The Blackboard Blogger of Africa

By Alex in Blogs & Internet, Book & Literature, Pictures on Mar 23, 2009 at 2:05 pm

Alfred Sirleaf is a blogger. Not just any blogger – no sir, Alfred is an analog blogger. He runs the "Daily News," a news hut in the middle of Monrovia, the capital of a Liberia, a country on the west coast of Africa. The lack of electricity doesn’t even faze him:

Alfred serves as a reminder to the rest of us, that simple is often better, just because it works. The lack of electricity never throws him off. The lack of funding means he’s creative in ways that he recruits people from around the city and country to report news to him. He uses his cell phone as the major point of connection between him and the 10,000 (he says) that read his blackboard daily.

Not all Liberians who read his news are literate, so he makes use of symbols. Whether it’s a UN or military helmet, a poster of a soccer player or a bottle of colored water to denote gas prices, he is determined to get the message out in any way that he can.

Link | A 2005 article on NYT on Alfred Sirleaf – via Onelargeprawn


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  1. Johnny Cat
    Mar 23rd, 2009 at 3:22 pm

    Ha! “Space For Sale” = UR doing it right! Someone call True and get this blog some annoying ads!

  2. gtron
    Mar 23rd, 2009 at 3:53 pm

    analog yes, but unfortunately he is not any type of blogger, by definition, but we can change this quickly…
    take one dv camera
    mount it on a tripod
    stand it near where this foto was taken
    (or other angles depending)
    put a lanier mike on Mr. Sirleaf
    line out camera to a laptop w wireless
    voila
    anavlog *
    i bet he becomes the biggest news thing in his country.
    i have a laptop and a mini-dv cam and a tripod that I can donate. anyone else?
    (also I can and will leave them there with him and teach him how to set it all up if that is required,
    but we’ll have to start a fund for that plane ticket as I am not able to cover that part – not fishin’ for a free ride, just not wealthy these days – maybe he’s tech proficient and we can just send the parts)
    also
    I want to start a small fund for the shoe throwing dude (for when he gets out of jail – JAIL!?!?) in 3 years) -
    simple escrow account managed by trustee
    anyone into that? set him up a bit – bet we’d get a pile of small donations for him –
    if it’s a whole lot, we could bring him over on a tour, get Will Ferrel to throw shoes at him on SNL… ok maybe I’m taking it too far – serious about the fund idea though

    free the world and your mind will follow

    *(coined 2009.03.23)
    anavlog, noun and verb

  3. gtron
    Mar 23rd, 2009 at 3:55 pm

    oops. apologies – anavlog coined previously.

  4. MrObvious
    Mar 23rd, 2009 at 11:06 pm

    its weird you talk about the lack of electricity, but in fact an electric post is present on the photo

  5. Sir Mildred Pierce
    Mar 23rd, 2009 at 11:53 pm

    Thank you for making the picture just small enough that that what he actually wrote is illegible, I’m sure it wasn’t very interesting anyways.

  6. Robolasse
    Mar 24th, 2009 at 3:26 am

    Pure genius!

  7. JOhn Davis
    Mar 24th, 2009 at 6:36 am

    Wow, that is like WAY cool!

    RT
    http://www.online-privacy.pro.tc

  8. Bedi Philips
    Mar 24th, 2009 at 9:31 am

    Great thinking by Alfred!

  9. Chris
    Mar 24th, 2009 at 8:55 pm

    Well, um, that’s not really a blog…

    It’s kind of like if there was some news story about someone publishing a printed version of Wikipedia.

  10. Gauldar
    Mar 25th, 2009 at 8:26 am

    I wonder if he is going to set up an RSS feed.

  11. soobbipsy
    May 20th, 2009 at 6:51 am

    Fantastic writing.. will definitely come back again soon=D

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    Thanks
    Sandra Dalene VanAlstine

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