M-Government

Author(s):  
Mubarak S. Almutairi

In developing countries like the Saudi Arabia, due to high mobile phone penetration rates, any electronic government initiatives that don’t take mobile technology into account will eventually fail. While the number of landline phones and internet subscribers are growing steadily over the past few years, the number of mobile phone users and its penetration rates are skyrocketing. In the near future and with the many mobile phone features, mobile phones will remain the main media of communication and a main source for providing information to citizens and customers.

2012 ◽  
pp. 1698-1717
Author(s):  
Mubarak S. Almutairi

In developing countries like the Saudi Arabia, due to high mobile phone penetration rates, any electronic government initiatives that don’t take mobile technology into account will eventually fail. While the number of landline phones and internet subscribers are growing steadily over the past few years, the number of mobile phone users and its penetration rates are skyrocketing. In the near future and with the many mobile phone features, mobile phones will remain the main media of communication and a main source for providing information to citizens and customers.


Author(s):  
Laura Stark

This chapter surveys and analyzes recent literature on mobile communication to examine its relationship to gender and development, more specifically how women in developing countries use and are impacted by mobile phones. Focusing on issues of power, agency, and social status, the chapter reviews how mobile telephony has been found to be implicated in patriarchal bargaining in different societies, how privacy and control are enabled through it, what benefits have been shown to accrue to women using mobile phones, and what barriers, limitations, and disadvantages of mobile use exist for women and why. The conclusion urges more gender-disaggregated analysis of mobile phone impact and use and offers policy and design recommendations based on the overview and discussion.


Author(s):  
Ho Sew Tiep ◽  
Goh Mei Ling ◽  
Radziah Shaikh Abdullah ◽  
Teo Kim Mui

As the world becomes increasingly interconnected, mobile phones has become the utmost preference device for most Malaysian to stay connected. Over the past decades, mobile phone users in this country has been increasing steadily. Percentage of individuals in Malaysia using mobile phones increased from 94.2% in 2013 to 97.5% in 2015 (DOS, 2016). According to the hand phone users survey carried out by MCMC (2017) , there were 42.3 million mobile phone subscriptions with a penetration rate of 131.2% to a population of 32.3 million at the end of 2017. In a study on university students of Malaysia, Ho et al. (2018) revealed that a substantial amount of them (18.83%) actually do not know what to do with the waste mobile phones. This reflects the low awareness amongst university students and the lack of formal management system in Malaysia. Moreover, the findings show the rate of replacements of even functioning phones is high and a significant high stockpile of the waste mobile phones, which in turn increase the generation of e-waste eventually. Tremendous amount of waste mobile phones are expected to be generated in Malaysia. Malaysia is now facing a challenge on how to deal with the ever growing generation of waste mobile phones from users. An insight into their e-waste management practices and key predictors in relation to waste mobile phones recycling intention are therefore essential. This would help to lay the foundation for developing a suitable, workable, effective and efficient system of collecting e-wastes. This study aims to probe into university students' behavioural intentions to recycle waste mobile phones. In the meanwhile, it is expected to derive the policy implications for the future expansion and enhancement of mobile phones recycling response rate. Keywords: Determinants, Mobile Phones, Recycling, Intention, University Students


2016 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. e26 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dror Ben-Zeev

Research has already demonstrated that different mHealth approaches are feasible, acceptable, and clinically promising for people with mental health problems. With a robust evidence base just over the horizon, now is the time for policy makers, researchers, and the private sector to partner in preparation for the near future. The Lifeline Assistance Program is a useful model to draw from. Created in 1985 by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC), Lifeline is a nationwide program designed to help eligible low-income individuals obtain home phone and landline services so they can pursue employment, reach help in case of emergency, and access social services and healthcare. In 2005, recognizing the broad shift towards mobile technology and mobile-cellular infrastructure, the FCC expanded the program to include mobile phones and data plans. The FCC provides a base level of federal support, but individual states are responsible for regional implementation, including engagement of commercial mobile phone carriers. Given the high rates of disability and poverty among people with severe mental illness, many are eligible to benefit from Lifeline and research has shown that a large proportion does in fact use this program to obtain a mobile phone and data plan. In the singular area of mobile phone use, the gap between people with severe mental illness and the general population in the U.S. is vanishing. Strategic multi-partner programs will be able to grant access to mHealth for mental health programs to those who will not be able to afford them—arguably, the people who need them the most. Mobile technology manufacturing costs are dropping. Soon all mobile phones in the marketplace, including the more inexpensive devices that are made available through subsidy programs, will have “smart” capabilities (ie, internet connectivity and the capacity to host apps). Programs like Lifeline could be expanded to include mHealth resources that capitalize on “smart” functions, such as secure/encrypted clinical texting programs and mental health monitoring and illness-management apps. Mobile phone hardware and software development companies could be engaged to add mHealth programs as a standard component in the suite of tools that come installed on their mobile phones; thus, in addition to navigation apps, media players, and games, the new Android or iPhone could come with guided relaxation videos, medication reminder systems, and evidence-based self-monitoring and self-management tools. Telecommunication companies could be encouraged to offer mHealth options with their data plans. Operating system updates pushed out by the mobile carrier companies could come with optional mHealth applications for those who elect to download them. In the same manner in which the Lifeline Assistance Program has helped increase access to fundamental opportunities to so many low-income individuals, innovative multi-partner programs have the potential to put mHealth for mental health resources in the hands of millions in the years ahead.


Author(s):  
Adriana Braga ◽  
Robert K. Logan

Recent statistics about the mobile phone market in Brazil state that for every 100 inhabitants there are 130 mobile phones. Despite the euphoria that those numbers bring to business, the social uses of mobile technology in Brazil tells a lot about Brazilian society and culture itself, and show a more complex picture than merely a marketing phenomenon. The authors examine subversive cell phone use in Brazil against the background of the cell phone use worldwide and the social implications of that cell phone use. As soon as a technology is implemented in a culture, it is possible to observe uses that were not intended by the inventors or producers of that technology. People create different strategies to take advantage of the new resource. Using social interaction theories and an ethnographic approach in the natural setting of cell phone use in Brazil, the authors observed how people use the mobile phone technology for interpersonal communication. This chapter addresses three subversive uses of mobile technology, namely, i.) strategies of mobile phone coding; ii) SIM card management; and iii) criminal uses of mobile phones.


Author(s):  
Gohar Feroz Khan ◽  
Junghoon Moon

Electronic government, or e-Government, is the practice of providing public services to citizens, businesses, and other government agencies where government services can be accessed through the Internet, mobile phone, fax, mail, telephone, and personal visits (MGAHA, 2005). Developing countries, utilizing the late comer advantage, are mimicking trends of paperless governments with the expectations to reap the same benefits enjoyed by developed countries. However, e-Government initiatives have not always been successful in developing countries. According to the study conducted by Heeks (2003), the rate of e-Government success in developing countries was only 15 percent. The authors believe that such failures are mainly due to certain unique social, economic, technological, and environmental challenges faced by e-Government in developing countries. For example, some major issues include digital divide, political instability, and skills-related issues. However, the research dealing with these problems is limited. Therefore, in this chapter, the authors discuss these challenges.


2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Sheikh Taher Abu

Japan has experienced two developmental stages in the mobile telephony innovation since 1979 when the first mobile phone was commercially launched. The stages can be identified as traditional mobile phone with only voice function and mobile phone with IP (Internet Protocol). This paper discusses how mobile phone with IP function offers diversified services, influences people’s daily lives by changing their ways of communication, and interaction by adopting mobile broadband. The paper examines key economic, technology and policy factors based on monthly datasets from 2000-2007 in the provision of both second (2G) and third generation (3G) mobile phones adoption. Particularly, the study uses a linear regression model and presents extended and reduced models using the Pearson correlation method. The results of the empirical study examine how innovations in services contribute to the mobile broadband deployment in Japan. Main findings of this study suggest policy and strategy implications for developing countries which are adopting IP functionality in mobile phones. The paper also presents brief recommendations for India’s 3G mobile phone adoptions in terms of opportunities, challenges, and policies which drive on growth.


Author(s):  
Renatus Mushi ◽  
Said Jafari

Voluntariness in technology adoption and use is vital in promoting technology diffusion and use in organisations. Various technology adoption models have been proposed to explain the adoption of technologies in different settings, such as organizational and individual, as well as in the voluntary and mandatory contexts. Recently, uptake of mobile phones in achieving organisational targets has been increased in developing countries and Tanzania in particular. This is due to the notable improvements in both hardware performance and sophistications. In organisation context, not all users are willing to use technology as required. In such circumstances, they are mandated to use it in order to fulfil their working duties. This leads to poor uptake of technology and results to unclear understanding regarding to their attitudes towards using it. While some studies have discussed the impact of voluntariness in using traditional desktop computer systems and thin client computing, mobile phone technology has not received the deserved attention. Discussing voluntariness in using mobile phone technology in organisations in relation to other technologies is essential especially due to its usage in both working and private purposes. This paper describes the voluntary aspects of using mobile phones in performing activities of the firms in Tanzania and compares it with desktop and thin client technologies. Also, it proposes possible ways of handling such situation in order to improve its use. Among others, the paper has analysed mandotoriness on usage of mobile technology. Further, it highlights key areas which should be addressed in order to improve the usage of mobiletechnology in organisations and eventually cover the gap caused by such mandatory situations.


Author(s):  
N. Srikhutkhao

In the past few years, the mobile phone’s performance has increased rapidly. According to IDC’s Worldwide Mobile Phone 2004-2008 Forecast and Analysis, sales of 2.5G mobile phones will drive market growth for the next several years, with sales of 3G mobile phones finally surpassing the 100 million annual unit mark in 2007. Future mobile phones can support more than 20,000 colors. With the advancements in functionality and performance of mobile phones, users will use them for all sorts of activities, and that will increase mobile content service requests. Currently, the pricing of mobile content service is up to each provider; typically they implement a fixed price called a market price because the providers do not have a formula to estimate the price according to the actual cost of their services. This article proposes a dynamic pricing model based on net cost for mobile content services.


Author(s):  
Daniel C. Doolan ◽  
Sabin Tabirca ◽  
Laurence T. Yang

Ever since the discovery of the Mandelbrot set, the use of computers to visualise fractal images have been an essential component. We are looking at the dawn of a new age, the age of ubiquitous computing. With many countries having near 100% mobile phone usage, there is clearly a potentially huge computation resource becoming available. In the past years there have been a few applications developed to generate fractal images on mobile phones. This chapter discusses three possible methodologies whereby such images can be visualised on mobile devices. These methods include: the generation of an image on a phone, the use of a server to generate the image and finally the use of a network of phones to distribute the processing task.


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