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Radio in a bucket
Technology
ONE PER CENT
Radio in a bucket Bare-bones broadcasts are setting information free in rural Uganda
“It has become possible to run a whole radio station with nothing more than a phone”
JANE ADONG used to ride for 10 hours on a motorcycle to get to her nearest radio station. From there, she would broadcast her show – an advice segment dealing with HIV education. Her neighbours back in the Ugandan town of Patongo would tune in and listen. This week, she got those hours back. Adong and the NGO she founded, Gwokke Keni, now have a station of their own in Patongo, one of four prototype radio transmitters being erected in rural Ugandan towns and villages. Made from a bucket, some circuitry and a smartphone, the system is opening up information access like never before. Although the internet and social networks have revolutionised the rich world, millions of people in poor countries don’t even have radio broadcasts in their own language. Traditional radio stations need a building with sound equipment that links to a powerful antenna. But as advances in electronics have driven computation into smaller and cheaper packages, 22 | NewScientist | 30 May 2015
listings – a valuable service in places like rural Uganda, where –Tub technology– literacy rates are low. Another will have an advice it has become possible to run a segment that focuses on whole radio station with little veterinary and agricultural more than a phone. issues. Adong and Gwokke Keni The stations are the product will devote airtime to HIV of RootIO, a start-up founded destigmatisation and information by Ugandan telecom expert on compliance with antiretroviral Jude Mukundane and Chris medication. Because cellphones Csikszentmihályi, formerly are plentiful in Uganda but of the MIT Media Lab. Each minutes of talk time are not, consists of a solar panel, battery, RootIO’s system will register the 15-metre-tall transmitter tower caller’s telephone number for and a smartphone. A white all call-in shows and, instead of 19-litre bucket houses the connecting, will hang up and dial hardware and keeps it dry. the person back at no charge. The smartphone is the linchpin. “[It] provides an It runs an Android app that interconnection between radio and phone, two of the most pervasive technologies used by poor and marginalised people,” says UNICEF’s Sharad Sapra. The result is a radio that functions more like a telephone, designed for a two-sided conversation. Silicon Valley technology is often touted as a way to better the lives of people in poor countries. But with her new station, and more like it coming soon, Adong and other Ugandans are taking the power of information into –Smartphone radio– their own hands. Luke Yoquinto n
Oxygen into wine In vino veritas, they say, but you find more than truth in a good glass of red. Oxygen, in just the right amount, is crucial. The airtight steel barrels often used for ageing make it difficult and expensive to ensure a wine gets enough. Now New Zealand entrepreneurs have created the “wine grenade” – a small, cheap gadget that can be plonked into the tank to gradually release a specific amount of oxygen, making sure your red is perfectly aerated.
970
The thickness in micrometres of a screen made by Korean electronics company LG – so thin you can stick it to the wall with a weak magnet
Algorithmically racist Two tech giants faced public outcry over embarrassing bugs this week. Searching a racial slur on Google Maps sent users to the White House. Meanwhile, Flickr ‘s automated image tagging had been labelling pictures of black people with the words “ape” and “animal”, and pictures of Dachau concentration camp with “jungle gym”. Both companies apologised and pledged to fix the issues.
Helge Mundt/plainpicture
both photographs: Chris Csikszentmihályi
connects to radio hosts’ personal phones, letting them control the broadcast through a phone call and their standard keypad. Smartphones at each station can talk to each other through the app to syndicate content, but most initial programming will serve specific local needs. In one show, listeners will call in with the vocal equivalent of classified
ONE PER CENT
Radio in a bucket Bare-bones broadcasts are setting information free in rural Uganda
“It has become possible to run a whole radio station with nothing more than a phone”
JANE ADONG used to ride for 10 hours on a motorcycle to get to her nearest radio station. From there, she would broadcast her show – an advice segment dealing with HIV education. Her neighbours back in the Ugandan town of Patongo would tune in and listen. This week, she got those hours back. Adong and the NGO she founded, Gwokke Keni, now have a station of their own in Patongo, one of four prototype radio transmitters being erected in rural Ugandan towns and villages. Made from a bucket, some circuitry and a smartphone, the system is opening up information access like never before. Although the internet and social networks have revolutionised the rich world, millions of people in poor countries don’t even have radio broadcasts in their own language. Traditional radio stations need a building with sound equipment that links to a powerful antenna. But as advances in electronics have driven computation into smaller and cheaper packages, 22 | NewScientist | 30 May 2015
listings – a valuable service in places like rural Uganda, where –Tub technology– literacy rates are low. Another will have an advice it has become possible to run a segment that focuses on whole radio station with little veterinary and agricultural more than a phone. issues. Adong and Gwokke Keni The stations are the product will devote airtime to HIV of RootIO, a start-up founded destigmatisation and information by Ugandan telecom expert on compliance with antiretroviral Jude Mukundane and Chris medication. Because cellphones Csikszentmihályi, formerly are plentiful in Uganda but of the MIT Media Lab. Each minutes of talk time are not, consists of a solar panel, battery, RootIO’s system will register the 15-metre-tall transmitter tower caller’s telephone number for and a smartphone. A white all call-in shows and, instead of 19-litre bucket houses the connecting, will hang up and dial hardware and keeps it dry. the person back at no charge. The smartphone is the linchpin. “[It] provides an It runs an Android app that interconnection between radio and phone, two of the most pervasive technologies used by poor and marginalised people,” says UNICEF’s Sharad Sapra. The result is a radio that functions more like a telephone, designed for a two-sided conversation. Silicon Valley technology is often touted as a way to better the lives of people in poor countries. But with her new station, and more like it coming soon, Adong and other Ugandans are taking the power of information into –Smartphone radio– their own hands. Luke Yoquinto n
Oxygen into wine In vino veritas, they say, but you find more than truth in a good glass of red. Oxygen, in just the right amount, is crucial. The airtight steel barrels often used for ageing make it difficult and expensive to ensure a wine gets enough. Now New Zealand entrepreneurs have created the “wine grenade” – a small, cheap gadget that can be plonked into the tank to gradually release a specific amount of oxygen, making sure your red is perfectly aerated.
970
The thickness in micrometres of a screen made by Korean electronics company LG – so thin you can stick it to the wall with a weak magnet
Algorithmically racist Two tech giants faced public outcry over embarrassing bugs this week. Searching a racial slur on Google Maps sent users to the White House. Meanwhile, Flickr ‘s automated image tagging had been labelling pictures of black people with the words “ape” and “animal”, and pictures of Dachau concentration camp with “jungle gym”. Both companies apologised and pledged to fix the issues.
Helge Mundt/plainpicture
both photographs: Chris Csikszentmihályi
connects to radio hosts’ personal phones, letting them control the broadcast through a phone call and their standard keypad. Smartphones at each station can talk to each other through the app to syndicate content, but most initial programming will serve specific local needs. In one show, listeners will call in with the vocal equivalent of classified