[Discuss] Nzola Swasisa and Radio E-Mail

[Jeremy Kiffiak]

Hello fellow VLUGers,

Some of you may remember a VLUG discuss email from Brian Burger  
talking about Nzola and his work this past October.  Just last week I  
had a chance to meet with Nzola Swasisa and talk first hand with him  
about his project and some of the work he has already done in Africa.

Nzola is currently scheduled to give a rather low-tech presentation  
to a computer club at Lambrick Park Church on Monday March12.  I  
talked to him about perhaps giving a more advanced talk (and perhaps  
demo) on the same day if I could attract some interested parties.

So, if you are interested in attending a rather informal (and at this  
point small) group to get a little more familiar with radio email  
please either respond to me on-list or email me directly.  He also  
said that if, after his Monday presentation, there was sufficient  
interest he could give a talk at a future VLUG meeting.

As a further note, the original software that Nzola and his team were  
using for radio email was a Windows only based product.  He has  
recently teamed up with 2 other companies that use Linux on their  
hardware.  Nzola has virtually no experience at this time with Linux  
and so would be ecstatic to receive any help.  I personally am  
planning to volunteer some of my time with the project as it would  
seem to be something that has some very positive social/political  
benefits on a potentially global scale.  Plus the technology looks  
kind of cool.  8-)

Anyways, everyone is welcome to drop by Lambrick Park Church (room  
208) either for the initial presentation (from 1-2:30PM) or for the  
more techie session (3-4 or perhaps later depending on how things go).

Following are some related links for those who want to learn more.

The website for Nzola's project
http://www.radiomail1.net/

Kiel Radio:  one of the 2 new companies he is partnering with.  They  
recently sent him one of their radio "black boxes" pre-installed with  
Linux and their software.  Anyone interested in playing with it?
http://www.kiel-radio.de/

Maritime Global Net:  the second organization Nzola recently started  
working with.
http://www.mgn.com/

Jeremy
(on behalf on Nzola and his group)