Imagine knowing about Libya, Yemen and Bahrain in a three dimesional manner, watching the bombing infront of you, knowing which town has been inflicted with airplanes, hearing true stories. Well, this dream is not too far now.
Engrossed in a lively conversation with budding entrepreneurs in London, Jon Gosier is unpretentious, confident and above all, very courteous.
Quickly making time for my eager questions, Jon Gosier, famously known as the ‘Technical Guru of Africa’ reflects about his product SwiftRiver at Ushahidi, role of technology and challenges related with real time data processing.
As a budding journalist, what left a lasting impression on my mind was how this man understood how important the interview was for me, rushed with me to one corner and answered all my queries. One after another. There was no pomp and show, no fake demand of respect or even the fact that ‘Look at me, I am a high profile guy.’
For several years, this 29 year old software developer and speaker at TEDGlobal has been playing a pivotal role in collecting data from disaster response groups. During the process of being the director of Swiftly.org and establishing communication in crisis situations, Jon reflects how he believes that connectivity is growing in Africa.
‘Impact of technology in Africa’
Contemplating about the change in time, he mentions how young people are using GoogleReader and other basic tools to be up-to-date. No doubt, it does signify a dramatic change. The goal of SwiftRiver, as he simply puts across, is ‘to create awareness through applications which cause empowerment.’
Though, speaking about the future of real time web processing in Africa, Jon says that the basic infrastructure that is needed is very expensive. Also, it’s hugely dependent on mobile phones and technical tablets, along with concerns of privacy. Thus, the road ahead is definitely herculean.
Meanwhile, exposing the challenges of real time data processing, he says that its risky and can be also used for malicious activities.
Shifting towards the business level, he explains the impact of connectivity which is rising through open source mapping, real time social timing, source mapping, google visualisation and translation. Over the years, Jon has been trying to effectively use these platforms to give accurate results.
‘Trustworthy Vs Non-trustworthy sources’
But at times, Jon Gosier does face problems in differentiating between trustworthy and non-trustworthy sources.
He calls it a ‘monumental task’. One of the ways to figure out if a contact is genuine or not, the team of SwiftRiver checks on the individuals who provide information defining them as the contacts.
Also, the ‘trustworthiness’ of information also depends on factors such as influence, uniqueness, translation and tagging. Giving the example of Egypt, the entrepreneur narrates how he set up the construct and allowed people to curate their truth.
‘The Difference: Natural Disaster Vs Conflicts’
But the challenge of construct grows during crisis such as earthquakes in Haiti and Japan.
Though, Jon calls the Haiti earthquake a ‘learning experience’, he did feel that one faces a lot of technological inefficiency during outsourcing in the times of disaster.
Comparing with Japan, the scale was different in terms of technological involvement. But then, the immediate need of automatic translation tools proved to be another daunting task in this case. One has no option left but to rely on translation or find a hybrid.
In the case of conflict, the confrontations are different.
Narrating his experience during the Egyptian revolution, Jon voices that he saw there were many people ‘working independently and telling different stories’. It felt like witnessing same occurrences but through different lenses.
So, it grew important to establish ‘seeds of reconciliation’. The same phenomenon happened in Nigeria during the time of elections.
Ultimately, Jon learnt that the main purpose needs to be bringing together people who normally do not talk to help in processing the information.
‘Future Projects’
Jon is working on River ID which is a reputation data store. Here, his team treats every source as a unique identity, trying to digitally use it as a currency for social exchange.
This social exchange involves analysis of human behaviour involved in communication, the impact of information exchange and the short/long term goals of it.
As the interview slowly approached the end, Jon Gosier established himself as a man who knows the demand of technology, the inefficiency in infrastructure that exists but is working with utter diligence to make a difference, a mark.
shubhdachaudhary 