Barcamp Madagascar

The first BarCamp Madagascar took place last Saturday, October 4th, in the capital city of Antanarivo with great success. One of the organizers, (@jogany on Twitter) is guestblogging for us, sharing some of her thoughts and impressions on the BarCamp Madagascar that we hope will inspire our discussions next Saturday:

Starting a Barcamp was an opportunity to showcase our skills and abilities to the world in the field of technology but also to prove to ourselves, as the very active but isolated Malagasy tech community, that we are taking part in the development of our country. Since Madagascar is not going to be connected with high-speed internet until early 2009, the best place to promote and hire participants for an “unconference” was elsewhere than online.

So we had a “one-by-one” approach and took the time to meet personally each participant before the Big Day to discuss with them the challenges and expectations we were all hoping to get from the Barcamp. Within few days, the list extenteded itself from activist open source developers “hiding” in the cosy town of Fianarantsoa, to a blogger from Majunga who used pictures taken from a mobile phone and a podcast to give medical treatment to a baby, to high-school students training for the 2009 programers Olympics in Bulgary and to a brilliant and altruistic developer who has been working alone and looking for help on a Malagasy MySpell project for 3 years.

We asked everyone to bring their geeky t-shirts and sandwiches to this free stage. With the internet connection offered by Madagascar’sfirst internet service provider, we expected the discussions to be very heated starting by the reactions this type of sponsorship would spark. The Web 2.0, a concept that has been studied through its technical aspects but also by demonstrating new projects focused on social networking, is still very unknown in a country where only 20,000 people have access to the internet and 72% are living on 1$ a day. Educating and Developing were some of the topics largely discussed by the participants who never hesitated to take control of a panel. Trying to find solutions together to lower the costly .mg domain name so that locals can really appropriate/afford it; elaborate partnerships between globally acclaimed translators and Linux developers to make an authentic Malagasy dictionary on technology words; joining forces to create a 3rd voice between the governement and powerful businesses and get involved in the drafting of Malagasy internet regulation laws (on infrastructures and content).

Later, we asked the attendees their thoughts on this memorable day, and one of the answers that will definitely motivate us to plan a second Barcamp Madagascar was:

With only 18,000 spots at Malagasy universities available for 30,000 youths, it is a necessity to start sharing as openly and freely as possible so everyone will know that a new generation is ready to take over the country.

Following BarCamp Madagascar

-BarCamp Madagascar Twitter summary: http://search.twitter.com/search?q=Barcamp_MDG
-Flickr Tag: Barcamp_MDG
-BlipTV: Foko, Barcamp_MDG
-BarCamp Madagascar Wiki: http://www.barcamp-madagascar.net/doku.php
-BarCamp Madagascar Blog: http://www.barcamp-madagascar.net/antananarivo

Participants & Sessions

- Diana Chamia: Blogging made one of my dreams come true : helping the others.
- Avylavitra: How to use Citizen Media to promote democracy in Madagascar?
- Pierre Maury: Bibliothèque Electronique Malgache
- Jentilisa: Global Voices Online Malagasy
- Tosoa Sifaka: Let’s speak Lojban
- Pati: Attending GIYS, 2008. Brussels with Rising Voices
- Hery-Zo Rakotondramanana: web 2.0 applications
- Mahefa Randimbiason - Malagasy Spell Checker
- Robe: Hi Tao, new Malagasy community news gates
- Fy: Eboons.com, a new way to use social networking
- Njaka: Salon Ebit, Journées de la Jeunesse
- Ariel Elyah - How to promote your website all over the internet?
- Joan Razafimaharo: What about starting Creative Commons Madagascar?

Open Source Developers : 
- AMUL, Malagasy Association of Open Softwares 
http://www.amul.mg 
- C3LF, Fiananrantsoa Open Softwares developers 
c…@univ-fianar.mg 
- Madagascar au Temps TIC 
http://www.oi-mada.org 
- Madagascar NTIC 
http://www.madagascar-ntic.org/ 

Dina Randrianarivo (AMUL)- web 2.0 tools 
Haja Ramboasalama  (AMUL)- IXP, Why not? 
Aina Rakotovao (C3LF) - Sécurité sous Linux 
Ratombotsoa Marc Fiderana (C3LF) - Why use Open Softwares? 
Ravonimanantsoa Ndaohialy Manda-vy (C3LF)- GPL 
Tombomora Chancelin (C3LF)- Nessus 
Randriamahefa nomenjanahary (C3LF)- MONO Dot NET under Linux 
Rakotondranaivo Haja (C3LF)- Managing an environment with Open Source   
Tools 
Tahina Raselison (Madagascar au Temps TIC)- Madagascar’s participation   
to Youth developers Olympias 2009