Revisiting CGNet Swara and its impact in rural India

Abstract

CGNet Swara is a voice-based platform for citizen journalism, launched in rural India in 2010. Since then, CGNet Swara has logged over 575,000 phone calls, over 6,900 published stories, and 287 reports of specific problems that were solved via the system. In this paper, we characterize the ongoing impact of CGNet Swara using a mixed-methods approach that includes 70 interviews with contributors, listeners, moderators, journalists, officials, and other actors. Our analysis also draws on the content of published posts, two focus groups, and a 9-day field immersion. Our results highlight personal narratives of the transformative benefits CGNet Swara has brought to rural communities. While the resolution of grievances is the most visible impact, we also uncover a diverse portfolio of other impacts connected to contributing and listening to the platform, as well as opportunities to further enhance impact. Our work contributes to the dialogue surrounding the impact of ICTD projects, especially those that span multiple years.

Utilizing Participant Voice in Volunteer Training

“…This has encouraged research into text-free and speech-based user interfaces and notably, Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems [13,48,65]. Speech interfaces have supported designs across a range of contexts, including: low-literacy populations in areas such as citizen journalism [50], grievance redress [46,53], cultural archiving [73] and leisure [60]. This is in line with broader trends around technology use in Developing contexts: countries in Asia-Pacific have an above average proportion of internet users who use voice controlled functionality on devices [36].…”

Learn2Earn

“…Polly Health [43] is an example of how this viral spread can be leveraged to disseminate health information between peers. Voice forums in additional domains such as citizen journalism [21,23], agriculture [25], and maternal health [6] have shown strong usage and impact. Learn2Earn seeks to build upon the lessons learned in these projects.…”

“…While the system was intended to spread via word of mouth, outreach to initial users required a different strategy. In our pilot, we seeded uptake by advertising the system on CGNet Swara, an existing IVR platform that was already used by indigenous populations [21]. In other contexts, seeding via personal outreach or one-time use of broadcast media (radio, TV, print, etc.)…”

From Alley to Landfill

“…Works by Sambasivan et al use exploratory studies to describe living realities, adoption, and use of mobile phones in urban slums [31]. Medhi et al and other researchers from the CHI and ICT for development (ICTD) communities examine the challenges to mobile use in low-literate communities and offer viable solutions including text-free and voice-based interfaces [23,22]. Other works introduce novel technology and interface design through direct interventions in developing regions [17,22,15].…”

“…Medhi et al and other researchers from the CHI and ICT for development (ICTD) communities examine the challenges to mobile use in low-literate communities and offer viable solutions including text-free and voice-based interfaces [23,22]. Other works introduce novel technology and interface design through direct interventions in developing regions [17,22,15]. The most closely related work to our problem of coordination in developing regions, Gupta et al studied the introduction of a mobile crowdsourcing platform for digitizing documents in India [17].…”