mobile

Data @ IFRC #6: Social Data, Mobile Data Collection Workshop

[ed. note: Data @ IFRC is a blog series to share highlights from data-driven Red Cross Red Crescent national societies, learning opportunities and thought pieces on all things data from ethics to evidence.]

What resources and frameworks can we draw on to build a data-driven organization? Fortunately on this journey, I have had the opportunity to meet many colleagues working on a variety of thematic areas around the globe. Just in the past week I found myself in a room of civil society data and security leaders, health practioners (community event-based health surveillance) in Geneva with the Norwegian Red Cross, Canadian Red Cross and more, a roadtrip with the American Red Cross to visit a software provider and now I’m in Kenya learning from leaders from across the continent of Africa. Truly, late December will be for distilling and napping.

Mobile Data Collection Training Workshop in Asia (Philippines)

There are many mobile data collection projects and tools used across all the IFRC network. My colleague Miki Tsukamoto recently co-hosted a workshop to collect best practices with many National Societies including Australian Red Cross, Bangladesh Red Crescent Society, the Hong Kong Branch of Red Cross Society of China, Mongolian Red Cross Society, Myanmar Red Cross Society, New Zealand Red Cross, Pakistan Red Crescent Society, Philippines Red Cross, Vanuatu Red Cross and the Vietnam Red Cross Society.

Field exercise in Katuhatan (Valenzuela)

The workshop aimed to combine survey methods, processes and how to use the mobile data collection tool of preference selected by the region. Part of the workshop was practical user testing with a field exercise in Katuhatan (Valenzuela) They worked with volunteers to pilot the questionnaire. I think this is a fantastic way to share best practices in a collaborative way.

Resources everywhere

As we aim to build a data-driven organization, how can we collate relevant resources and obtain guidance both inside the Federation and in the wider networks? One of my core priorities is to create an IFRC Data Playbook. To achieve this goal, I am meeting with people across the Movement and engaging external partners/allies. Their input is invaluable as we co-create this resource. Last week at the Aspiration Non-Profit Software Development Conference, I had the opportunity to meet with a number of people working on Data Literacy topics. Two sessions provided some key questions to think about with data-driven project.

Progress check – (“doable, winnable and replicable”)
1. How can we tell we are making progress.
2. Barriers and Enablers in the Health of Shared Resources.

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The American Red Cross has been documenting their training materials online. If you are looking to learn more, take a look.(click here) We have a plan to aggregate the multiple data resources to help people on their data journey. This will be done in collaboration and with credit to any individual or organization.

How can we communicate better

Since I joined IFRC, one consistent message is how each team is working to change communications flow with communities. This means we need to understand how some people communicate. While not everyone is online or using social media, the numbers of people on Facebook is still growing. Last week they launched Facebook Community Help for emergencies. I think we can expect more companies to tackle this online.

What about Open Source to support humanitarian work?

Open Source technology supports the backbone of the internet and many organizations. There are a growing number of open source projects across the humanitarian field. Colleagues at ICTWorks created some tips to help guide you.

“Open source, at the end of the day, is one tool of many in increasing impact for stakeholders. Its popularity across all industries and governments is tied to its ability to build faster, smarter technologies. However, building open source in a sustainable way requires approaching it from a developer’s perspective, especially in building a healthy community around any project.”

Read the full article here.

Photos can support your data mission: Climate Change

Data is just part of the story. How can we show impact to augment the data story? The National Geographic shared a series of photos on the impact of Climate Change. Take a look (Click here.)

Information requests

Do you have a data story from the Federation? Please share!

15Jul

You can MapSwipe!

Every day we use our phones. We tap, we read, we photograph, we chat, we view, and we connect. But wait! What if your ‘tapping’ time could help a humanitarian? Queue MapSwipe.

mapswipe_lockup_whiteblue larger

Your quick tapping decisions about images could save mappers time and help the most vulnerable. Satellite imagery for project regions are added to MapSwipe. Then, we give you project tasks focused on looking for key items. For example some projects will look for houses, if you see a house in a tile, you tap once for yes (tile turns green), if you are unsure you tap twice (tile turns yellow) or if the tile is flawed (blurry), then you tap three times (tile turns red). Multiple people look at the tiles so that we can crowdsource to higher accuracy. Once the project is completed, we share the curated data with mappers who will review and map the data on OpenStreetMap. All of this is to help humanitarians have the best map possible.

