70975 Water Papers Water Papers MAY 2012 WATER HACKATHON Lessons Learned Water Papers are published by the Water Unit, Transport, Water and ICT Department, Sustainable Development Vice Presidency. Water Papers are available on-line at www.worldbank.org/water. Comments should be e-mailed to the authors. Water HackatHon report ii APPROviNg MANAgERs Julia Bucknall, Sector Manager, TWIWA Jae So, Manager, TWIWP Philippe Dongier, TWICT CONTACT iNfORMATiON This paper is available online at http://www.worldbank.org/water. The authors can be contacted through the Water Help Desk at whelpdesk@worldbank.org DisClAiMER This volume is a product of the staff of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/The World Bank. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this paper do not necessarily reflect the views of the Executive Directors of The World Bank or the governments they represent. The World Bank does not guarantee the accuracy of the data included in this work. 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All other queries on rights and licenses, including subsidiary rights, should be addressed to the Office of the Publisher, The World Bank, 1818 H Street NW, Washington, DC 20433,USA; fax 202-522-2422; e-mail pubrights@worldbank.org Water HackatHon report iii TAblE Of CONTENTs Acknowledgements .....................................................................................................................v Executive Summary ....................................................................................................................vi Background .................................................................................................................................1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................1 What is a Hackathon?.........................................................................................................3 What is the RHoK model? ..................................................................................................4 What was different about Water Hackathon? .......................................................................5 Project Objectives and Outputs ..................................................................................................7 Benefits .............................................................................................................................9 Process ......................................................................................................................................10 Checklist ..........................................................................................................................11 Problem definition ..........................................................................................................13 Collection .............................................................................................................13 Translation ............................................................................................................15 Pre-events ............................................................................................................16 Communication .....................................................................................................19 Partnerships .........................................................................................................20 Hackathon ......................................................................................................................21 Facilitator .............................................................................................................21 Venue ..................................................................................................................21 Sponsorship .........................................................................................................21 Prizes ..................................................................................................................22 Judges .................................................................................................................23 Code repository ....................................................................................................23 Water Hackathon Locations ..................................................................................24 Follow-up .......................................................................................................................26 Water Ambassadors .............................................................................................26 Incubation ............................................................................................................27 Follow-up events ..................................................................................................27 Implications for procurement ...................................................................................................28 Annexes .....................................................................................................................................29 Annex 1 Start-ups ..........................................................................................................29 Annex 2 Problems ............................................................................................................34 Annex 3 Links to Planning Documents ..............................................................................53 Annex 4 Local Partners ....................................................................................................54 Annex 5 Cost breakdown ..................................................................................................55 Annex 6 Funding sources .................................................................................................56 Annex 7 Sample water applications ..................................................................................57 References .................................................................................................................................64 Water HackatHon report iv ACKNOWlEDgEMENTs The Water Partnership Program’s funding for this project is gratefully acknowledged. Water Hackathon was led jointly by the World Bank Water Anchor, Water and Sanitation Program and ICT Sector Unit, with operational support from Second Muse, technology partners from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Open Development Technology Alliance, Random Hacks of Kindness, and dedicated local partner organizations in each hackathon event location. The report was prepared by Daniel Shemie, Max Hirn, Vivek Raman, Cecilia Paradi-Guilford, Elizabeth Sabet, Yehude Simon, Rosemary Rop and Edward Anderson. Ilana Cohen and Christian Kreutz provided valuable research. The authors are grateful for useful comments provided by Isabelle Huynh, Nagaraja Rao Harshadeep, Rajendra Singh, Randeep Sudan, Robbie Schingler, Francis Ghesquiere, Eric Gundersen, Noel Dickover and Johannes S. Kiess. A large number of World Bank colleagues contributed to making Water Hackathon a success. While these individuals are too numerous to mention, the authors would like to acknowledge the contributions made by Christopher Walsh, Kara Watkins, Katherine Maher, Ravikumar Joseph, Kimberly Lyon, Christopher Juan Costain, Deepak T. Bhatia, Ammini Menon, Vandana Mehra, Adrien Andre Pinelli, Nehal Hassan El Kouesny, Heba Yaken Aref Ahmed, Carlo M. Rossotto, Susanne Scheierling, Juan Chong Ortiz, Iris Marmanillo, Miguel Vargas-Ramirez, Glenn Pearce- Oroz, Lizmara Kirchner, Richard Murby, Samuel Mutono, Steven K. Shalita, Wambui G. Gichuri, Toni Sittoni, Alex McPhail, Karolina Ordon, Will Pate, Stuart Gill, Sheryl Silverman, Samhir Vasdev, Linda Adigwe, Immaculate Bampadde, Chonlada Sae-Hau, Patrick Mwangi and Nagaraja Rao Harshadeep. The team would also like to acknowledge the support of managers Julia Bucknall, Jae So and Philippe Dongier. Global partners provided invaluable support at each hackathon event location. The authors would like to acknowledge the invaluable contribution of event leaders Suryanarayanan A., Paul Rau, Andrew Petrovitch, Femi Longe, Bosun Tijani, Kiko Mayorga, Michael Niyitegeka, Julien Harou, Phares Kariuki, Jessica Colaco, Dan Nesher and Melanie Gorka. The full list of partners is included in Annex 4. Water HackatHon report v ExECuTivE suMMARy The global revolution in low cost information and communication technologies can help address some of the developing world’s oldest challenges in water and sanitation. More people today have access to a mobile phone than to a toilet. Convergence of widespread mobile phone ownership with new mobile commerce and location aware services offer new platforms for reach, transparency and participation in achieving water security. ObjECTivEs The 2011 Water Hackathon was a first-of-its-kind gathering of software developers with the aim of increasing awareness of water sector challenges facing developing countries amongst technical communities in-country and globally. Water Hackathon had four interim objectives: (i) creation of a network of atypical partners engaged in finding solutions to water-related challenges, (ii) preparation of a list of challenges facing the water sector, (iii) development of new applications designed to address these challenges, and (iv) adoption of new applications and codes in World Bank projects. Water Hackathon adopted many of the methods for engagement of technologists from the software community. The team also sought to adapt—or re-engineer—the methodology to suit a traditional development sector. In this context, Water Hackathon should be seen both as a process as well as a series of events intended to build a lasting community around water innovation needs. OuTCOMEs Water Hackathon took place simultaneously in ten cities around the world. From Lima to Cairo to Bangalore, over 500 local technology specialists competed to build prototype solutions to water- sector challenges defined by governments, utilities, civil society groups, World Bank experts, and directly by citizens. By embracing a competition model common in Silicon Valley, and through partnership with tech organizations, universities and community leaders, the World Bank was able to leverage its brand to draw attention to development water problems. Overall, more than 60 prototype solutions were built in response to the 113 water sector challenges defined. The team observed that in order for hackathon outputs to lead to meaningful