Yesterday ,the 25 th of August 2011, is a day to recall in the history of “ushahidi” as it was the official evaluation launch of the platform. Ushahidi is a tool for crowd-sourcing information by use of multiple channels like web, sms and twitter. Its also what voice of kibera uses to aggregate and map reports.
Speakers from both the founders and the users aired out their different views on how it has been used in the past, the success brought about and how it can be used to change the community positively through information sharing and dissermination.
Credit is and was given to both the users of ushahidi as well as the founders, but highly to the founders. The users of Ushahidi thanked the initiators of the platform, for coming up with a platform that makes the citizen voices matter and amplified for rapid response. In return, the founders of “ushahidi” thanked the users, stating that, “ushahidi” wouldn’t be where it is were without the help of the community.
The crowdsourcing tool is not only meant to amplify the credible voices of citizens, but also to revolutionize the world at large.
Ushahidi which was built in response to the post election violence in kenya in 2008, is all about gathering and mapping of incidents of violence information and peace efforts in the country based on the reports submitted either by web or mobile phone sms technology from the public, hence providing new insight at close real-time.
“Ushahidi”,which means testimony in Swahili, is three years old since the inception. It is comprised of a group of individual who initially were volunteers and has grown tremendously to a fully forcused organization that has attracted the attention of the world positively at large. The team is comprised of competent individuals with a wide span of experience and have also been able to build strong team of volunteer developers from Africa and across the world.
“You dont have to be an expert to do something” ,says Erick Hersman,one of the core team. He emphasizes that Africa has a great potential and is capable of building world class softwares and we shouldn’t expect nothing less out of us.
Several issues were raised from the audience on how they would want some other things incoporated to the plartform so as to meet other needs from the users, which were promised to be put into considerations.
“Ushahidi” partners with a number of organizations that in one way or the other have seen its’ growth to success.Since the inception of this platform, “ushahidi” has been able to spread its wings to(132) one hundred ant thirty two countries across the world and it’s still gaining momentum with a lot more interest showing up.