Welcome to the updated website of RiOS Institute.

In this monthly column, we will keep your abreast of our work as well as share insights and experiences from travels and meetings.

Just to give you a few highlights of our activities in the recent past, the New Wave ICTD Lecture Series organized by RiOS at UC Berkeley's School of Information attracted large crowds of students and faculty, especially the talk by Craig Newmark (of Craigslist fame) about innovation in ICT and the panel discussion by Jessica Flannery, co-founder of kiva.org, Darian Rodriguez Heyman, the Exectuive Director of Craigslist Foundation and Gerard Speksnijder of McKinsey who talk about the possibilities and limits of markets to alleviate poverty and the role played by technologies. To learn more and to listen to a podcast of Craig's talk, visit our Public Engagement page.

The lecture series was part of our graduate seminar on "Social Entrepreneurship in ICTD," and the final project presentations were a full success, as attested by the presence of representatives of all the organizations for whom our teams developed ICTD solutions. To learn more about the projects, go to our Project page.

We are now carrying on some of the projects. The 2008iGUIDE - the first ever directory of ICTD Resources in Silicon Valley and the San Francisco Bay Area - will be available later this month. We received lots of enthusiastic responses while compiling the information for the iGUIDE, which reinforced the need for such a resource guide. We especially thank Intel, Microsoft, Ncomputing and Internet Speech for their financial support of the project.

March will also see Paul traveling to New York to attend the "The UN meets Web 2.0" event at the United Nation's headquarters. This is a follow-on event to the "UN meets Silicon Valley" conference that took place last February at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View.

The Web 2.0 event will consist of a series of policy dialogues and panel sessions on the first day, showcasing a variety of perspectives on key issues, including the use of technology to drive development; understanding what is in the mind of ICT entrepreneurs; and how the new media and content are shaping the landscapes of business and economics in developing countries. Paul is moderating a panel on ICT policy.

The second day will include an Investors Forum, showcasing emerging business and investment opportunities in information and communication technologies in developing nations, including ICT initiatives from countries across Africa, Asia, the Americas, the Middle East, the Pacific, the Caribbean, and Eastern Europe. Check back at the end of March for Paul's report from New York.

Till then, happy St. Patricks' Day and may the first day of spring bring you sunshine wherever you are.