outcomes for beneficiaries, there is a need for more iterative learning, transparency and sharing of experiences and tools as a means to improve water and sanitation services. PROCEss The hackathon event was preceded by an iterative process of consultation, definition and refinement. These processes identified significant challenges in the water sector judged amenable to technology solutions. They were then reframed in a way that allowed computer programmers— often unfamiliar with the water sector—to understand and address them directly. Strong partnerships with local technology leaders allowed the World Bank to reach this community, and the response was enthusiastic. The iterative process of defining pressing problems also brought to the surface existing and nascent innovations and innovators within the water community. This deepened their engagement and strengthened their ties, both to one another and to the hackathon community. Water HackatHon report vi fOllOW-uP The process also emphasized the importance of follow-up activities after the hackathon. Winning teams were rewarded with business incubation support and offered further opportunities to engage with their water counterparts. In some cases, this led to financing start-ups and the recruitment of local developers by various governments. These outcomes reinforce the conviction that in order to achieve lasting impact, a hackathon should be part of a process, not just a one-off event, with deep preparation in both expert and local communities, as well as follow-up. lEssONs The openness of the approach attracted considerable attention from within the water community and also from print and online media, including blogs and social networks, which traditionally do not feature water content. “This was the new Egypt at work,� said one participant in Cairo. Water Hackathon offered a low-cost, high-reward opportunity to open up water sector challenges to the talent and creativity of the ICT design and development community. This approach also required a change in mindset for the World Bank, calling for greater openness, experimentation and tolerance of failure. Other development sectors willing to take this risk may find useful the lessons learned in the process, which are detailed in this paper. Water HackatHon report vii Background Introduction With the number of mobile subscriptions exceeding five billion, more people today have access to a mobile phone than to a toilet. The surge in mobile phones in developing countries—some 94 percent of urban Africans are near a GSM signal—is transforming the way people live. Farmers in Niger use mobile phones to find out which market is offering the best price for certain goods. People in Kenya can pay their water bills using mobile money. In India, the mobile phone is used in citizen election monitoring and in equipping voters, via text message, with information on candidates’ incomes and criminal backgrounds (Devarajan 2012). The lack of safe drinking water and adequate sanitation is the world’s single larg- est cause of illnesses, responsible for two million deaths a year. The sustainable management of water resources has acquired a new urgency considering that the global population is expected to reach nine billion by 2050. Water is also the primary medium through which climate change will impact people, economies, and ecosystems. In many poor countries, water resource variability is already pos- ing a challenge to development efforts. Poor governance and political interference remain key constraints to addressing these issues. New non-traditional ideas, the better use of open data, and innovative tools are needed to respond to this global water crisis, in an effort to change the governance of these systems and improve trust in water services. The global convergence of increasing mobile network coverage, mobile commerce and smart technologies offer new pathways to achieving water security based on low-cost, scalable and accessible information architecture (Hope et al. 2011). From leak detection to smart water metering to database management, software is already embedded in the delivery of water services. Use of Geographic Informa- tion Systems (GIS) are also widespread in hydro modeling. More recently, mobile phones are increasingly being used for individual reporting of hydrological events, such as floods or droughts, or for crowdsourcing1 approaches using networks. 1 Crowdsourcing is the act of outsourcing tasks to an undefined, large group of people or community (a “crowd�), through an open call. Water HackatHon report 1 Background Are we taking full advantage of increasingly ubiquitous mobile phones and internet access to transform water management and services when it comes to inclusiveness, citizen participation, and transparency? are we using open data to its fullest practical advantage? In search of answers, the World Bank water practice embarked on a year-long process of introspection and outreach that culminated in the first ever water hackathon. Bangalore Water Hackathon Access to An Improved wAter source And sAnItAtIon compAred to moBIle suBscrIptIons In developIng countrIes 100 90 80 70 Percentage of Population 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2011 2010 2012 1990 1991 1992 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 Mobile Subscriptions Improved Sanitation Access Improved Water Access Source: JMP and World Bank Open Data Water HackatHon report 2 Background what is a “Hackathon�? A hack-a-thon event (also known as an apps challenge, hack day, hackfest or codefest) is an intensive marathon competition of brainstorming and computer programming that draws together the talent and creativity of software developers and designers. These events typically last from several days to a week in length, and can be com- mercial or civic in nature. The barrier to entry in the creation of open source mobile and web applications is low, enabling innovation and the creation of operable prototypes within tight time constraints. Since their inception, the main purpose of hackathons has been to bring together programmers in order that they might share their skills for common projects. What began as rather informal get-togethers among programmers have evolved to become increasingly well-organized events aimed at motivating programmers to share their skills and fulfill a social purpose. Organized hackathons may even offer incentives, such as prizes. Kampala Water Hackathon It is important to understand the root of such events, since they are based on open collaboration within a distinct culture. The success of a hackathon therefore de- pends in no small measure on the event’s perceived authenticity, which first must be ensured by embracing the language of hackers. The term “hacker� itself is often misinterpreted by the public when it comes to programmers.2 There is regularly a need to define “hacking� and to explain what hackathon organizers understand by the term. An increasing number of hackathon events aim to pair technology expertise with real world problems. Hackathons are common in Silicon Valley, where companies such as Linkedin and Facebook credit them with some of their best innovations (Coutu 2011). However, there have been few public sector-led hacking competitions. Recognizing the potential for the co-creation of knowledge, an increasing number of hackathon events aim to direct technology expertise toward addressing real world problems. One prominent example is Random Hacks of Kindness (RHoK), which organizes biannual hacking events focused on developing technical solutions in response to humanitarian challenges. 2 See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_(programmer_subculture)#Ethics Water HackatHon report 3 Background what is the rHoK model? the World Bank engaged with the hackathon methodology before designing Water Hackathon, most notably through the Random Hacks of Kindness (RHoK) model, which was driven in its onset (2009-2011) by the disaster risk management community. The RHoK approach was inspired by earthquake impacts in real time. The of others to use and adapt developed the steady rise in technical volun- mobile application was piloted in Chile technologies according to their needs. teerism of software developers willing after the 2010 earthquake.4 Projects must be licensed under an to dedicate time to coding, mapping, Open Source Initiative (OSI) approved RHoK projects are open source. The and web design in response to global license.5 Projects must also have their RHoK model allows participants the humanitarian crises. Random Hacks of code posted on a publicly available most freedom possible in selecting Kindness sought to provide an avenue code repository. a license, balanced with the freedom for volunteer developers to contribute their skills to help communities prepare for risks before crises occurred, rather exAmples of HAcKIng for HumAnIty simply in response to disasters. RHoK events offer an opportunity for The following are some examples of hackathons and application subject matter experts and technolo- development competitions to support improved public services: gists to work together on addressing Random Hacks of Kindness (multiple cities): civic challenges. Through global http://www.rhok.org/ partnerships (Google, Microsoft, Yahoo!, NASA, HP and the World Bank) New York City Big Apps Competition: and the support of 180 local partner http://nycbigapps.com/ organizations, RHoK aims to attract en- Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) Transit App Contest: thusiastic programmers and designers http://www.vta.org/appcontest/ to engage on a voluntary basis in locally organized events held around the world. Apps for Californians Competition: http://www.ca.gov/appsforcalifornians/ The combination of sector expertise and “hacking� skills—which include World Bank Apps for Development: expertise in computer programming, http://appsfordevelopment.challengepost.com/ web design, mapping, database Apps for Climate Action Contest: management, social media, and online http://www.livesmartbc.ca/A4CA/ campaigns — has led to numerous unique software solutions.3 For ex- Reinvent NYC.gov (New York City): ample, one winning solution to emerge http://socialmediaweek.org/blog/tag/hackathon/ from RHoK allows first responders to Crisis Camp Haiti: crowdsource useful information about http://crisiscamphaitiwdc.eventbrite.com/ International Space Apps Challenge: http://open.nasa.gov/appschallenge/ 3 See http://dl.dropbox.com/u/6479339/RHoK Hacking Autism: Success Stories.pptx for full list of deployed