Africans, and Kenyans in particular, are making their presence felt online too. When Kenya erupted in violence in the aftermath of a disputed general election in late 2007, a handful of Nairobi code writers created Ushahidi (meaning testimony in Swahili), a data-mapping platform to collate and locate reports of unrest sent in by the public via text message, e mail and social media. The idea was simply to find out what was happening. Says Ushahidi co-founder Juliana Rotich: "The TV was playing The Sound of Music while we could see houses burning in our neighborhood." But the desire to know what's going on turned out to be universal, and Ushahidi quickly became the world's default platform for mapping crises, disasters and political upheaval. According to Rotich, by May of this year, Ushahidi, which is free to download, had been used 14,000 times in 128 countries to map everything from last year's earthquake in Haiti to this year's Japanese tsunami and the Arab Spring.
As a result, Internet traffic in Africa is among the fastest growing in the world. "This is a tidal wave of activity crossing the continent," says Ben White, a blogger and the founder of VC4Africa, which connects African tech entrepreneurs with mentors and financiers. Google says online advertising in 2010 saw 5.2 billion clicks on African sites vs. 3.7 billion in Western Europe. "The pace is amazing. It's lightning speed," says Mucheru, who heads Google's sub-Saharan Africa office. The Web's economic effect echoes that of mobiles: a 2009 World Bank study found every 10% rise in high-speed connections raises growth by 1.3%.
"The TV was playing The Sound of Music while we could see houses burning in our neighborhood." But the desire to know what's going on turned out to be universal, and Ushahidi quickly became the world's default platform for mapping crises, disasters and political upheaval. They could use this service in Milwaukee, Chicago, and south Florida, among other places Obozo's flash mobs are operating and trying their wings.