Ethnographic studies for the PCtvt

PCtvt is a massive project undertaken by Dr. Raj Reddy,
faculty and Head at computer science dept, CMU. There are lots of
universities and student teams involved. The prominent participating
universities are IISc, IIIT, JNTU from India, CMU, Universities of
California, Berkeley from the US. The participating companies include
Microsoft, Trigem, Intel etc; If the product succeeds in the market it
is expected to lap up 4 billion PCtvts in the coming years. We are the students of JNTU currently pursuing the Master of
Science in Information Technology program (MSIT). Our target is to:1. A business model and registration procedure for the users of the
PCtvts, when they will be deployed in Indian villages in January, 2005
and full scale deployment goes underway in March, 2005.
2. The work includes conducting a survey in the target villages,
consolidating the data, writing reports, spending time with villagers
and teaching Village Information Officers (VIOs) how to use the PCtvt.
3. Checking out how the illiterates are using the device and comeback
to suggest changes in the user interface (ethnography) etc;
4. Finally we have to write a paper/report suggesting a business model
that would be able to market the PCtvt and they would earn profits.
Our Mentor is none other than Praveeen Garimella, Principal mentor for
MSIT and Project director, PCtvt-India.
Learn more about our targets, experiences and work.
Visit:http://www50.brinkster.com/pctvt
http://www.pctvt.tk
e-mail:
pctvt_jntu@googlegroups.com
pctvt@yahoogroups.com