http://www.hackingautism.org/ apps to emerge from RHoK 4 See http://epic.cs.colorado.edu/?page_id=11 5 See http://www.opensource.org/licenses/category Water HackatHon report 4 Background what is different about water Hackathon? matter expert involvement through- out the process; (iii) local community building by leveraging existing networks and recognized local champions; (iv) targeting incentives towards technical entrepreneurs more likely to engage in the medium term, rather than volun- teers for the short term; (v) positioning of problem statement owners as clients with some degree of follow-up commit- ment; and (vi) investment in post-event measures, such as naming of water ambassadors. water Hackathon aimed to build on the rHoK model, Nairobi Water Hackathon implementing several Many early hackathon events in the humanitarian sector modifications based on included “crisis camps� and often took the form of self- rHoK’s experience: organizing groups convening during weekends in 1. the team would make a concerted effort to source response to immediate crisis events. problems from World Bank These were successful at attracting high-quality technical volunteers. While the staff, local government, and outcomes of such events had an impact in the response phase of disasters, the local communities directly. value of rapid but short-lived technical volunteerism to the longer-term goals of disaster risk management—in prevention and sustainable recovery—were less 2. the team would encourage clear. Most projects suffered a lack of sector expert engagement, a narrow focus sector specialists to on short-term needs and limited follow-through on the part of the volunteers participate in hackathon that created the application. events and pre-events. While the water and sanitation sectors have much in common with disaster risk management, it was also clear that the incentive mechanisms would have to be 3. the team would embed adapted. Water and sanitation would not be able to count on the powerful moti- follow-up measures to vator of a major crisis to attract technical volunteers and would, therefore, have support and showcase to build a case for itself. On the other hand, a non-crisis driven sector can afford winning teams. to pick a fixed date and invest in lengthy preparatory screenings and community building. Water Hackathon, therefore, sought to adopt a process inspired by the RHoK model but chose to identify and brand itself primarily as an activity led by the water community. It also emphasized incentives aimed at leveraging more appropriate applications and more sustainable outcomes. The principal design features have been to prioritize: (i) locally identified problems; (ii) deep subject Water HackatHon report 5 Background need to HAve vs. nIce to HAve These modifications were designed with two outcomes in mind: 1. to increase the likelihood that the hackathon would produce “need to have� prototype apps for World Bank staff and their counterparts rather than “nice to have� technology solutions that might be useful for outreach or for water advocacy more broadly. 2. To increase the likelihood that those “need to have� prototypes apps would have access to resources to help them scale up and deploy in the field quickly and cheaply. Water Hackathon represented a radically open approach to problem solving, unusual to most in the water sector in and outside of the World Bank. Accordingly, water professionals, as much as their technology counterparts, needed to be London Water Hackathon convinced of the merit of participating. The team quickly learned that many water problems are multifaceted and do not lend themselves to simple technology descriptions, and thereby requiring considerable translation by ICT experts. More often than not, convincing water professionals of ICT’s potential and translating water sector issues for technology experts was best facilitated by local knowledge of the constraints and context of the problems. These efforts were aided greatly by the fact that the department and vice presidency were able to jointly share risks and accountability (the water and ICT teams are both part of TWI), ensuring cross-sectoral collaboration and a decentralized World Bank presence. Water HackatHon report 6 objectives and outputs project objectives Water Hackathon began with a modest development objective — to increase awareness among technical communities, in-country and globally, of the water-related challenges faced by developing countries. From the outset, the organizing team (composed of technology and water experts from the World Bank’s Water anchor, Water and Sanitation Program, and ICT Sector Unit) recognized that reaching the global tech community would require going beyond the traditional boundaries of the World Bank. In order for promote this cross-sectoral collaboration, the team sought to attract non-traditional solutions to development water problems. The team, however, was always more concerned about building a community than about generating applications. In doing so, the team needed to remove barriers for collaboration between water professionals and local technologists. Cairo Water Hackathon project components: 1. Convene a network of non-traditional partners committed to finding solutions to water-related challenges 2. Establish a list of challenges facing the water sector 3. Develop new software applications and appropriate technologies designed to address these challenges 4. Promote the adoption and deployment of new applications and appropriate technologies in water projects, including those of the World Bank and its counterparts tHe scope: The scope of the activity was deliberately broad in order to capture the greatest number of problem definitions (see Annex 2), including but not limited to challenges relating to water supply and sanitation, flood and water resource management, and agricultural water management. Water HackatHon report 7 objectives and outputs project outputs the project had three phases of outputs: pHAse 1 April — October 2011 Preparation of a list of challenges facing the water sector 113 Problems (Full list Annex 2) Design and management of on-line platform for collaboration waterhackathon.org Establishment of partnerships with actors in the water community 25 Partners Identification of three main stages for the event Bangalore, Cairo and Nairobi pHAse 2 July — October 2011 Refinement of the list of challenges facing the water sector rhok.org/problems Establishment of partnership with the ICT community 40 Partners Organization and execution of a hackathon event 10 hackathons held simultaneously in Ban- galore, Cairo, Kampala, Lagos, Lima, London, Nairobi, Tel Aviv, Toronto, and Washington DC Development of new applications and codes designed 62 prototypes developed7. 67 percent of partici- to address water challenges pants were still working on their project three months after the hackathon. pHAse 3 November — February 2012 Dissemination of the best ranking applications and Water Ambassadors enlisted, post-event codes developed meet-ups, government-hosted workshops, multiple blog posts and articles Organization of learning events for Bank water staff TWI department meeting 7 Since October, various participants of hackathons organized independent of the World Bank have worked on the problems published online. Water HackatHon report 8 objectives and outputs Benefits outcome BenefIcIAry exAmple Direct benefits Network of non-traditional partners Water clients 25 water sector partners and 40 ICT partners collaborated across focussed on water challenges 10 events - included new connections with partners such as Bug Labs, Nokia, and Akvo A discrete listing of innovation Innovators 113 problem statements described by experts and associated needs and potential sponsors with potential sponsors or host projects Appropriate applications developed Water clients 62 protypes were created at the hackathon including water testing, citizen feedback, and water use optimization Real world deployment of new Water clients and Three months after the event, 67% of participants continued to technologies citizens work on their prototypes, five deployed in projects Indirect benefits Creation of new communities Water clients and 12 start-ups were founded to address diverse needs of the water citizens sector, 10 Water Ambassadors selected to follow-up with partici- pants and report biweekly on development of prototypes New public release of water data Water clients and The Open Peruvian Water Map prototype makes official data avail- citizens able to the public and, for the first time, consolidates all available water resources data in a central and open form Awareness of water challenges Water clients and Broad media coverage - eg. Wired magazine article on water hack- citizens athon and water innovation needs, #waterhack twitter trending Demonstrated culture for risk and World Bank Group, Government of India water specialists encouraged to put forward innovation water clients new ideas for innovation Changed public perception of risk World Bank Group Innovators and development partners more likely to approach the apetite of World Bank Bank with new ideas - eg. National Geographic Learning and awareness of ICT World Bank Group, Numerous bank and government staff participating in hacking opportunities water clients events and internal learning events Improved synergies across World Bank Group World Bank Group staff collaboration across Water, Sanitation, ICT, departments disciplines Communications, Innovation and Country units Synthesis of local talent and Procurement pro- Hackathon functioned as precursor to support the design of demystified R&D tasks fessionals Requests for Proposals, identifying potential consultants and il- lustrating the breadth of potential technical approaches that could apply Water HackatHon report 9 the process Approach lessons learned from water Hackathon Water Hackathon can be seen through the event-centric lens, with output measured by number of submitted problem statements, participants, and prototypes developed, and it can also be viewed as a process. In the event regard, Water Hackathon activities exceeded expectations, with nearly An overemphasis on outputs 1000 registered hackers at ten locations worldwide, and some 62 new prototypes developed. It is little wonder that public attention—and considerable media conceals many of the meaningful attention—should focus on the event itself. However, an overemphasis on outputs outcomes that can result conceals many of the meaningful outcomes that can result from designing a from designing a