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Thursday, October 20, 2005
Toral: Empowering citizens through technology
By Janette Toral
Digital Filipino
In celebration of Sun.Star Superbalita’s 11th anniversary, there will be a week-long celebration at the Atrium of SM City Cebu. I’m glad that we got the opportunity to hold a small “One Internet Day Cebu,” during the celebration, on Oct. 25 from 1 to 5 p.m. It is a free event and I hope many would be able to participate. Our theme for this year is “Empowering Citizens Through Technology.”
Blogging, which has become very popular, allows any Filipino Internet user to become a publisher. With this realization, our online team at Sun.Star will talk about Sun.Star SMS, the Sun.Star blog, and the paper’s Citizen Journalists project.
When Nini Cabaero, Sun.Star Network Exchange (Sunnex) head, discussed this opportunity with me, I thought that as blogging empowers the citizen, perhaps it is best to make it a central theme. It is much in the context of Thomas Friedman’s “The Lexus and the Olive Tree,” where globalization 3.0 is the empowerment of super-individuals or citizens. However, this concept can only be true if information, capital and technology (ICT) exist.
Information when you need it. Not just plain data but information that can be used for timely decision-making. Access to knowledge and information is vital and this is where we come in, in support of research efforts.
Capital or credit as needed. The biggest drawback for the empowerment of citizens is lack of access to capital or credit. In these trying times, the challenge of finding sufficient financial resources is becoming bigger.
I’m certain, as past experience shows, the best in all of us will come out during this time. In crisis, we become more patriotic. As for entrepreneurs, they become more decisive; their business attitudes and ethics, more firm.
Technology. In our effort to save costs on transportation, fuel, communication and many others, we need the importance of technology.
In crisis, subscription to Internet and e-commerce surges as these technological developments are considered effective alternative to traditional ways of doing business.
During the week-long affair, Lawrence Hughes of Infoweapons.com, a Cebu-based high-tech start-up will share his personal experience on putting up a Silicon-Valley-type of business. He is the first in Cebu City to do this. He is producing high-tech products that foreign clients can’t believe are manufactured in Cebu City.
Vincent Rallon, CyberPromdi founder and entrepreneur behind SalvEON.net will be sharing his personal experience on personalized marketing using online social networks.
A resource person from YesPinoy.com will also talk about online payments and use of remittance services.
Congratulations. I would like to congratulate Cebu-based Swambi Incorporated for bagging the Katha Best Website Award during the Manila F.A.M.E. event. I’ve been judging this contest for quite sometime and I’m glad to see more exporters going online.
(October 20, 2005 issue)
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