MapSwipe main project screen “In a humanitarian crisis, the location of the most vulnerable people is fundamental information for delivering food, shelter, medical care and other services where they are most needed. And, although it may be hard to believe, millions people around the world are not represented on any accessible map.” (Pete Masters, Missing Maps Coordinator, MSF, July 14, 2016)

MapSwipe is available today on the Google Play and Itunes stores. Download and MapSwipe Today!

MapSwipe is a Missing Maps project aimed to proactively map the places in the world where the most vulnerable people live before a crisis happens. Missing Maps is a partnership between Medecins sans Frontieres, American Red Cross, British Red Cross, Netherlands Red Cross, CartoONG, and Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team.

Please share MapSwipe widely with your friends and family. And, do let us know how we can improve. Help bit counts!

About MapSwipe Team and Project

MapSwipe was funded by MSF UK for the Missing Maps Project. Currently, all projects are for Missing Maps partners, but this might change in time. The tool was developed by an amazing team. Congratulations Ivan, Pim, Sadok, Alison, Pete, Astrid and Bennie. You all inspire me. (Note: My contribution of advisor was on my personal time as a proud Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team Board Member. )

Imagery is provided by Bing (Thanks Microsoft!).

Thanks for Mapswipe be a mobile volunteer with mapswipe

3Feb

Social Media and Humanitarian Response

[Ed. note: This is the full article submitted to the World Economic Forum report. Thanks to Shannon Dosemagen and Claire Wardle for their editorial guidance]

People use social media during emergencies. The speed and volume of online information is increasingly overwhelming to humanitarians. Digital humanitarians and individuals have organized into skilled teams to decypher the signal to the noise as well as seek valid, accurate and actionable data. These teams work in parallel to humanitarians with digital forensics, mapmaking, data mining, curation and conversations. Communication is aid and social media is part of this toolset. The complexities of privacy, power and access are just some of the gray areas as humanitarians and communities work to help those in need.

Introduction

Seeking to “do something”, more and more people are answering the call to action with each emergency. Digital responders or “digital humanitarians” log online at the speed of news spreading. Individuals and teams “activate” based on skillsets of volunteer and technical communities (VTCs). These digital responders use their time, online or technical skills as well as their personal networks in attempt to help with information overload. The terms often used to define these contributors in the humanitarian space includes remote help, citizen engagement, citizen response, localized community, civil society and global civic technology. Some participants are new to online humanitarian response, but have found a topic or location that drives their passion to get involved. This surge of participants is often just as chaotic as the actual physical emergency response. People are compelled, at a dizzying pace, by the fact that many parties require valid, urgent and actionable data. Focused on the needs of the citizens in the affected areas, informal and formal networks collaborate and sometimes collide in the effort to make sense, identify needs or stories and action this user-generated content. With a combination of will and skill, they create updated maps, datasets, information products and, even, communities (both online and offline networks). The global growth of these activities is based on access to information, connectivity and language skills as well as digital literacy levels. There are efforts to become more inclusive while respecting local language, culture and knowledge. The mantra by most digital responders is “support” not “supplant” local citizens, humanitarians and emergency responders.

The role of digital communities in humanitarian response has been well documented from the UN Disaster 2.0 report to the rise of the CrisisMappers Network and beyond. A starting point might be the use of online bulletin boards (BBS) and mailing lists in responses to Tsunami in Asia followed by a parallel timeline for most small and large humanitarian and conflict crisis since 2004. The tools and volume change over time, but the propensity to connect and potentially help occurs with each incident. The fact is that every day there is a local or global emergency (slow onset or immediate), and there is a flood of online communications (social and messaging) that follows immediately afterwards. The amount of news and citizen data saturates online spaces with such speed that accuracy and priority items become a blur. This user-generated content comes in many forms: text, photos, aerial and satellite imagery, video, and more. Digital responders learn and refine techniques with each response.

Humanitarians and citizens are overwhelmed by the speed of change and the onslaught of information.

In the five years since the Haiti earthquake, there has been a steady progression of change. There is resistance to incorporating social media into humanitarian information workflows. Often, this is due to process changes, trust, accuracy and fear of change. People who create user-generated content (UGC) are often considered outliers and have not yet gained the trust of leaders within official institutions. And, having people in the affected regions use these tools to help each other or ask for help changes the information flow from one way to two-way. Humanitarian institutions simply change at a slow pace. These institutions also have a low capacity to review information outputs or the funds to incorporate UGC into their process. Plus, they often do not understand the tools and techniques by which these online/offline communities connect. The conundrum is that UGC and citizens are simply changing faster. As such this gap is being tested and often fulfilled in new ways.