hackathon as hackathon as a process that supports the creation of connected water and a process. technology communities. The process approach places equal emphasis on the collection of problems from those best equipped to define them, the execution of a fun and open hackathon hosted by tech community partners best equipped to organize them, and follow-up activities that offer opportunities for further collaboration. Lima Water Hackathon Water HackatHon report 10 the process Approach cHecKlIst for sector-led HAcKAtHon Must have Optimal but optional For Bank Staff proBlem defInItIon begin 1 - 4 months prior to the hackathon date problem collection Pre-events Identify suitable development problems through Facilitate communication between software devel- active preparation and consultation with those in- opers and sector experts over a longer period (1-3 vested in the sector, including government, private months) prior to hackathon event, e.g. through services providers, NGOs, citizens and World meet-ups, tech camps, and clinics. Bank staff. problem translation partnerships Reframe development problems into succinct Engage a local tech partner that will be better technical specifications recognizable to software equipped to host a hackathon and can lend developers. Support from tech partners at pre- authenticity to the event. events is helpful. communication Brown Bag Lunch With the help of tech partners and in-country staff, Host a BBL early on to inform staff of the hack- identify the best outreach channels (blogs, press athon, key dates and how to participate. Once on release, etc.) in order to attract quality participants board, staff are the key link to problem owners in and shape a communications strategy around im- government. pacts to real world problems to attract volunteers seeking to make a difference. HAcKAtHon event begin 1 - 2 months prior to the hackathon date code repository Facilitator Post participant-developed solutions to a common Recruit facilitators to be responsible for opening web platform. Clearly indicate in advance guide- and closing the event, communicating hackathon lines for licensing (eg. OSI approved license posted rules to participants, guiding judges through the in a publicly available code repository such as selection process, and providing general logistical GitHub or Google Code.) support during the event. venue Sponsorship Choose a creative, non-traditional, open space Sponsorship from the local business community for the event, preferably provided by a partner or could take many forms, including venue provision, sponsor. If it is difficult to reach, group transporta- prizes and refreshments. Organizers should con- tion should be arranged. sider how much discretion over licensing they wish to maintain when aligning with partners. Water HackatHon report 11 the process Approach cHecKlIst for sector-led HAcKAtHon (contInued) Must have Optimal but optional For Bank Staff HAcKAtHon event (Continued) begin 1 - 2 months prior to the hackathon date Judges Share knowledge Invite a distinguished group of leaders from the Prepare and share briefing notes with Bank Man- development sector and from the tech community agement in advance of the event. This will prevent to act as judges. Judges use criteria, developed by misunderstandings and provide an opportunity for organizers, to evaluate the applications developed input and participation. at the event. Prizes Prizes could be a bonus for participants although participants tend to be motivated, in large part, by the opportunity to contribute to real-world solu- tions. follow-up begin immediately following hackathon date ambassadors Post-events Recruit “Ambassadors� at event locations to Follow-up events enable programmers to further support follow-up. They write blogposts document- engage with their development sector counter- ing the progress of applications and facilitate com- parts. This can lead to financing for start-ups and munication among the new community other employment opportunities. of participants. incubation Get Feedback Make the effort to collaborate with incubation Send out an on-line survey to participants for facilities that offer access to office space, feedback on what worked and what didn’t. This internet access, and mentorship from is useful for documenting success and learning experienced start-ups. from mistakes. Water HackatHon report 12 the process Approach problem definition in order for software programmers and designers to build meaningful prototypes, they needed to understand the challenges facing those already invested in the sector. The natural first step for any sector- the one hand, many were not yet con- services. Securing their ownership of a focused hackathons is cataloguing vinced that ICT could add value to their problem was critical, not least because these problems. For Water Hackathon, projects. Engagement in the hackathon they are the natural clients of a several groups were targeted, including would thus be an exploratory venture, good solution. water experts at the World Bank and perceived as too time consuming in a in academia, water service providers task manager’s already tight agenda. once on board, staff became (utilities and local government), non- For this category, the team collected the key link to service providers governmental organizations (NGOs), examples of technological applications and government. and finally, end users of water services. that had led to increased transparency and accountability at the project level In many countries, the government had (see Annex 6). access to sectoral data that may be proBlem collectIon On the other hand, where task unavailable to the general public. The Extracting Development Problems managers had a commitment to inte- team witnessed a strong correlation be- from the Source grating ICT and had clearly formulated tween having a proactive government problems, reluctance was borne of partner and running a successful hack- lesson: Identifying suitable problem athon. For example, in Peru, the Lima reputational risk for the Bank. The fact definitions for a Hackathon will require hackathon resulted in the release for that hackers were likely to be young active preparation and consultation. It is the first time of national hydrological individuals without the backing of necessary to interview people, so they data from the Ministry of Agriculture. professional software development can explain their challenges with a water This process of securing problem own- firms raised the concern that engag- project and provide or suggest data ership by public sector counterparts ing hackers could be a futile endeavor, when relevant. One is generally unable relied heavily on the credibility and as winners would either not have the to rely on a spontaneous submission of dedication of World Bank colleagues in qualifications to be hired on behalf of suitable problems. the field. clients or, if hired, would be too difficult The participation of experts from the to administer in view of World Bank field was critical to Water Hackathon’s procurement and web governance success, but many are unfamiliar requirements. For this category of with how ICT can help address seem- skeptics, management endorsement of ingly intractable issues. To bring these the hackathon process was critical to front-line engineers, project manag- driving up participation among staff. ers, and community organizations into Once on board, staff became the key the process, the team began asking a link to service providers and govern- simple question: “what information do ment. Better than any external expert, Click to watch video: you wish you had�?8 the professionals within these organi- Can a Webcam Monitor Waterflows? At the outset, World Bank water experts zations understand the problems they http://youtu.be/aWyQb4epa8s were very reluctant to participate. On face on a daily basis delivering water 8 Sometimes the converse question would help too, namely “what information do you have, that you wish others had access too�. This question worked well with owners of national hydrology data, like Peru’s Ministry of Agriculture, or owners of international meteorological data, like NASA. Often this data was already in the public domain but its location and importance obscured. Water HackatHon report 13 the process Approach from proBlem to pIlot The origin on Maji Voice The winning Maji-Voice application was developed at the Nairobi Water Hackathon in response to a challenge issued by the Kenyan national Water Services Regulatory Board (WASREB) to develop a new mobile-to-web customer feedback system. 18 months prior to the hackathon, the regulator, in partnership with the Water and Sanitation Program, piloted a sector feedback mechanism through local, community-based watchdogs, referred to as Water Action Groups (WAGs). Three important lessons from the WAG pilot Click to watch video: informed the hackathon problem statement. First, that structured citizen engagement on The Cartel Problem in Mathare the demand side as formalized through the WAGs initiative improved turnaround times of http://vimeo.com/27528058 outstanding service challenges, especially those faced by poorer populations relying on kiosks. Secondly, it unveiled glaring weaknesses in accountability of the resolution of utility Leveraging the World Bank’s convening complaints recording and resolution processes, in spite of the considerable gains realized power and that of civil society partners, by sector reforms and the Water Act of 2002. Thirdly and importantly with respect to the the team was able to collect problems hackathon was the lesson that, from the enormous amount of feedback generated by WAGs in four cities alone, the mechanism could not be scaled up nationwide as planned unless directly from end users. For residents in a smarter means of handling the bulky data generated was found. The regulator and WSP Mathare, that problem was the cartels concluded that an electronic feedback system could further accelerate refom and improve that charged ten times what the aver- sector efficiency by: age Kenyan pays for clean water. For a • Enabling automated consolidation of bulky citizen feedback data, data analysis farming company in Egypt, the problem and reporting was inefficiencies in irrigation that left • Providing a demand-side tool to facilitate access to information and inform dialogue them short of water in the dry season. around service improvements between consumer representatives and their service While not all of these problems lent providers themselves to ICT solutions, those that • Assuring accountability in resolving consumer cases, tracking progress of responses in did ranked among the most compelling. real-time, and improving the effectiveness of the oversight functions between front line The involvement of end users also shed staff, utility management, water boards and WASREB light on the barriers to ICT use, such as World Bank staff worked with the regulator to write up a simplified definition of the illiteracy, network access, electricity for problem and the sought-after features. WASREB showed its commitment by sending a charging, and education levels. representative to the Nairobi Hackathon event to explain the challenge to the technology experts present. Multiple hacker teams then competed to build and demonstrate an This process of sensitizing water efficient prototype solution. The winning Maji-Voice application managed to include all key stakeholders to the potential of ICT to features that function well, even on basic Nokia handsets. increase transparency, participation In the spirit of treating the Hackathon as a process, the winning team received a six- and accountability itself has value. month business incubation sponsorship and was asked to participate in a tender to develop Many water professionals are curious the system to maturity. The intention was to give the best Hackathon teams a path to build on the outcomes of the actual Hackathon event. The Maji-Voice team eventually managed about how they might leverage the to obtain endorsement by WASREB and its partners to develop the initial prototype. The rapid growth in access to ICT tools in development is currently ongoing. their work. However, just as water professionals have developed their own vernacular, so too have technologists, preventing all but the most enthusiastic water professional from getting involved. 9 See blog by Daraja on barriers for Maji Matone http://blog.daraja.org/2012/02/so-what-have-we-learnt-summarising.html Water HackatHon report 14 the process Approach proBlem trAnslAtIon PRoBleM SPeCIfICATIoNS Reframing development problems for techies Often requiring input from both subject matter experts and technical interme- lesson: It is important to reframe water problems so that the technology entry diaries, this section allows computer point is clear. The goal is to allow programmers and designers to relate to the water programmers—often unfamiliar with community; this appears to work best when issues are presented in the form of the water sector—to understand where human interest stories that are at once vivid, intriguing, and moving. Adding a their entry points lie. This process of section to the problem statement that tells a story and describes the challenges vetting problems was aided greatly by related to water helps technology experts to better understand what is at stake. technology partners, as well as by in- house ICT staff. Examples include the Problems require some degree of translation from development terminology into elimination of redundant or sector-spe- succinct technical specifications recognizable to software developers. A popular cific terminology and a sharper focus format includes: i) the crisis statement (why does this particular problem matter on technical needs, such as platforms, and deserve immediate attention?); ii) the problem specification itself (what is technologies, software languages, inter- needed?); and iii) an impact statement (what actions will be taken if such a prob- faces, standards, compatibilities, users, lem is solved, and what impact will it have?). licensing, scope and costs. Problem CRISIS STATeMeNTS specifications should avoid prescrib- While the human development consequences of poor latrine hygiene seem obvious ing assumed solutions and define only to a sanitation engineer, they may not constitute the most compelling call to arms needs. For instance, many in the water for a software developer. Crisis statements should therefore seek to distill into one community seeking mobile data cap- sentence the “why does this matter� aspects of a particular issue, highlighting the ture tools would at first ask for an “SMS impact on poverty, health or well-being. feedback system,� unaware that several standards in fact exist to facilitate mobile reporting. Only after consulta- tion with ICT staff did they learn that ownersHIp leAds to sustAInABIlIty USSD (which many people think of The story of YacuPortal as SMS) may be more appropriate technically, but that costs, scale and In Peru, the participation of the Government was a key element for identifying potential open/proprietary licensing would need challenges and implementing prototypes such that they might achieve the greatest possible impact. Participating institutions included the National Water Authority (ANA), the Drinking to be specified as well. Water and Sewerage Service of Lima (SEDAPAL), the National Program for Rural Sanitation (PRONASAR), the National Superintendency of Sanitation (SUNASS), and the Ministry of IMPACT STATeMeNTS Housing, among others. This final section can serve to orient One of the challenges identified was how to strengthen the limited capacities of workers programmers towards the sustainabil- from rural municipalities when it comes to water resources management and facilitate ity of their applications. The incentive access to key information. The proposal was named “YacuPortal� and described a content appeals most to those seeking to turn management tool with easy access and functionality that would serve as a mechanism of their contribution into a startup or pilot communication between all government professionals and, in particular, as a capacity- and motivates follow-on engagement. building system for municipal authorities working in rural sanitation,. This application will gather, for example, all existing legislation or updated literature regarding the use of Additionally, impact statements offer water. The leadership of the challenge was entirely assumed by a government official from an opportunity to highlight where the PRONASAR who expressed her commitment to the further development of this initiative. greatest impact lies and to orient non- Another prototype from the competition—the final winner, in fact—focused on subject matter experts to focus on the addressing the lack of access to current and accurate information on all rivers, lakes and low-hanging opportunities. watersheds existing in Peru. This initiative is currently under development and is expected to soon be adopted by government institutions, as detailed in this section. Water HackatHon report 15 the process Approach The complexity of development prob- pre-events lems is traditionally underemphasized the more you mingle, the better at hacking events, leading many tech- nologists to build solutions to problems lesson: Facilitate communication between programmers and water experts over they themselves perceive as critical, a longer period prior to the actual hackathon. Invite the tech community and rather than focusing on those identified sector experts to select potential ideas. Working on relatively small projects, which as critical by sector experts. A pub- have some ownership, is better than merely offering lists of problems. Additionally, lished set of technical water problems, such projects need a deadline (countdown) and clearly designated responsibilities. identified by communities, defined and vetted by experts and linked to clients Pre-events are an important process component to consider in promoting effective provides for a powerful road map and stakeholder engagement and problem definition. Pre-events encourage iterative represents a comparative advantage discussions around atypical problems, such as how to crowdsource weather data of the World Bank. Such a wish list via mobiles or how to visualize irrigation data in real time. As such, they serve to can guide any technologist, however surface and refine ideas that may have previously been thought too risky to con- unfamiliar with the water sector, as to sider or inappropriate. These events can also build on the digital literacy of sector how he or she can make an impact on specialists while improving technologists’ knowledge of sector challenges. real-world needs. A key success factor of any hackathon is to organize such events and the process There is no guarantee that even a well- around them hand-in-hand with the tech community. Transparency is an essen- defined problem will be solved at the tial value within such communities, which rely mostly on distant communication. hackathon. Many intriguing and well- Pre-events offer a chance to incorporate the community’s input with respect to defined problems were not addressed problem selection and hackathon event design. Those locations that hosted pre- at Water Hackathon. This is one of the events in advance of the hackathon were also often able to address data gaps and risks involved in taking an open ap- build ownership around a potential solution. proach, and it should be communicated There are 3 types of pre-events: clearly to problem definers. That being said, the problem-formulation exercise meet-ups itself has value. Once pooled together A meet-up is an informal meeting to brainstorm and exchange ideas. The relaxed and posted on the RHoK platform, atmosphere encourages an open discussion on which water problems are most problems may well attract the attention pressing and which best lend themselves to technical solutions. These meetings of others. For example, a water purifi- also provide a chance to bridge the technical language barriers between hackers cation problem defined by a Columbia and water specialists. University PhD candidate was not solved at Water Hackathon, but its on- DC Water Hackathon line publication attracted hacker teams at two subsequent hackathon events. Water HackatHon report 16 the process Approach Meet-ups in lima Meet-ups in Bangalore and Delhi In Lima, three preparatory meet-ups prior to the Hackathon served to identify nine water challenges as well as to build the foundation for strategic alliances among institutions in various sectors, especially those that potentially could provide sustainability to the proposed solutions. Around 23 institutions from different sectors (government, hackers, civil society) were represented in these sessions, and through a live Internet broadcast, people from different cities across Peru could also join in this process. The first meet-up allowed the water specialists to meet the leading team and become familiar with the event’s guidelines, and also allowed the leading Click to