tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-296692882024-03-13T16:15:37.329-04:00Andy's Global ViewAndrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.comBlogger31125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-65575211373992133802010-05-24T16:07:00.001-04:002010-05-24T16:08:46.900-04:00Facebook pageBecome a fan of out just relaunched facebook page, more content to come.http://www.facebook.com/pages/Washington-DC/AMGlobal-Consulting/122947074392879Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18046876046418082020noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-39387731953662405892009-11-05T18:32:00.000-05:002009-11-05T18:34:29.376-05:00Queuing for IDN gTLDs in SeoulEarly last week, still jetlagged from the long flight in from the US, I had the chat with some of the Emerging Markets delegates to the Seoul ICANN meeting. And, on the basis of that conversation, I drafted my article about Kenya’s struggle to sell tea to its markets in the Middle East on an all-Arabic website and the need for IDN gTLDs (http://www.circleid.com/posts/Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18046876046418082020noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-24691111863101966252009-10-27T23:02:00.004-04:002009-11-05T18:40:08.192-05:00Shouldn’t tea time for Kenya mean IDN TLDs?Anyone who knows Kenya knows it is famous for tea. And while I can now get Kenyan tea online from US companies like Starbucks, Caribou Coffee or any number of other re-sellers, like most consumers I would vastly prefer to cut out the middle man and buy my tea direct from Kenyan companies. Why not?But here's the rub. Besides me and a significant number of Brits, who buys Kenyan tea? According to Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18046876046418082020noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-33927235576889842762009-10-27T21:57:00.003-04:002009-10-27T21:59:21.384-04:00ICANN's Positive Affirmation: Good News for Africa and Emerging Markets Originally submitted October 8 on CircleID Oct 08, 2009 1:32 PM PDTComments: 1Views: 1,122 as of 10-27-09 By Andrew Mack Sometimes you get what you are asking for. And this seems to be one of those occasions… and the US government can give itself a pat on the back for having listened to other stakeholder opinions. For years the world of Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18046876046418082020noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-20826750732292785802009-03-31T13:01:00.002-04:002009-03-31T13:04:15.935-04:00As ICANN Grows, time to focus on Emerging MarketsBy Vika Mpisane and Andrew Mack[NB, this article, co-written with my friend and colleague Vika Mpisane from South Africa, is currently awaiting publication in Johannesburg] Today, ICANN -- the international group responsible for managing Internet governance -- is growing and taking on more responsibility than ever before. However, as we saw at the recent ICANN meeting in Mexico City, the systemAndrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-67379848812005929692008-10-13T11:37:00.003-04:002008-10-13T12:06:36.677-04:00ICANN – Confidence Campaign or Just a Con Game for Emerging Markets?I work in Washington, and a week and a half ago the ICANN Confidence Campaign came to town.As theater, it was a pretty impressive event. A near capacity crowd gathered in the hallowed halls of the National Press Club to hear Peter Dengate-Thrush, Paul Twoomey and various ICANN luminaries talk about the group’s plans to improve institutional confidence. The audience – mostly lawyers and policy Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-61169749902454899172008-05-14T10:49:00.001-04:002008-05-14T10:50:49.426-04:00Scrabulous, Scrabble, and Economic Development in South AsiaFirst published in The Progressive BangladeshBy Andrew Mack Friday, 25 April 2008 In February I made my first visit to the Subcontinent, in Delhi, for the regional meeting of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, ICANN. In the main hall there were business and government leaders from around the region. At one of the side Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-9250079768876499212007-11-15T10:15:00.000-05:002007-11-15T10:34:52.843-05:00Rio, IGF, and Getting IP RightAbout a year ago I attended the first Internet Governance Forum (IGF) meeting in Athens. It was a huge techie jamboree bringing together Internet experts and advocates from around the world. And as I sat there in the audience and listened to the different visions of the future presented from the podium, I recall being pretty stunned by the political focus of the whole thing.Well, I’m happy to Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-3520729195938465632007-11-05T09:46:00.000-05:002008-12-10T08:15:58.898-05:00Making sense on