Here’s a fascinating idea – Alfred Sirleaf noticed that many of his fellow Liberians could not afford to buy newspapers, and even if they could, many of them wouldn’t be able to read them. To bring useful information to them, he came up with an ingeniously simple form of news – a blackboard.
He runs the Daily Talk ‘news hut’, which sits by the side of the road in Monrovia. He writes the news on it, phoned in to him from around the country by an informal network of contacts. You can read more about it on the wonderful Afrigadget blog.
In the UK, we are losing our tradition of local newspapers, which is a shame. With the loss of a local paper goes that hub for community activity, for events, buying and selling. Awareness of local business goes too, and participation in local democracy must suffer too. Perhaps Alfred’s idea would work in the UK too, at a cafe or pub.
The Earthbound Report 