Archive for the ‘asynchronous voice message’ tag
“A message oriented phone system for low cost connectivity”
I stumbled on a paper by R.J. Honicky, et al., called “A message oriented phone system for low cost connectivity” when I was on Nathan Eagle’s publication page. Nathan Eagle is the PI for EPROM.
This paper excited me because it’s about an idea for a voice message based system for people living in developing countries. The system it proposes is much more concerned with hardware and infrastructure than my Pigeon idea, but it a great point for helping me to continue generating questions about communication in developing countires and to begin more academic research.
I had been thinking about Pigeon more in terms of international calling, but domestic use could be useful also. As I’ve been talking to people about mobile phone use in Belize, there are still hoops people will jump through to save their credit. Something that could help them save money and communicate more easily would have a good chance of being adopted.
The paper mentions how a voice message system would effectively put people on the grid who live in areas where there is no mobile coverage but travel often to areas with coverage. In this case, asynchronous communication may be beneficial since when a person will be avaliable is unknown. Honicky’s proposed system would allow people to record when they are unconnected and then to upload when they are in a connected area.