A partnership between the CSIR, the Department of Science and Technology (DST) and Eskom has created South Africa`s second "Digital Doorway" in Mamelodi near Pretoria.
The Digital Doorway project is designed to bring technology to rural areas, says Mamelodi launch organiser Marita Kritzinger. "We want to make people computer literate, but also make the technology minimally invasive. That way, they will basically teach themselves to use it."
The Mamelodi Digital Doorway is a stand-alone computer installation, situated next to the town council. It allows for e-mail and Internet access. "It`s all open source," explains Kritzinger. "There are new programmes being developed for it. It is also multilingual."
While the DST provided the R&D, Eskom funded the installation. Future projects will be reliant on business, says Kritzinger. "We would like to roll out a few more, but we will need to get corporate sponsorships for that."
The official launch for the Mamelodi doorway is on June 30, but the project was actually installed in December 2003. Kritzinger says this was done so that the success of the project could be monitored. "We needed to see how people would react first, how they would use the technology.
"So far the results are really impressive. Completely illiterate people have been able to operate the technology."
The launch will take place at the Mamelodi Town Council Offices, and the keynote speaker will be Science and Technology Minister Mosibudi Mangena.
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