a feeling that solutions for the people would come from the people, not governments or corporations. There was a strong trend for service solutions to disintermediate traditional commercial relationships and directly connect buyers and sellers. In media-centric solutions, the voice of the people was as important as authoritative sources. User generated content in the areas of local news was popular, as was enabling a distribution of voices to be heard," she said.

Internet access

According to Borchert the issue of more widespread access to the Net and overall improvement in digital literacy in Africa is complex and multidimensional, and why there is no one-size-fits-all solution.

She refers to reports from McKinsey, Brookings and the World Economic Forum that mention barriers such as lack of relevant content and services, lack of cultural or social acceptance, low income and affordability, user capability and limited access to international bandwidth, underdeveloped national core IT network, as well as limited spectrum availability.

"Also we would argue that existing approaches may be too centered on massive infrastructure solutions that are cost prohibitive, or too focused on affordability where users may be forced to make unattractive compromises. Capabilities (digital literacy) and incentives get a lot less attention. Put another way, what are the local solutions that actually help bring people online after you light up the fibre, build the tower, etc.? Mozilla believes the kind of change we need is part technology, part open systems, part business, and part human will and ingenuity to get things done. It's an area where we believe the power of decentralised solutions developed by people in the field solving problems can play a huge role if they can find, connect, and support each other," said Borchert.

The company believes there is no 'silver bullet' that will connect the next billion people in Africa and globally to open the internet.

"Which is why we've designed the Challenge to galvanise innovation, broaden the discourse, and advocate for sustainable solutions that serve local needs. In particular, we were welcoming proposals that build on local knowledge and expertise. Because who are we to say what works best? We rely on local problem solvers - and by this we not only refer to "experts" - to better understand the barriers to access that users face today. What are the kind of experiences users want? How and why do people use the Internet differently when their data is not subsidised? What is the gap in locally relevant content?," Borchert added.

Mozilla received 98 submissions from 27 countries, and confirmed a disproportionately high number of submissions from Africa.

This speaks to the level of engagement but also of the seriousness and quality with which people here think and innovate around the topic of connectivity said Borchert.