Across the world there are branded hubs, labs, fellowships, meetings, conferences and research, (so much research!). Governments, International Non-Governmental Organizations (INGOs), Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) are all working on various projects. How can these new voices and communities become part of the humanitarian apparatus? From Unicef Innovation to Ihub Nairobi to Kathmandu Living Labs to UN Global Pulse Jakarta, there many new spaces to observe and create solutions. There is a parallel stream with the Code for All community and other civic technology or humanitarian technology/research communities who aim to connect software developers, data scientists and designers to solve hyperlocal issues with official organizations. Code for All has grown from United States to Japan and beyond. Their goal is to connect local communities and governments with digital technologies and problem solvers for all issues. The intersection of these two movements is inevitable in risk prone areas.

What is the scope of these Digital Response communities and how effective are their efforts?

The Digital Humanitarian Network consists of many groups, from those that create maps, like Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team, to those who curate social information like Humanity Road and Standby Task Force to bridging language skills via Translators without Borders. Ranging from small tasks to big asks, digital responders coalesce during an emergency. Over 2800 people contributed to Nepal Earthquake response with small tasks like MicroMappers by making quick decisions about text or images. These curated information insights were used by over 250 organizations to make decisions about various needs for the response, including damage assessments and aid distribution. The UGC could be created by anyone, but someone needs to parse the data, find the key points and match these core items to needs and actions. In reviewing the IP addresses of contributors, Qatar Computing Research Institute observed that the majority of these digital MicroMapper helpers were from northern countries.

For the Nepal Earthquake Response, over 7500 people contributed to improve OpenStreetMap in a short span of time. OpenStreetMap is a the Wikipedia of maps creating a large free and open dataset which anyone can use. Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (a VTC) creates tools and training to support mapping for humanitarian response and economic development. The Nepal earthquake response was co-lead by Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team and Kathmandu Living Labs. Kathmandu Living Labs, started in 2013, creates local data and map solutions and partnerships, for Nepal. They have steadily built a local community of mappers trained in OpenStreetMap plus they mapped the country. Over the years, they have also built relationships with local partners from emergency responders to universities. When the Nepal Earthquake struck, they lost their office and a day’s work. Meanwhile, remote digital responders in the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT) community activated. HOT, with generous support of partners, obtained both pre- and post disaster satellite imagery to trace the regions of Nepal that might be affected.

Once Kathmandu Living Labs returned online, they worked very closely with the global and local community, which included responders like the American Red Cross, Canadian Armed Forces, Nepal Red Cross and Nepal Civil Defence. Mappers traced and created millions of edits for roads, infrastructure, helicopter pads, and potential emergency zones. The map products were then added to devices, printed and shared among responders to help with logistics and overall response. Humanitarians are collaborating side-by-side with digital responders and civic technology communities. The HOT Activation team advised the global community of mappers where to map based on official needs as directed by emergency managers as well as via Kathmandu Living Labs. Online communities are stitched together with local civic technology communities. They connected via skype, IRC (internet relay chat), Twitter, Facebook, G+, Instagram, mailing lists, websites, and wikis.

The networks, while informal, are all driven by the common vision of UGC for humanitarian response. Simply put, they move fast and have initiative to do the needful. For example, the OpenStreetMap Japan Foundation community translated the Guide to Mapping Buildings in Nepal from the Kathmandu Living Labs. So, one former disaster affected civic technology community activated to aid another transferring skills and supporting the digital need. No government or formal institution advised that this was required. People simply self-organized based on digital responder knowledge and the desire to help their digital neighbour. While the processes are not yet seamless, the gap between official and informal is closing with each response.

The World Humanitarian Summit, scheduled for May 2016, includes a consultation stream called “Transforming through Innovation”. The reports are glaring in their observations of NGO needs, power imbalances across the globe and, even, the desire for new technical skills to problem-solve. The Doha Youth Declaration for the World Humanitarian Summit consultation cited the need for more digital technology training, like the ones noted above. They cited a gap in training for civil society organizations across the globe, but especially in disaster risk areas. The Children and Youth Major Group has set up a working group to investigate implementation of digital training among other suggested outputs. In the months leading up to the summit there will be more reports analysis about innovation and scalability. Most of these are being shared widely via the WHS website or #ReShapeAid hashtag on twitter. But, the parallel system highlighting growth of digital responders can be found via hashtags like #civictech or website like Civicist or Code for All.

Despite the efforts of digital responders in the past five years, there is still also a gap in funding models. The skilled groups create tools, training and techniques which are increasingly invaluable to humanitarian needs. Yet, traditional donors do not consider them a right fit in NGO models, nor are they pure social entrepreneurs who can garner support from VCs or big business. A bright spot is that some NGOs are starting to get digital savvy by hiring data scientists/crisis informatics expertise (NetHope), GIS Professionals (eg. MSF, ARC) as well as software developers and social media curators. Plus there are programmes like Missing Maps that connect official organizations like HOT with MSF, American/British/Dutch Red Cross and CartONG to map the most vulnerable places in the world.

The Future

Community networks are blurred between offline and online. Social Media has become an essential service. People go online during all emergencies seeking information about “What is happening” and are their connections ok. Recently, the attacks in Paris, Beirut and Mali demonstrated that the pace and complexity of UGC is shifting more. The Facebook safety check is a tool that allows users to “check in” as “ok” in a specific affected area. This “check in” alerts individuals within a network. It is a newer feature widely used after the Nepal Earthquake. The surge of support to increase social sharing by key tools was demonstrated by online requests and the subsequent decision by Facebook to include Safety Notifications in conflict areas. After the Paris bombing, Facebook received overwhelming social response to make this feature available for more events across the world. Facebook agreed to open up this feature for more emergencies. There are questions about privacy of the individuals who use these tools during complex times. Data mining is part of Facebook’s revenue model with advertising. Digital Humanitarians are using social media tools for digital forensics to help affected communities and humanitarians. Concerns about who uses this data and for what purpose is ongoing. While the safety check is helpful on the surface, it could potentially put people in harm’s way.

Groupe Speciale Mobile Association (GSMA) reports cite the mobile use growth in the world. By simply overlaying a population map, it is clear that there is a correlation with youth populations. For affected communities and humanitarians alike, social media provides a massive shift in the information flow. New super skills will continue to build on the momentum to obtain and analyze aerial imagery for any digital response. Efforts will also continue to further the computational response by combining machine learning and human computing to parse massive datasets at high speed. It’s incredible to think about what will be possible in the very near future.

Three Challenges

At the moment, the vast majority of social media is available via public posts. But with huge growth in private Messaging tools like Whatsapp, how will digital response incorporate data from platforms like this?
In times of crisis, data becomes the lifeblood of managing humanitarian operations. But as access to data increases, how will people safeguard the privacy and security of those who need help?
What role should the main social platforms play during disasters? Can these social networks work together more closely to coordinate their responses?

9Dec

Delivering, Still Waiting

Harvard Humanitarian Initiative is hosting a Data and Technology Humanitarian Response Workshop this week. I’m delighted to attend on behalf of Qatar Computing Research Institute. This occasion gives me pause to reflect: Where is humanitarian technology going, what are the gaps, what are the new research questions, what is innovative, what needs remixing, what have we learned and what does implementation look like? Certainly, this burst of questions are not something a blog post can address. But, it is my expectation that smart people are working on these items and syncing up to collaborate is essential.

Humanitarian Innovation: Where is the parallel stream

In October, the World Humanitarian Summit held a Global Consultation in Geneva. There was an Innovation Marketplace with small NGOs, large NGOs, technology companies and Digital Humanitarians. Representing OpenAerialMap (OAM) on behalf of Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team, along with my colleague Nate Smith from Development Seed, I spent the day talking with our fellow presenters and some of the participants. A conference and marketplace/demonstration hall is never fully representative of what is happening globally in the field, but it was a snapshot of a certain view. Humanitarian Innovation Fund had a few of their successful projects demonstrating their work on exciting projects like 3D printing and our OAM (aerial imagery platform). There was a virtual reality space and some demonstrations. Catching up with Bob Marsh from Inveneo lit up this idea that parallel systems matter. I mention these small highlights because there was a distinct gap.

The Innovation Marketplace was not enough to actually represent or connect people doing true innovation in the field, including Humanitarian technology. Early summaries from the WHS cite more localized support and even digital training (the WHS Youth agenda). Where will the real work happen to 1. identify which innovations (specifically humanitarian technology) that need to be supported 2. build a plan to implement them. This is still super unclear for me. Innovators don’t wait for conferences or research papers to deliver. Sure, there is a keen eye on the high level conversations and a hope that there will be increased support for the various streams of activities. Negotiations will happen. People will write more reports. Yet, the world keeps turning. Simply put: some of the priorities, activities and innovations cannot wait for large NGOs and the UN to get on board. It is the hallways and community centers in small local spaces that will really do the shining.

