Heh, It's times like these I realize I'm still in a minority here. As one of the few non-american/european readers of the list, my perspective, differs on this issue.
I don't know what people imagine when they think of the conditions in these refugee camps. Allow me to paint a picture using commons [1][2] - These places have some of the highest population density anywhere in the world. Most have make-shift housing - tents or shanty, electricity - which is mostly for a single light or to charge an old phone - is unreliable, water in tankers has to be collected in jars and carried back[4]. Sanitation, roads - if such things exist, are equally troublesome. The designated monthly food vouchers/allowance, if they can get, is already being cut [3]. Add to that some petty crime and occasional police clashes. There's always the constant fear of outliving their host countries welcome, and being thrown out, left homeless. All that remains is just a harsh desert, a few sandstorms.
These are people fleeing their homes from a civil war, with no end in sight. Food, water, shelter, safety and their own dignity has to rank higher as a major concern. I'm not saying that we can't help, just that we figure lower in priorities from avoiding a civil war, genocide, to just surviving - things are far from stable at these places still, sadly. These refugees don't even have a legal status in most places, when they do it is only temporary.
On Tue, Sep 8, 2015 at 1:15 AM, Leinonen Teemu teemu.leinonen@aalto.fi wrote:
Hello people,
Just an idea. Number of Syrian refugees is over 4,000,000 people, mostly residing in Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq.[1] Refugee camps are set in all in these countries.[2]
Between ISIS and kurdish forces, Iraq and Turkey are likely to have some instability in these camps. Turkey with the highest number of refugees has concentrated them at overcrowded refugee camps at borders while denying them refugee status. Lebanon refuses to set up any refugee camps, Jordan might have some of the highest density population center on earth, at one of its two camps. While the other gulf states have outright refused these refugees.
Internet-in-a-Box[3] is a a WiFI-device with "Wikipedia in 37 languages, a library of 40,000 e-books, most of the world's open source software and source code, hundreds of hours of instructional videos, and world-wide mapping down to street level.”
This device sounds like a portable hotspot with an attached storage.
I don't understand however, what device people would use to access this hotspot? ios, android- smartphones aren't as common in that part of the world yet. And you would still need electricity to charge those devices, all that remains is the language barrier...
Anyway, I think we already have something better - Wikipedia Zero. It was designed for very similar situations. We just need some sort of a carrier relationship to avail free access for everyone with a phone in those region, I seem to recall a light text only version too that would work on any phone. The carriers might even be receptive to the idea, if approached correctly - Kul might know.
Regards Theo
[1] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:An_Aerial_View_of_the_Za%27atri_Refu... [2] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Syrian_refugee_camp_on_theTurkish_bo... [3]http://www.unhcr.org/55b7737b6.html [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Children_filling_water_in_Al-Zaatari_Camp...
Could we as a movement get the internet-in-a-box to the refugee camps?
- Teemu[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refugees_of_the_Syrian_Civil_War [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syrian_refugee_camps [3] http://internet-in-a-box.org
Teemu Leinonen http://teemuleinonen.fi _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe