BasicInternet:Village Hackathon

=Village Hackathon= ''Preamble: This page is established to collect ideas around Hackathon's for a sustainable future. We are seeking for partners to support the Hackathon, either with ideas, manpower, competency or funds for winner''

Ideas

 * The Village Platform for Africa
 * Solar-power Internet-of-Things (IoT) gateway
 * Women's Hackathon
 * ... feel free to let us know your ideas

Background: Agenda 2030
The United Nations have established the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), addressing 17 goals with a total of 169 targets. Given the ongoing development, it is obvious that development need digital inclusion, and the transformation towards digital societies.

Basis for digital societies is information for all, and the digital access. Given that roughly 4 billion people (status 2016) are not connected to the Internet, the first focus is 'Goal 9 on sustainable industrialization and foster innovation. We see that target 9.C Significantly increase access to information and communications technology and strive to provide universal and affordable access to the Internet in least developed countries by 2020 is directly addressed through the InfoInternet standard on free access to information for all. We see that free access to information is the catalyst for a majority of the SDG goals, and especially:
 * digital health is basis for SDG 3 Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages
 * digital information is basis for SDG 4 Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all, and will contribute to
 * digital inclusion is the basis for digital jobs, and addressing SDG 8' Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all
 * strong contributions to SDG 10 Reduce inequality within and among countries, SDG 11 Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable and thus we
 * invite everyone for SDG 17 Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development.

About the Basic Internet Foundation
University of Oslo (UiO) and Kjeller Innovasjon have founded the Basic Internet Foundation to focus on free access to information for all. The Foundation has
 * substantiated the need for free access to information through the InfoInternet standard,
 * established a network infrastructure for a low-cost provision of Internet access,
 * provided demonstrations both in Europe and Africa, and has
 * established a sustainable business model for commercial operations.

Ongoing activities
In 2016 the Foundation invited 9 partners for the DigI activity "Non-discriminating access for digital inclusion", with the goal of piloting digital health in Tanzania (TZ) and the digital ecosystem in Congo (DRC). The Research Council of Norway and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs are supporting the pilot.

As part of the activities, the consortium has established a pilot installation of a village hot-spot for digital health, and is now planning the Connectivity of the 4 pilot villages in TZ and the villages Kano and Palu in DRC. During the pilot, we identified the need for cost-effective infrastructures in the villages. Regarding connectivity, we have standardised on cost-effective equipment from Mikrotik and Witelcom. However, we have seen the need for a village server and an IoT gateway. We envision student work or hackathons to establish the infrastructure for sustainable development.

= Hackathon: Village platform = Goal of this hackathon or student work would be to establish a low-power community server for a village of 2.000 - 10.000 people. Given the costs of communication and electricity, we envisage:
 * a low-power (<50W) platform for storage of local video information
 * PoE or solar-powered operation
 * server for local community content
 * social network platform for the village society
 * cache server for network content
 * low-cost server

= Hackathon: IoT home platform = Goal of this hackathon or student work is to establish a low-cost IoT gateway, first of all controlling the power from the solar panel, charging of battery, and priority of attached devices. Current low-cost solar regulators have no Internet connectivity, thus remote configuration and assistance is not possible. The goal of the implementation would include:
 * a solar charge regulator for panels up to 1000 W
 * communication interface, typically Ethernet or Wifi based
 * controlling of produced energy, consumed energy (e.g. USB), batteri status
 * interface towards IoT devices, e.g. controlling other IoT devices

Both hackathons are done in collaboration with industry (Eye Networks, Witelcom, IPXextenso), the Partners of Partners of DigI, and the University of Oslo.

= Women's Hackathon = Goal of this hackathon or students work is showcasing the talents of women and girls in coding and software development, and encouraging them to become involved in the world of technology through the creation of solutions using technology. This hackathon is expected to attract women in Africa who are already in a technology-related field, and who are helping other women. The goals of this hackathon are:
 * coming up with solutions affecting societal problems and women today in Africa. Solutions such as: inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all (SDG 4), including girls development, women’s health, and assisting rural women to upskill.
 * one day "Digital media literacy" workshops on the following topics: 1) Bridging the gender divide on the internet, 2) How to use social media to address digital inequality, 3) education and leadership for girls and women in Africa.
 * helping women and girls in science in Africa

= Contacts = If you have an idea on whom to include, how to involve, please help and contact us:
 * Prof. Josef Noll, Department of Technology Systems (ITS), University of Oslo
 * Krister Borge, Department of Informatics (Ifi), University of Oslo
 * Linda Firveld, Business Developer Eye Networks and Steering Board Member Basic Internet Foundation
 * Dr. Danica Radovanovic, Digital equality advisor, Basic Internet Foundation