If the observations and suggestions truly mean to deliver, it needs more strong support from business, NGOs, donors and you. Sitting in Geneva made me again realize that we need stronger parallel systems to succeed. We need a humanitarian technology roadmap. It would help to have local, multi-lingual side events online and in person focused on doing instead of more writing more reports. If we are really going to ReShapeAid, then it is time to dig in and build some true lightweight infrastructure to actually implement things that are needed. There are many activity streams which are truly critical with Transforming through Innovation is one small corner, but it is the corner I know well. Technology is not always the answer. But people use the internet, they create things and use their mobile phones. We need to reclaim “innovation” and “disruptive innovation“. In all the reports, bylines and marketing campaigns, it has gotten buried as a punchline rather than true grit. As Panathea Lee pointed out with User Centered Design, we need to be careful to not lose track of implementation and delivery.

Some of the research and implementation areas that I am excited about include: mobile (messaging), imagery (aerial, satellite), translation, citizen participation, edtech, citizen science, web of things, civic technology, open hardware, blockchain, and, of course, location. There are pockets of amazing innovation and technology coming from the UN and other organizations. But, we can do more with collaborative spaces. There is much to learn from the Open Source and Agile Startup models to really knock it out of the park on humtech (humanitarian technology). I am not stating that we hackathon our way to change, but the chasm between the technology communities, affected communities and humanitarians needs some strong coordinated planning and more delivering. How can we get more technology companies supporting the growth of humanitarian technology? If the humanitarian spaces and research institutes are slower, what are other ways to get things moving?

Example: Digital Technology & Digital Humanitarians (Responders)

Digital, volunteer/technology communities and civic technology communities are consistently delivering during emergencies. Some recent efforts include the Nepal earthquake, collaboration on the Ebola response and now the refugee crisis. There were many efforts that shine in this space of digital participation and response, but to name a bias few: Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team, Standby Task Force, Missing Maps, NetHope (Tableau collaboration), PeaceGeeks (Service Advisor) and Kathmandu Living Labs.

Impact examples:

Kathmandu Living Labs – Nepal Earthquake
Ebola response with Doctors without Borders (MSF), Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team, Missing Maps
PeaceGeeks Service Advisor for Refugee Support

There are many more articles, reports, research articles and the like on the impact of digital humanitarians. However, what is missing is the bridge between proof of concept and real concrete sustainable support.

For the past 5 years, many digital humanitarians/digital responders have worked/volunteered alongside humanitarians and the NGO machine. Truly it is a gift that all these people volunteer their time, energy and skills to assist on the information overload and citizen engagement gaps that new technology like social media opens. Reading all the World Humanitarian Summit reports on the goals, needs and suggestions, I keep asking the question around Humanitarian Innovations – What will implementation look like?

We are not looking for a free ride, but what is going to take to open this door?

Volunteer and Technical Organizations have proven their impact and considered essential to the humanitarian information workflow. Some of those organizations setup small NGOs to support the large volunteer bases with lightweight documentation, staff and servers. The collaborative spaces are organically growing. Civic technology communities globally are connecting inside the digital humanitarian communities. One of my favourite examples was the support from the Japanese civic technology community of the Nepal civic technology community after the Nepal Earthquake. The Nepal OpenStreetMap guide for identifying buildings was translated into Japanese to support remote mapping efforts.

Considering the small corner of potential that humanitarian technology can deliver for affected communities and humanitarians, it is time to rethink how we can collaborate using the best of minds, best of technology and some sheer grit. We need spaces like the Digital Humanitarian Network in many parts of the world with local language, local knowledge and local culture. While digital humanitarians is one example, there are many other humanitarian innovations that do not get the financial support they need to really succeed. The donor model is set up for traditional NGOs. Some of these digital organizations don’t completely qualify as social technology companies/social entrepreneur startups. Fortunately, there are some bright spots like the Humanitarian Innovation Fund or the various NGO supported Hubs/Labs that are supporting some local humanitarian technology. But how do we get more concentrated humtech accelerators and donors for bright innovations? If digital humanitarians are not NGOs and not social entrepreneurship businesses, what is the long term sustainability?