watch: The Dehli Meet-up team to become familiar with the specialists’ perspective. During this meet- http://youtu.be/UYpNEnblAxY ing, sector specialists discussed their perspectives on water-related problems (cleanliness, water utilities performance, etc.), while hackers took a different Before the Bangalore Water approach (addressing problems from the point of view of non-specialists or Hackathon, two brainstorming users of the service). During this session it was hard to understand the respec- events were held jointly by India tive technical language of both hackers and water specialists. Accordingly, the Water Portal, the Indian Institute of use of simple language was encouraged, allowing each group to understand Human Settlements and the Water the other more clearly. and Sanitation Program (in New The second and third meet-ups focused on brainstorming around Delhi and Bangalore). Over 100 potential solutions, refining the challenges, and determining the owner of the sector professionals participated, challenge and a team to support it. During these meet-ups, it was very impor- including senior central govern- tant to seek strategic alliances with large coverage programs in key areas that ment officials, non-governmental could ensure the sustainability and impact of the proposed solutions. For organizations, water utilities and example, during the second meet-up, the One Laptop per Child Program other bilateral and multilateral (sponsored by the Ministry of Education) became a partner, offering the use agencies, such as DFID of half a million OXL computers distributed among the children of Peru to and UNICEF. disseminate potential solutions. Also, the use of social networks (Facebook, More than 80 problem Twitter) helped in promoting the event and its outcomes. statements were submitted and the organizing team shortlisted a final 14 statements by forming a selection team that included government representatives. Many of the problem definitions revolved around consumer complaint redressal, monitoring and progress tracking. For example, the problem of tracking and rating public toilets in India garnered a lot of enthusi- astic participation from software developers, as many could relate to this issue personally. For the actual event, recognizing that the software developers would require Click to watch: The Lima Meet-up more information from sector http://youtu.be/tI0Hel4zZK0 continued on next page Water HackatHon report 17 the process Approach tecH cAmps continued from previous page A tech camp is a slightly more formal brainstorming meeting, usually led by a professionals, each problem facilitator, the goal of which is stated up front (eg. refinement of a list of water definition had an owner and, challenges). The tech camp’s format can involve a presentation by the facilitator additionally, several sector and key discussants to provide an overview of major water challenges in the professionals were available on country and applicable technology solutions, followed by break-out groups devoted site to explain the issues to the to different problems, usually moderated by experts. As with a meet-up, a tech participating hackers. camp can help to bridge the language and knowledge barriers between hackers These pre-events ensured and water stakeholders. the support of nine partners and institutes, as the organizing team sent frequent mailers announcing Cairo Tech Camp the event and solicited feedback The Cairo Water Hackathon team and its partners convened a wide range from professionals on the problem of stakeholders at a tech camp in Cairo two weeks prior to the hackathon to statements, holding several one- discuss priority challenges around water in Egypt and refine them into specific on-one meetings to invite govern- problem statements that could be addressed through technology. Stake- ments, the private sector and holders included the Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation (MWRI), the development partners to join in Ministry of Communication and Information Technologies (MCIT), the Holding as partners in the event. The main Company for Water and Waste (HCWW), non-governmental organizations, purpose of these efforts was to academia, members of low-income communities and members of the see to it that other agencies also Egyptian technology community. had a stake in ensuring that the The team considered this camp an essential step in the hackathon prototypes developed at the hack- process; they perceived a significant knowledge gap between the water and athon would be taken forward for technology communities. The water community—in particular the more actual implementation. The event traditional, government counterpart—seemed to lack a full understanding of created a good deal of excitement innovative technological approaches to water resource management and throughout the country, and almost how to define water-related challenges in problem statements that could be everyone contacted ultimately addressed at the hackathon. supported the event, providing in The tech camp attracted over 40 participants, with 85 percent hailing kind or financial support. from the water and development sector. It was convened with the objective of prioritizing the top ten challenges related to water and sanitation in Egypt and Cairo Water Hackathon refining these in specific problem statements that ICT tools can address. The format of the tech camp was centered on presentations by the facilitator and key discussants that provided an overview of major water challenges in the country and introduced applicable technology solutions. These were followed by break-out groups devoted to irrigation, water conservation, conveyance, and purification, moderated by water experts who defined and translated wa- ter problems for the technology community. The tech camp helped the Task Team, together with the tech camp facilitator and World Bank water specialists in Cairo, to draft a more substantive list of problems and refine and prioritize them for the hackathon, as well as build water specialists’ and technologists’ understanding of technology solutions for water problems. Water HackatHon report 18 the process Approach clInIcs communIcAtIon Clinics offer a more formal option for promoting problem refinement and communicating the crisis ownership. Unlike a meet-up or tech camp, sector participants are required to come prepared with project-related problems and questions. Technical specialists lesson: In-country staff can help lead small group discussions related to specific technological tools (mobile, identify the best outreach channels to mapping, etc.), offering advice and assistance to problem owners looking to attract quality participants. Directing reframe their problems for a technical audience. These sprint sessions can help efforts towards clearly identified real to demystify what is achievable at a hackathon. needs is often what participants and volunteers are seeking: the chance to make a difference. Hacking for Dummies Clinic in Washington DC Water Hackathon needed to make the Click to watch: case for water issues. For the design The DC Clinic and development community, RHoK http://youtu.be/ events traditionally provided a way to PUBRsMMoTO4 contribute to relief efforts following earthquakes and flood events. Little effort was needed to persuade par- ticipants of the importance of issues being “hacked.� However, traditional development sectors, such as water and sanitation, would need to include a communication strategy to raise aware- ness about water and the scale and complexity of water challenges. As part of the preparatory steps for a main hackathon event, the team orga- The communication strategy played a nized a “Water Hacking for Dummies� workshop at World Bank headquarters. critical role in supporting the objectives This lunchtime event was designed to help problem owners (World Bank of the Water Hackathon, especially in Project Managers - TTLs) to get their problems as well defined as possible raising the profile of real world water before the start of the hackathon. The team invited three highly experienced issues to new audiences. By promot- technologists: Tom Lee of Sunlight Labs, Andrew Turner of GEOIQ, and Jon ing the hackathon through traditional Gosier of Metalayer. They served as thought partners for the TTLs in their ar- channels as well as social media, the eas of expertise (crowdsourcing, mapping and data, respectively) and helped team was able to link the importance of them think though the problems to ensure that they were not only clear, but water issues with the excitement and also that the potential solutions from the hackathons would be of value. This creativity of new technology. conversation was facilitated by World Bank staff with significant hackathon The team used a blog to highlight the experience and resulted in higher quality problem statements that were im- community as often as possible in mediately added to the Water Hackathon website. order to keep the focus on people and A secondary aim of the event was also to entice TTLs who had yet to come their ideas. For example, it was impor- forward with problem statements to engage in the Water Hackathon. The team tant to publish blog posts regularly hoped to achieve this by using the technologists present to demystify the that highlight stories from the field and hackathon process and help TTLs understand the kind of solutions possible describe the ways in which technology from such events. The team received highly positive feedback from people can make a difference. In addition to who attended the session and are extremely grateful of the time Tom, Andrew the main website – waterhackathon.org and Jon made available. – the team used multiple existing World Bank web platforms, such as Water HackatHon report 19 the process Approach worldbank.org/water, wsp.org and youtube.com/watersanitation. spotlIgHt on open dAtA pArtner nAsA A Twitter hashtag, #waterhack was NASA’s commitment to open data has expanded the audience for the vast body of created, promoted, and widely used to knowledge captured in nearly 100 years of U.S. aeronautics and space data collection. enable participants around the world Developers, technologists, entrepreneurs, citizen scientists and many others can contribute directly to the exploration of space and Earth by helping to create new ways of to collaborate in near real time, and looking at this data. NASA’s interest in Water Hackathon lay primarily in providing open to promote the hackathon broadly. data to resource developers and water experts as they created solutions to one of the @WSPWorldBank and @Randomhacks most vital challenges currently facing humanity. tweeted regularly leading up to and Climate is clearly impacting water availability; what is more complex is the extent and throughout the hackathon. nature of that relationship. As Bradley Doorn, program manager for Agriculture, Carbon, and Water applications in the Applied Science Program of NASA’s Earth Science Division, Traditional news media also proved says: “It is really important that we put it in the equation to better and more accurately beneficial, with articles appearing in assess long- and short-term trends to plan what water we’re going to have in the future. Wired magazine, The New York Times, While many of the short-term issues we face are more due to water resource management AFP, The Guardian, The Financial issues than climate change, solutions must include a better understanding of how climate Express (India), the Hindustan Times, change is affecting our water cycle.