the 'net... after the dotSitting here in the dimly lit ballroom of the LA Airport Hilton, I am every day more impressed by the challenges faced by ICANN, the international group that is tasked with making the Internet run. There are issues of safety and security that are at ICANN’s core. And then there are issues of access, issues around the ability to create the online presence you always wanted, about the net Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-88878836264378937112007-10-25T16:20:00.001-04:002007-10-25T18:15:00.374-04:00Pop!Tech 2007 - A Blog's eye view: A Conference RetrospectiveSo, you just got back from an exciting week at Pop!Tech 2007, tell me a bit about your expectations going in? Honestly, I wasn’t sure what to think going in. I heard that Camden was pretty and that everyone was working on really interesting “over the horizon ideas.” I also heard in the words of the Bostonian, this group was “wicked smaht”. No question, Pop!Tech is an incredible scene. For Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-19282862905694403332007-10-20T13:53:00.000-04:002008-12-10T08:15:59.298-05:00Northwoods Alchemy IV – Africa is looking up. Africa is looking up. Believe it. After years of being fed a constant diet of bad news about the continent, most Americans are all too ready to assume nothing but the worst stories come out of Africa. Sometimes it seems that CNN has a special slot reserved just for a weekly feature on pestilence, war and famine. At least in the US media, you really have to look hard to find anything Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-40507989134587563162007-10-19T15:19:00.001-04:002008-12-10T08:15:59.447-05:00Northwoods Alchemy III: Speed Kills, Slow Kills - Lost in Time in Camden, MaineI’m rushing to try to put something down for a blog… Partly because we face big issues. Because we don’t have time to wait. But also because I’m only at Pop!Tech for a while. And because unlike many bloggers, it seems to take me a long time to crank out a piece. Time is short, and I’m on deadline, after all. So quickly to the work at hand… Again this morning we heard about the planet Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-22372034991017818922007-10-19T08:45:00.000-04:002008-12-10T08:15:59.726-05:00Northwoods Alchemy II: Save the bees Thursday morning’s session had an audacious title: “The Human Impact”. And, of course this immediately appealed to me… A veteran of many soccer, rugby and an odd US football game, impact is no stranger. After all, we grow up – especially us boys – wanting to be “impact players”. As we get older, we try to keep in shape through our high impact workouts. And then, as we age, Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-40669765670826174322007-10-18T14:26:00.000-04:002007-10-19T08:44:20.797-04:00Northwoods Alchemy I: Give me a cell phone, or give me death! – Does Tomorrow belong to the c-Citizen? It’s been a long time since Patrick Henry made his famous speech in Virginia calling for liberty or death, calling for democracy and independence for what is now the United States. And a lot has changed since then. A lot more countries are nominally considered democracies, and at least some of them claim to be interested in providing services and opportunities for their Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-42492473223970903932007-10-15T17:45:00.000-04:002008-12-10T08:15:59.920-05:00Northwoods Alchemy If you are a regular – or occasional – reader of Andy’s Global View (www.amglobal.blogspot.com), you’ll know that one of my goals is to try to think over the horizon a bit, looking at technology and development issues in new ways, focusing on Emerging Markets. Well I am happy to say that our world just got bigger. This week I will be attending the Pop!Tech (www.poptech.com) conference in Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-89358178007104805242007-09-17T12:40:00.000-04:002007-09-17T12:43:50.006-04:00 Incremental or not, what Africa needs is Entrepreneurial InfrastructureBy Andrew Mack In his piece last month about “incremental infrastructure”, Ethan Zuckerman makes a number of excellent points about the recent development of infrastructure in Africa. Using his example of the entrepreneur who put up cell towers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, he rightly observes that Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-923295794760118922007-09-07T10:30:00.000-04:002007-09-17T17:29:12.377-04:00In a world of .com and .org, why not .Africa?During the march ICANN meetings in Lisbon I happened in on an interesting presentation. Around the hall sat a group of Africa’s true Internet leaders – entrepreneurs, Government representatives and NGO heads. They were intently listening to a plan aimed at creating a special domain