[Disclosure: I am on the Board for Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team and PeaceGeeks. Previously, I worked at Open Knowledge and Ushahidi. For Crisis Commons in 2010, I did a short research project about the innovation community. And, I am part of the event team at CrisisMappers. Currently I work at Qatar Computing Research Institute]

7Nov

Mozfest Report Back: Community Toolkit

What happened to the Community Toolkit project? Last year many community leaders at Mozfest hacked the table of contents for a Community Handbook. Our goal was to take all the content, divide up the chapters and start writing on Github.

About the project:

Open wins when we share tools, tips and cheats to build community. This remixable toolkit aims to help communities and community builders learn best practises and remix tools, guidelines and resources. The emphasis is on practical, “grab-and-go” templates, worksheets and modules anyone can use quickly!
Contains:

Remixable toolkits
Best practises, use cases and examples
Cheatsheets, recipes and templates

The team set up a trello board, Hackpad and a github account. Then, while it would be simple to say life and work happened for the leaders, there is much more to this story for me.

The Missing Chapters

Perhaps this Toolkit needed some missing chapters:

Hiring a new Executive Director
Onboarding your Executive Director
Guiding your community through a the largest event they have done (7500 mappers for Nepal)
Negotiating, navigating and transitioning the community and organization through big changes
Crowdfunding must be your friend
Board management and call a friend/Advisor

As volunteer who started a job in a new country, I only had 10-20 hours a week to contribute to a project this year. I really did not anticipate that I would be working countless extra hours to help on the above big items. But, as the president of Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team‘s Board it was absolutely what had to be the priority. While every community leader is a master of all trades, these were some big lessons for me and for our community. One thing I will be doing soon is open sourcing all the templates for how we handled the transitions, search/outreach, evaluation, and hiring. We had some excellent help from Allen Gunn (Gunner of Aspiration Tech). I looked long and hard for guides and resources on how to do this. There were just few documents for open source communities, so we created them. We will share these back with you because at some point your community will need to do this. (All the personal info will be removed.)

What’s next

This project needs to live, but we need a few more hands and someone else to be lead dancer for awhile.

If you and your team ever have these types of big items happen in your community, contact me. We are in this together to build open. I am your resource and support.

Ode to Mozfest

For my Mozfest allies: This year for the first time ever I am missing Mozfest. I was there at Drumbeat and then all the next iterations. Living in Doha makes for a long trip and work has me head down on tasks. I miss the creative interactions and wonderment of hanging out with my open soulsisters and brothers. Truly, I can’t wait to see what you create. Happy Mozfest!

29Oct

How will Qatar prepare for Information Overload?

We are neighbours, no matter where we live. Being a new resident to Doha, I am grappling with a number of questions. These stem from working with humanitarian and crisis information for a number of years. Plus, it is part of my mandate at Qatar Computing Research Institute to help apply research and software to support local needs. We have learned much globally about emergencies. I’d like to learn more about how to help locally and who is keen to collaborate.

How will Doha and Qatar prepare for the upcoming information overload? What are the communications plans during an emergency? How will the public use or not use social media or new technology during an emergency? What are the information and technology needs in the GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council)? How does preparedness compare to other regions? How can citizens and communities prepare? How can Digital Humanitarians be of service? How would Digital Humanitarian community in Qatar differ? What are the training and technology needs of digital humanitarians locally? How can the local Digital Humanitarian community get more involved in the global community? How would Qatar Computing Research Institute’s work apply or not apply for emergencies in the region? What other types of research and/or software would serve the local responders and communities?

In September I attended the GCC Government Social Media Summit in Dubai. There were a number of presentations about preparedness and communications. I was interested to learn that in Dubai, every neighbourhood has a #hashtag. It is used for community activities but my colleague Ali Rebaie advised that this practice is also used for emergencies or resilience. This is something that happens around the world. Neighbours online are networks and information ambassadors locally (offline). This is invaluable. How can we apply this to Doha? Maybe because we are a smaller city and country, we organize primarily around #Doha or #Qatar. There should be tags for all social media platforms in multiple languages by districts and cities. By doing this, we can plan and share for communications.

The Qatar Red Crescent Disaster Management Camp in April 2015 provided great insights into how communication flows among responders. My observations found that people use WhatsApp to organize but are keen to investigate how social media might also be a communications channel. This participation has provided an impetus and goal to host a local social media and emergency meetups. Bringing responders and local enterpreneurs into the same space has started with the joint QCRI and Qatar Red Crescent Digital Humanitarian workshops. But, we do need to talk more about how social media will or won’t be a factor in Doha. How will people communicate during an emergency? How will responders work with them? At minimum, there needs to be local ‘information ambassador’ programme setup on WhatsApp. The more training the more ready we are for emergencies. The Qatar Red Crescent has been doing preparedness and resilience training in communities and with schools. Businesses may be thinking about text messages (SMS) during emergencies. But as a new resident working in these spaces, I do see opportunities to help.