� NASA’s scientific research in these areas, paired with the World Bank’s experience with on-the-ground needs and development programs, was SME Advisor, Scoop.it, The Daily News an excellent fit. This can help us to better understand supply and demand issues in water - (Egypt), and more. How much will we allocate to agriculture to grow food, not only for sustenance but also as a means of growing our economies? How much will we allocate to energy? Where do the consumptive needs of big cities fall into this equation? There are all these demands on the pArtnersHIp cycle of water. Local partners, global network NASA’s remote sensing data, available free of charge to the public, provide critical parameters for the water supply. Working together with international institutions such as lesson: Partnerships with a local tech the World Bank, along with the engagement of citizen developers, enables NASA to extend partner is critical, as they far better the contribution of that data to real-world solutions more quickly and effectively. equipped to host a hackathon that is fun and open. Global networks can help raise the profile of the hackathon the team took pains to foster an open sorship of food and prizes, local to a broader audience. Large environment that encouraged local PR and media coverage, and the international tech partners can lend partners to become involved and bring incubation of winning solutions. The credibility to a sector led hackathon, their own strengths and resources to strong local partnerships supporting but participation depends to a much bear in support of Water Hackathon. each event also increased local of greater extent on the authenticity These partners helped to engage the ownership and credibility for the of local partners. local technology community in the event, while also providing broader pre-event planning and refinement of avenues for sustainability of successful Hackathons are inherently local events. problem definitions. projects following the event. So while a hackathon hosted simulta- neously in multiple locations requires The global network was made up of Hackathons are inherently local both international and local organiza- a global network, its success depends tions, including developer and hacker events, but the global network just as much on local partners. This was the case for Water Hackathon, networks, government agencies, aca- allowed collaboration across which enlisted the support of some 56 demic institutions and multinational sectors and timezones. local and international organizations companies as well as many water and (Annex 3). sanitation-focused NGOs who par- ticipated. These partners contributed Each city location had its own unique funding, space, expertise, in-kind spon- partnership supporting it. Accordingly, Water HackatHon report 20 the process Approach Hackathon event From October 21 to 24, 2011, teams of volunteer venue programmers, designers and water specialists competed to The hackathons were deliberately located in creative open spaces, such rapidly develop prototype technical tools to address locally as the computer lab at University College London, or in local tech defined water problems. hangouts, such as iHub in Nairobi. Locating the event in more informal, With the dedicated support of 65 collaborating local organizations and partners non-traditional sites represented a real in Bangalore, Cairo, Kampala, Lagos, Lima, London, Nairobi, Tel Aviv, Toronto, draw for many participants and helped and Washington DC, over 500 hackers convened to work simultaneously at the to generate a spirit of energy, creativity, marathon event. All Water Hackathon event locations were demand-driven; and openness. For this reason, hold- necessary prerequisites were the demonstrated capacity to host a successful ing hackathons in World Bank offices hackathon and the participation of a willing water partner. Over 62 prototype was out of the question. When a venue applications were developed in just three days, tackling over half of the 113 locally was difficult to reach—the American defined water problems raised for consideration. University in Cairo, for instance—group transport was arranged. lesson: Each Water Hackathon organizer learned to embrace the unpredictabil- ity of the hackathon event model. This open spirit is at the heart of what attracts Locating the event in more volunteers to participate and fosters the creative, cross-fertilizing atmosphere informal, non-traditional sites associated with hackathons. For example, locating the event in more informal, unconventional sites, such as innovation or technology hubs, can attract represented a real draw for expertise and maintain the spirit of energy, creativity, and openness. many participants and helped to generate a spirit of energy, tecH fAcIlItAtor creativity, and openness. A facilitator was recruited as host at each water hackathon location. Facilitators Caffeine, snacks, comfortable chairs, were responsible for opening and closing the event, communicating hackathon headphones, background music and rules, guiding judges through the selection process and making sure logistics ran powerstrips were in ample supply at all smoothly. Hackers were invited to work on whatever problem interested them, sites. Most importantly, organizers tried but in cases where groups failed to form, facilitators would act as matchmakers, to secure the highest speed Internet pairing hackers and water specialists. Facilitators were often aided by a team of connection possible and ensured that volunteers, all of whom played an active role in organizing the actual event. Wi-Fi SSID and password were easy to access. sponsorsHIp Hackathons should not come across as a branding exercise. For example, no logos were featured on the Water Hackathon t-shirts distributed to all participants. However, World Bank staff and organizing partners did work at each individual site to reach out to the local business community and identify appropriate overlaps. By far, the most Tel Aviv Water Hackathon Water HackatHon report 21 the process Approach common form of sponsorship was to provide a hackathon venue, though pArtIcIpAnt demogrApHIcs some locations managed to garner additional support. For example, in Cai- ro this support was worth thousands of dollars. Pepsi Egypt offered cash prizes for the top three solutions and covered catering for the two-day event. Local agribusiness Farm Frites 813,959 volunteer programming hours 82% 18% 73% gender under age of 30 contributed food and cash prizes for 922 507 67% irrigation solutions, while mobile startup TA Telecom offered cash and incubation to the best mobile startup. Many sponsors, including Farm people registered attended participants were working on their Frites and Pepsi, contributed their (60% of registrants) project 3 months after the event own problems for hacking. Their contributions were met with creative solutions from participants; some teams continue to collaborate with BIg-nAme speAKers set tHe tone In BAngAlore these corporate sponsors. As participation in hackathons is voluntary, extensive outreach efforts must be made to involve the software community, especially in large countries and since water management Water Hackathon chose deliberately may not be a familiar subject to many. Thus the India team collaborated with an online not to align global coordination with media agency/website to regularly broadcast information about the upcoming hackathon. any private sector partner in order to Additionally, for the kick-off and launch event, the team invited a number of high- retain full discretion of licensing of the profile guests to encourage the hackers and at the same time provide context to the water code (open source) and ensure that hackathon in the global tech scenario. no solutions were platform specific The India event saw the participation of: (i.e. only compatible with Android). 1. Senior Indian government officials at the Joint Secretary level, a high-profile position within the huge India government system. This demonstrated the interest of the Government in applying emerging technologies to these low-tech but pervasive prIzes problems. Local sponsorship of prizes was sought 2. Mr. Sam Pitroda, Adviser to the Prime Minister of India on Public Information for each hackathon site. In some cases, Infrastructure and Innovations. In his special address, Mr. Pitroda highlighted the need to prioritize water and pledged his support to form a National Innovations international technology sponsors, Council for Water. such as GPS manufacturer Trimble, 3. Washington and India: Keynote address by Mr. Jeff Martin, CEO of Mpowering and Tribal were able to offer gadgets and gear as Technologies. In his keynote address, Mr. Martin spoke of his company’s experience prizes to be awarded at a specific loca- using mobile phones to reward children for attending school and how this concept could tion. However, while participating hack- be customized for water and sanitation applications. Participants used this concept in ers were thrilled to receive prizes and their prototypes. rewards for their work, prizes were not The participation of these speakers encouraged the participants to dedicate a weekend of the motivating factor that drove partici- their time to the hackathon and also set the tone for both the event and follow-up activities. pation. According to survey results, the key motivation was to the opportunity to make a contribution to solving real- world problems and the recognition they might receive as winners. Water HackatHon report 22 the process Approach judges code