for the continent –.africa. And as I listened and learned more, I came to believe that .africa is an idea Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-17660790088753062292007-08-23T13:35:00.000-04:002008-12-10T08:16:01.205-05:00Guest Columnist: Downloading the Future: IP In the Digital AgeBy Jeremy M. Goldberg with Andrew Mack Earlier this summer I spoke to a group of young telecom professionals from around the world at the United States Telecommunications Training Institute (USTTI), in a meeting here in Washington, DC. I couldn’t have walked into a room with a better collection of today’s emerging telecom and technology stars, from the Philippines and India to Singapore, Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-67708604724557347082007-05-22T13:53:00.000-04:002007-05-22T13:54:55.804-04:00Really want to help Africa? Let’s build an Africa TechCorpsBy Andrew MackAll over Africa, there is a significant realization that tech is the wave of the future. African Government Ministers are traveling around the world – from San Francisco to the UAE to Bangladesh – pitching opportunities for new investors and building deals. Technology has also quickly become a major item on the development agenda, thanks in large part to Africa's new tech Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-26232186391668743842007-04-13T12:22:00.000-04:002008-12-10T08:16:01.536-05:00Africa's ICT Wave reaches San Francisco BayAbout three weeks ago, I sat in a conference hall in San Francisco and listened as President Paul Kagame of Rwanda addressed a group of African and US Government officials. Nothing particularly remarkable in that. Its part of the role of head of state, after all. However, the location was more than symbolic. The event was at the Hilton, in the Financial District, in tech-rich northern Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-16733605475216759152007-03-05T12:34:00.000-05:002007-03-05T12:45:55.254-05:00Guest Columnist: Can A Ball Change the world? Yes... it canBy: Jeremy M. Goldberg Sports today are nearly everyone’s global obsession, but did you also know that they are also a new trend in international development? Donor agencies from Sweden and Norway along with the United Nations and sports outfitting companies like Nike and Adidas, have all joined the “Sports for Social Change” movement. Sadly, most donors – like most sports fans around the Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-1170095134751426832007-01-29T13:22:00.000-05:002007-01-29T13:25:34.776-05:00On Africa's IT compass, all arrows point to RwandaBy Jeremy M. Goldberg and Andrew MackRwanda?! There it was again, the same puzzled look – a combination of concern and disbelief –when I told a colleague that I’d been working in Rwanda. After all, what do we in the outside world know about Rwanda? A small country with a history of unspeakable violence, but a place of opportunity? A leader of Africa’s march into the 21st century? Well my Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-1168561362834358462007-01-11T19:11:00.000-05:002007-01-11T19:22:42.846-05:00Wimax – and the Path to Peace – in UgandaNot long ago a friend of mine was sitting in an internet café in Gulu, Northern Uganda, busily typing away… and suddenly in mid-email, the server went down – the 3rd time in 2 weeks. And, while technology challenges are nothing new for those of us that work or live in places like Northern Uganda, it made me think about the future of Gulu and the region. Uganda is clearly at a crossroads. The Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-1167234296163380402006-12-27T10:42:00.000-05:002006-12-27T10:44:56.180-05:00Consider the Caipirinha -- Brazil, IT, and the Danger of Over-regulationConsider the caipirinha, the national drink of Brazil. A simple mixture of lime, sugar and cachaça (a local sugar cane-based aguardiente), the caipirinha is a delight. Separately the pieces are too sweet, too bitter, or too sour to appeal. And yet together, when crushed up just right in a low ball glass and served over ice with the soft sway of bossa nova in the background, these three come Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29669288.post-1162364913168709312006-11-01T01:59:00.000-05:002006-11-01T02:09:50.180-05:00Do Emerging Markets really want Rescue by ITU?I was in the big plenary room in Athens yesterday when the ITU’s Yoshio Utsumi made his big claim of the day. According to Declan McCullagh of ZDNet who paraphrased Utsumi, the ITU chief “criticized the current rules for overseeing domain names and Internet addresses, stressing that poorer nations are dissatisfied and are hoping that this week's meeting will erode U.S. influence.” If you read Andrew Mackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02422892513829523992noreply@blogger.com0