Civil Defense Exhibition and Conference is hosting preworkshops on preparedness, community risk reduction, evacuation and infrastructure planning. All week for 5 hours a night I have joined about 60 people to learn from experts in the field. Participants are from across emergency response, civil defense, business and research. Questions have been fascinating. The earnestness to plan for all the stakeholders is very evident. While the mandate was not about ‘how communities will communicate’, it is very much on the minds of organizers and participants. All of this highlights the need for a more research on how will responders and communities work together.

(Map presented by the Professor Zare of the International Institute of Earthquake Engineering and Seismology, IIEES (Tehran, Iran))

There is a large multilingual and high-volume mobile telephone penetration. I’ve found some success in building informal alliances and finding allies. In talking with many stakeholders, there is an enthusiasm to build more plans around communications and citizen engagement for preparedness. Who should I talk with who is interested in communications and emergencies in Doha, Qatar or the GCC?

2Sep

The Next Stage of Digital Humanitarians

The World Humanitarian Youth Summit is in Doha, Qatar this week (September 1 – 2, 2015). Students and young people under the age of 30 joined from over 80 countries around the world. They are here to consult on a number of key issues creating an outcome document with key recommendations. Last night the drafting team was up until 5am AST working to compile all the brilliant ideas. This work will be submitted as part of the larger global consultations to Reshape Aid.

It was my honour to join the Transformation through Innovation panel to share some thoughts on how people could get involved as Digital Humanitarians and how they could learn and lead with these skills. During my talk, I share some thoughts on how we could challenge the future to get young people more involved all around the world. See my slides and detailed notes for more information.

The Next Digital Humanitarians from heatherleson

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Thank you to Reach out to Asia, the World Humanitarian Youth Summit, and the Children and Youth Major group for welcoming me in their conversations. Also thank you to Chad Bevins, Mark Iliffe, Kathmandu Living Labs, Yantisa Akhadi, and Stace Maples for their photos about Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team and OpenStreetMap activities around the world.

19Aug

Digital Humanitarians in Qatar

It is World Humanitarian Day today! Humanitarians make a huge difference in the lives of many people around the world. On this day that we honour these amazing people, we are starting a local Digital Humanitarian Community to support their efforts.

Digital Humanitarians are a growing global network of people aiming to use their technology and social media skills to support humanitarians and affected communities. There are many communities within the Digital Humanitarian Network. Our goal is to encourage more participation from Qatar and the GCC. We will host local community events, training and support. Qatar has a high youth and very technical capable population. It is our hope that more people from Qatar will join and lead within the various communities.

We’ve created a mailing list to help you connect. (digitalhumanitarians-qatar@googlegroups.com ) Join us and stay tuned for more details. Please introduce yourself – your interests and why you are keen to learn.

This community is for you. We will provide spaces for technical and non-technical participation. Getting involved in your world is your journey. Digital Skills learned from Digital Humanitarian activities are directly applicable to your learning and your potential career. Plus, you will meet others from around the world who seek to make a digital difference.

There are a number of active Digital Humanitarians at Qatar Computing Research Institute (QCRI) (based in Doha Qatar). We created Artificial Intelligence for Disaster Response (AIDR) and MicroMappers to help people get involved in the world. Training and events will include data, maps, verification and software techniques. We will invite our local and global friends to help support your learning journey.

Upcoming Events

Our first big activity will be joining the World Humanitarian Summit – Global Youth Consultation to be held in Doha on September 1 – 2, 2015. The Reach out to Asia team has been working hard to bring over 450 young people from around the world. There will also be many participants from Qatar. Our team will host a booth at HBKU to share details about our work at QCRI and share how you can be a Digital Humanitarian. Please stop by and visit to learn more!

18Aug

Recap: Virtual Reality at Google Developer Group – Doha

As I child, I loved to play with kaleidoscopes. It seemed like pure magic to put a box to your face and see colour and light design and change before your eyes. A sense of play in technology can lead to new startups and creative research science.

Last night Qatar Computing Research Institute hosted the Google Developer Group – Doha team for the Virtual Reality session. The night included an introduction to Virtual Reality, Google Cardboard and then a hands-on session with creating VR with Unity. Hadij Hicham and Sachin Kumar lead the training and are founders of GDG Doha. As always, it is a pleasure to have technical guests at QCRI to collaborate and learn.

