Africa

"Solving Africa's grand challenges"

This research agenda is driven by profit and economic interests although the articulated narrative is about "solving Africa's grand challenges" which he states are "well-known." But then as he...Read more

Hao, Karen. 2019. “The Future of AI Research Is in Africa.” MIT Technology Review (blog). June 21, 2019.

AO: This MIT Technology Review post describes the machine learning community on the continent and places companies like IBM front and center of these "blossoming" communities. There is an important critical labor and tech training component to be unpacked here. 

The article quotes...Read more

AOk. African problems are "information" problems

AO: This quote (see copy-pasted below) states that IBM (Research) believed that "many of the hardest problems in our world today, particularly in Africa, are problems of information." The speaker...Read more

AOk. "'Lucy' reminds us that we are all connected...to those hard problems...of Africa"

This quote (copy-pasted below) details why IBM decided not to use the name "Watson" which is how they have branded their super-computer around the world but when they bring the technology to...Read more

Attiah, K. (2020, September 22). Opinion | Africa has defied the covid-19 nightmare scenarios. We shouldn’t be surprised. Washington Post.

AO: This article (from September 2020) notes that despite a narrative that heavily circulated early in the global spread of the COVID pandemic that "vulnerable" and "high-risk" places, in Africa for example, were going to be devastated by COVID, it has not in fact played out that...Read more

Thierry, Raphaël. 2016. “Amalion Publishing: An Interview with Sulaiman Adebowale.” Wasafiri 31 (4): 23–25.

AO: This interview, conducted by Raphaël Thierry with Sulaiman Adebowale of Amalion Publishing points to the importance of broadening what constitutes knowledge or scholarly publishing. In order to achieve this, Adebowale describes the need for publishing expanded genre forms like "...Read more

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