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STUDY ABROAD OPTIONS
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 MALAWI TELCO FAILING TO KEEP AHEAD OF BANDWIDTH DEMAND The Leland initiative has upgraded its Malawi link to a 528 kbps dedicated link from Vortex. Unfortunately M Streams, the Malawi Telecommunications subsidiary who administer the link have already sold 640 kbps of bandwidth. You will not be surprised to learn that they are not offering their corporate clients any price reductions due to the inevitable congestion, and have indicated that they will not upgrade even though some clients have offered to purchase a further 128k from them. The price of their bandwidth remains at US$1500 for 64Kbps. A little math tells us that their income is US$15000 per month, and the cost of 528k from Vortex? At an informed guess, not more than US$7500? An unrelated story from Malawi is the nightmare of the .mw domain. It appears to have come to a head recently as the two ISP’s who use .mw were unable to change their DNS entries to reflect a change in upstream service provider. One has had to change from xx.mw to xxmw.com with the resulting chaos in email domain changes for clients. ITXC SIGNS UP GHANA TELECOM TO TERMINATE INTERNATIONAL CALLS ITXC Corp and Ghana Telecom announced today that Ghana Telecom is now terminating international long distance phone-to-phone traffic in Ghana using ITXC.net(SM), VOIP-based product. In less than four years of operation, ITXC has developed ITXC.net - the world’s largest network for voice over the Internet - and has used it to become the seventh largest carrier in the US measured by revenue from wholesale US outbound international phone calls. Ghana Telecom is jointly owned by the Ghanaian government and Telecom Malaysia. It is not long ago that the same government was locking up ISP owners who were offering international VOIP calls. Under the agreement with ITXC, Ghana Telecom is paid for completing calls flowing into Ghana over ITXC.net, which has points of presence in over 125 countries. Other ITXC carrier customers around the globe, who are also connected to ITXC.net, generate these calls. ITXC claims to be able to offer Ghana Telecom better margins on international calls.By co-locating ITXC equipment at its switch facilities, Ghana Telecom is able to connect its switches directly to ITXC.net to speed provisioning time, increase network capacity, and improve cost structure with almost no additional capital investment. SA’S MWEB IN ROW OVER STREAMING OF BIG BROTHER TV SHOW It looks like a case of the
technology not being there to support the product. Itweb carried
a story saying that following the launch of the Big Brother reality
TV show, many South African netizens "are finding that they
cannot access the much-hyped Internet video streams". According to Andre Retief, MWeb Connect’s Technical Director:"Some Internet users are experiencing difficulty accessing the live stream functionality on the Big Brother SA Web site. M-Net did, in fact, subcontract M-Web to contact the ISPs regarding the necessary technical upgrades as a result of their Internet specific focus and experience. In order to facilitate this live streaming functionality so that all Internet users can access the live stream, it is necessary for Internet Service Providers to upgrade elements of their infrastructure". "In June 2001, M-Web formally approached tier one ISPs - Internet Solutions, UUNet and SAIX - re this requirement. At that stage, it was possible that the demand for live streaming of Big Brother was not yet realised by these players. In spite of interest shown by all three, they declined to upgrade due to the investment in infrastructure required in order to achieve the desired service. However, considering the response Big Brother SA has received, some of these ISPs are now reconsidering. M-Web is now assisting all tier one service providers with all the necessary technical expertise in order for them to configure the streaming of live feeds". Laugh or cry? The choice is yours. (source: IOZ) ICANN RELEASES REPORT LOOKING AT WIDER PARTICIPANTION The NGO and Academic ICANN Study (NAIS) has released its report on reforming ICANN to make it more responsive to the public interest, entitled, "ICANN, Legitimacy, and the Public Voice: How to Make Global Participation and Representation Work." The report is available in PDF at: http://www.naisproject.org/report/final/. In summary, the NAIS report calls on ICANN to commit itself to including the public voice in three major areas: - ICANN should maintain a broad, open At-Large Membership, accessible to any Internet user with an interest in ICANN’s activities. - The At-Large Membership must be provided with strong participatory mechanisms, to enable Members to have a persistent and continuing role in the dialogue and debate that are part of the ICANN policy process. - The Membership must also be strongly represented at the Board level through the direct election of a number of At-Large Directors equal to the aggregate number of Directors selected by the Supporting Organizations. Responses to Alan Levin (alan@FUTUREPERFECT.CO.ZA) or Clement Dzidonou (dzidonu@africaonline.com.gh) GHANA’S BUSY INTERNET CENTRE NEAR COMPLETION, SIGNS ACCORD WITH HP With over 100 people involved in the project on the ground in Ghana, the first BusyInternet center is fast approaching its completion. It has doubled the size of the original building, adding one floor. It will have 15 serviced offices for high-tech companies, one main access hall with 100 flatscreen PCs for fast internet access, two training rooms, a copyshop, and a bar. It has also recently signed an agreement with HP as part of its e-Inclusion programme. "HP is excited to be partnering with BusyInternet whose first center in Accra is consistent with our e-inclusion goals of creating digital opportunities," says Christopher Rowlison, Director of Global Alliances, HP World e-Inclusion. HP is spearheading the effort among the top five PC-manufacturers to bring new technologies and services to markets like Ghana. Together, HP and BI hope to initiate several innovative programs for skills transfer and product development, as well as bring business opportunities to partners both in the US and Ghana.
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This page last updated on January 28 2004.
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