[Prospects-community] Welcome to the Prospects Community!

Sat Jul 27 15:12:18 BST 2013

Dear Zara, Aladdin, Eva, and rest you all (as I had difficulties in getting
your 1st name from your e-mail ids),

I have been trying to find and follow each of you and your activities
through SM - like twitter (@RanjiGoswami <https://twitter.com/RanjiGoswami>)
& FB (ranjit.goswami.5 <https://www.facebook.com/ranjit.goswami.5>).

I guess most of you to be much younger than me (I am 43), and I probably do
not come with meaningful technical skills that may be much desired for
OFKN. I am the Dean of an apparently top-ranking Indian B-School (IMT
Nagpur<http://www.imtnagpur.ac.in/>,
and my profile <http://www.imtnagpur.ac.in/Dr.%20Ranjit%20Goswami.html>),
having teaching/research interests on ICTs, Global economics, geopolitics,
operations management, etc. Prior to my academic job, I worked in corporate
world for 12 years, in leading Indian companies to global ones, like as
Management Consultant in Siemens (SBS), and subsequently as Associate
Director of eBay (India), etc.

I would be really keen to get involved in various possible ways, as
suggested by the welcome kit. My prime objective is to use OFKN/other
supporting initiatives in creating content for underprivileged school kids,
and if possible, making a little difference in the end-to-end supply chain
of its delivery. Difficulties here is having content in various vernacular
languages in a nation like India. India has been trying to have a low-end
tablet (Akash 4), although many such market initiatives are also on (since
OLTP days).

In my opinion, availability of content, even open and free content, in
English is no longer the challenge (though it remains a challenge in many
Indian vernacular languages, we have more than 20), challenge is in
delivery of right content at right time to school kids or to marginal
farmers - most of whom again come from underprivileged and
socio-economically backward sections of society - be from India to Africa
to other places.

One resource I do have is students (PG level) - who, I believe, can work
meaningfully in small projects and make things happen. Many of these
students, as it is India, come up with good programming level skills too.
Therefore, I would be keen to know about projects/initiatives where these
students can be involved.

Best wishes to all of you, and thanks to the founders of OFKN,

Prof. Ranjit Goswami
Dean (Academics), IMT Nagpur, India

On Wed, Jul 24, 2013 at 6:04 PM, Ala Haraty <aelharaty at gmail.com> wrote:

> Dear Zara:
>
> It is a pleasure to correspond with you all! I have heard of the great
> work you have done with OpenOil, and look forward to working with everyone
> through the Prospects Community.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Aladdin
>
>
> On Wed, Jul 24, 2013 at 11:35 AM, Zara Rahman <zara.rahman at okfn.org>wrote:
>
>>  Hi all,
>>
>> Welcome to the Prospects Community, an opportunity for you to get more
>> engaged more in the Open Knowledge Foundation community, and hopefully a
>> step on your way to becoming an official Open Knowledge Foundation
>> Ambassador!
>>
>> Let me introduce myself first; my name is Zara, and I work closely with
>> my colleagues Christian Villum and Neal Bastek to support our lovely
>> international community.
>>
>> Here is the Welcome Pack for the Prospects Community<https://docs.google.com/a/okfn.org/document/d/1zqYw8u_aXrf5G6nTfRcw_IZjrZG5mQH7o2t-ZbG2ifQ/edit>that we have prepared for you. It includes a number of suggestions for how
>> you can begin to get engaged in the community. We've also set up a
>> discussion list for you, prospects-community at lists.okfn.org (cc'd above
>> too!) - please use this to communicate with your fellow Prospects. Neal,
>> Christian and I are also on this list, but if you'd like to contact us
>> separately, please email local at okfn.org ; we all receive emails sent to
>> this address, so it allows us to respond promptly between the three of us!
>>
>> You are the brave first round of our Prospects Community, so we're
>> especially happy to have you joining the community! If you have any further
>> questions, please don't hesitate to ask, using the channels mentioned
>> above.
>>
>> We look forward to seeing all of your contributions to the open movement!
>>
>> Very best,
>>
>> Zara
>>
>> --
>> Zara Rahman
>> International Community Manager | skype: zara.rahman | @zararah<http://www.twitter.com/zararah>
>> The Open Knowledge Foundation <http://www.okfn.org>
>> *Empowering through Open Knowledge*
>> http://www.okfn.org | @okfn <http://www.twitter.com/okfn> | OKF on
>> Facebook <http://www.facebook.com/OKFNetwork> | Blog<http://blog.okfn.org>|
>> Newsletter <http://okfn.org/about/newsletter/>
>>
>
>
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