Get involved:

GDG Doha
G+
Twitter

The next event is to be scheduled, so watch those spaces for more details.

Some photos from the night:

Note:

There were 6 women in attendance too, I just missing getting a good action photo of their brilliance. All photos are CCBY.

13Apr

Communicating at Disaster Management Camp

The 6th Annual Qatar Red Crescent Disaster Management Camp (QRC DMC) successfully united over 300 participants for 10 days of intense practical training. My compliments to the Qatar Red Crescent staff, International Federation of Red Crescent and Red Cross, other trainers/guest speakers and participants for a very professional and often all too realistic training camp. On behalf of Dr. Sofiane Abbar, Dr. Sarah Vieweg and our team, thank you for including Qatar Computing Research Institute in your event.

Participants at the DMC included Qatar Red Crescent Staff, staff of other Red Crescent societies, the Qatar EMS, Qatar Civic Defense, other official entities and volunteers. A portion of the participants were divided into training teams designated by colour code. These groups received training across various humanitarian and emergency scenarios including water and sanitation, shelter, food and nutrition, search and rescue, medical response and communications.Participants were responsible for the activity from their training track for the remainder of the day. The Social Media and New Technology class taught by my co-host, Ali El-Sebai El-Gamal (Qatar Red Crescent), and I held a one hour training for 6 days with 6 different teams. Before and after class, I created online communications, attended scenarios, joined classes and other camp activities. Every day people talked with me about the potential of Digital Humanitarian skills, Qatar Computing Research Institute’s work and best practices of social media during emergencies. So, if students attended the Media and Communications track, they were then responsible for all camp communications for the day (as with all the other tracks.) The Media and Communications track included media handling, communications methods, GPS, Satellite phones, radios and social media. We observed social media and communications training translate practical communications activities during the scenarios. The methodology of learn by doing provided students with a richer experience. The communications teams used their social savvy to practice online verification and human computing (harnessing ‘your network’), they live-tweeted events, crushed rumours and held press conferences with Twitter. They used WhatsApp to relay critical information during scenarios between two emergency sites, thus having the medical center receive updates via radio, phone and a WhatsApp messaging group. Pictures were also sent via WhatsApp by the response team to medical team to help them prepare.

المتحدث الرسمي باسم غرفة العمليات تتحدث للصحافة عن الاستجابة والاحصاءات الأولية #مخيم_الكوارث6 pic.twitter.com/vOTYxD34Ec

— Haneen Suliman (@haneen81) April 7, 2015

See our updated Storify (aggregation of social media) of the Qatar Red Crescent Disaster Management Camp. While the photos include smiling faces, note that we often delayed or obscured social content during some difficult scenarios. After all, the purpose of the camp is not only about communications and storytelling. Some of the participants have previously participated in humanitarian response. Some of the new trainees will be trained more and deployed. On the last day of the QRC DMC, I watched faces of participants and staff knowing full well that they may experience the best and worst of humanity. The teaching moments abound as I consider how to apply this experience to our work at Qatar Computing Research Institute. I have some ideas based on the feedback from staff and participants. Stay tuned on the implementation after I do some reflection and consultation.

Often the scenarios and conversations resulted in participants and staff highlighting ethical issues around these communications tactics. It was fantastic to hear people question issues around social media from privacy, security, access, trusted sources and the best practices. As humanitarians, they will face a wide range of issues so training instincts and debating tools/tactics is so important. The reality is that within a camp such as this it is possible to see just how pervasive new media may be during some emergencies. It is true though that this adds a complexity to their already difficult work. But the point of highlighting these tools and techniques is really training for “IF” social media and messaging becomes a factor in their real field work.

DATA: Disaster Management Camp Participant Use of Social Media and New Technology

Every day I collected a straw poll (informal survey) in my class. I asked people about their use of social media and new technology. Sometimes there were people missing from the groups due to meetings, so the numbers are not exact. However, this gives you a window into the DMC’s community technology use. Thanks to Infogram for the tools to tell this data story. How to use: click on the radio buttons to see the data by group and by type of social media/technology tool.

Qatar Red Crescent | Create infographics

(Photo 1: Said Tijani, Qatar Red Crescent, at the QRCDMC April 3, 2015 scenario, credit: Heather Leson CCBY; Photo 2: Suma (QRC) at the QRCDMC April 7, 2015 scenario).

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