“Building Inclusive Tech with the Global South”, Payal Arora
PLAMADISO Talk by Payal Arora (Utrecht University) – 12 December 2024 || Organized by the Research Group “Digital Economy, Internet Ecosystem & Internet Policy” @Weizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society
Title: Building Inclusive Tech with the Global South
Abstract
What actions and innovations are needed to create an inclusive internet? In the last decade, affordable mobile phones and data plans have brought the ‘next billion users’ online – mostly young people from the Global South who have fast come online to engage with the internet in ways that go beyond our common understandings. Today, 90 percent of the world’s youth today live outside the West. Just India and China alone are home to most users today. Despite having limited resources, they are increasingly becoming digital creators and innovators in this AI driven era. It is time we stop underestimating and instead, start understanding the creative potential of the Global South. We should seek ways to ethically engage with different cultures, contexts, and conditions to rethink digital opportunities, online safeguards, and creative economies with the world’s majority. Inclusion is not an altruistic act. It is an essential element if we are to build a global community to generate sustainable solutions in how we work, play, love, and live with the planet’s limited resources. Join Payal Arora for her talk as she lays out a pathway for inclusive digital futures.
Short Bio:
Payal Arora is a Professor of Inclusive AI Cultures at Utrecht University and co-founder of FemLab, a feminist futures of work initiative and the Inclusive AI Lab, a global south centered debiasing data initiative. She is a leading digital anthropologist with two decades of user-experience among underrepresented groups, especially in the Global South. She is the author of award-winning books including ‘The Next Billion Users’ with Harvard Press. Forbes called her the ‘next billion champion’ and the ‘right kind of person to reform tech.’ About 150 international media outlets have covered her work including The BBC, Financial Times, and The Economist. She sits on several advisory boards including for the UN EGOV, LIRNE-Asia, and UNICEF-UNESCO. Her new book ‘From Pessimism to Promise: Lessons from the Global South on Designing Inclusive Tech” is out with MIT Press. She is Indian, American, and Irish, and currently lives in Amsterdam.
More info about Payal Arora:
Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.com/citations?...
Personal Website: https://payalarora.com
Link to her new book: https://mitpress.mit.edu/978026204930...
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