reposItory And Types of Problems All hacking teams were asked to briefly IntellectuAl property present their prototypes on the last The problems submitted to Water Water Hackathon had very few rules, Hackathon covered a wide range day of the hackathon. Many teams but attempts were made to strongly of issues and technological innova- opted for a PowerPoint presentation, enforce the ones it did establish. In tions, from the need to make water but this was not a requirement. A order to be eligible for a prize, solutions quality data more accessible to the distinguished group of leaders from the had to be posted to the RHoK.org web promotion of water conservation water and tech sector were invited to platform and licensed under an OSI- through games. The 113 problems act as judges. Each judge was given a approved license10. Any code developed identified can roughly be classified list of criteria—emphasizing progress over the course of the hackathan also by subsector: water quality, water made and sustainability—with which to had to be posted in a publicly available supply, sanitation, floods, droughts, evaluate the solutions. The opportunity code repository. GitHub and Google agricultural water management and to “pitch� proposals to these distin- Code were popular choices. water resources. The highest pro- guished judges was a good motivator for participants. portion of problems (35 percent) were related to environment/water resources issues, with water supply a close second (27 percent). Many wining hacks addressed these sKIlls or expertIse offered two issues, but there were also several that targeted agricultural 2% Engineering water management. 3% Data 1% Translation Types of Prototypes 7% Logistics & Popular among winning hacks were 45% Hacking & some variation on mobile reporting Organization Programming systems for water infrastructure 10% Design malfunction, supported by a variety of other mobile communication components between service providers and customers. Overall, 62 tools were developed, roughly 12% Other categorized by subsector as: 24% Problem Definitions mobile, database, crowdsourcing, & Requirements mapping and game. Responses to many problems included more than one tool, though mobile and database tools each represented about one-third of the problems. For example, many tools designed to map data relied on crowdsourc- ing to obtain the data in question. The same was true for some of the tools aimed at building a database of information. 10 While participants were free to choose any license, teams were encouraged to use one listed under the category “Licenses that are popular and widely used or with strong communities.� Water HackatHon report 23 the process Approach toronto 6 participants 1 project london University of Toronto 40 participants 4 projects University College London youtu.be/9FxVB_UUaPs washington, d.c. 31 participants 8 projects Insomniac Design lima 40 participants on-site 20 virtual participants 8 projects Escuelab lagos youtu.be/gPQSVhZpFEU 43 participants · 4 projects · Co-Creation Hub Nigeria Water Hackathon Lagos came together through the commitment of its participants and organizers. On a limited budget, and with little lead-time, the Co-Creation Hub Nigeria hosted members of the technology and water community for a series of events. At a meet-up prior to the hackathon, developers met with local water experts to learn about their pressing problems and brainstorm potential solutions. Together they identified ten critical issues, ranging from greywater recycling to borehole sharing. These experts and developers came back together for Water Hackathon Lagos, where they prioritized four solutions: a website for public water information, a problem-reporting applica- tion for urban water infrastructure, a game for water education, and a water quality and reporting tool. The winning hack, Mairuwa, allowed people to report broken pipes. All winners were offered incubation at ccHub, while judges from Nokia and Google of- fered additional mentoring and support for solutions as they moved closer to launch. The government-operator Lagos State Water Corporation was initially skeptical that the local developer community could help solve their problems; however, they were impressed by the end results and pledged further cooperation. Water HackatHon report 24 the process Approach tel Aviv 30 participants 5 projects Tel Aviv University Bangalore youtu.be/xaGhGx6Bzoo 120 participants · 22 projects · IIIT Bangalore Water Hackathon Bangalore was held at one of India’s most respected IT universities, IIIT Bangalore. The event attracted the largest number of participants—more than 120—who cairo were picked up by minibus on the morning 75 participants of the event. Everyone came eager to solve 12 projects their country’s water problems. Shortly after American University in Cairo arriving, 22 teams were formed. The morn- youtu.be/3liyoSkuhRI ing session started out with talks by some of nairobi the partners (see full list in Annex 4) and then 70 participants the hackers (who immediately began calling 12 projects themselves “Whackers�) got busy on the 14 iHub featured problems that were collected at two youtu.be/WEOJzbpfPx8 pre-hackathon problem defining events held in Delhi and Bangalore by the Water and Sanita- tion Program and the India Water Portal. Many Kampala prototypes were built over the weekend, includ- 73 participants · 7 projects · Makerere University ing an app that allows users to locate and rate What began as one of the most difficult hackathons to organize turned public restrooms across India. The team that went on to win included the youngest hacker out to be among the most inspirational. Despite not holding a pre-event present at the event, a 14-year-old whose with water stakeholders, Water Hackathon Kampala attracted 73 hackers enthusiasm was contagious and who produced to Makerere University. Teams were quickly formed and all seven projects the best video introducing the event. The World had immediate social media presence, inviting the support of friends. To Bank and WSP appointed an Ambassador to understand and appreciate the task at hand, participants quickly dashed keep track of the apps after the close of the to the Internet to research, map out project objectives and define discreet event and the organizers continued to seek tasks. For many, the problems seemed vague, but at regular checkpoints potential partners and agencies to support mentors from MTN, Google, Mountbatten, Ugo, the World Bank, UNICEF further development. and Uganda’s water services provider, National Water and Sewerage youtu.be/GWXt1jgH7_w Corporation, were able to help out. As one mentor put it, “All we could do as mentors was to smile in amusement at what talent we have in this country that is yet to be discovered.� This talent pool produced numerous prototypes, including Water Crusader, an interactive game centered on water and sanitation issues. Water HackatHon report 25 the process Approach follow-up Hackathon events offer new Reflections from the london Ambassador ways of collaborating and My experience working as the London Ambassador has been highly rewarding a space in which prototype and engaging. I set out to follow up on the prototypes developed at the London Hackathon and other ICT applications to water and sanitation outside of the tools can be built in a short Hackathon. Although I was initially disappointed by low engagement from London participants when I followed-up with them (suggesting they decided to amount of time. develop their prototypes further), I was excited to learn that London’s wining team, Taarifa, was still actively developing its prototype. My request to follow Hackathons are not, however, meant their development was met with an invitation to contribute to building the tool to support the ongoing efforts of those by providing the practitioner perspective, which I have enjoyed doing. teams that want to take their prototype The most rewarding aspect has been the opportunity to investigate and through to product development. Sev- report more broadly on other ICT innovations in the water sector by interview- eral follow-up options are available to ing key actors. This has been a perfect segue from my own research on the help curate the most promising tools to effectiveness of mobile tools for water services and has enabled me to develop emerge from the hackathon and provide a great network among those working in this field. As a result, I’ve been able to opportunities for programmers to en- actively connect people working in this arena and spread the word about dif- gage with their water counterparts. ferent innovations, at the same time highlighting the need for greater collec- tive learning among implementers, researchers and donors in an effort to un- lesson: Ownership and sustainability derstand how ICT tools can be most effectively designed and applied. I’m now of new prototypes can only be achieved looking to organize a learning event to address this. Beyond this, I’ve taught when the (predominantly free and open myself how to conduct and edit video interviews and try my hand at some source) software solution is demand- journalistic research. oriented. It is important to direct effort toward documenting and supporting promising teams as well as the broader Reflections from the Nairobi Ambassador community. While surveys can rely on My experience as Nairobi Ambassador has been quite the eye-opener. Having distant communication, the local pres- three years’ experience as an environmental auditor, the knowledge on issues ence of community representatives that plague the country with regard to water management were apparent, but and technology partners is needed to the deep interaction with the sector as Water Ambassador has opened my remain engaged with teams. eyes to the endless opportunities that are there for the taking. These opportu- nities can only be enhanced by Kenya’s focus on becoming a silicon hub for Africa in mobile solutions. Water and ICT has a niche to which wAter AmBAssAdors developers must wake up. My strategy was built on the understanding devel- Water Ambassadors were recruited at opers gained at the hackthaon and improved awareness of the potential of various Water Hackathon locations to designing software for the sector. support follow-up. They were asked to Having two roles — as an ambassador and being on the project team write blog posts documenting the prog- responsible for designing the mobile-web complaint system for Kenya — has ress of hackathon solutions and help allowed me to see that more ICT solutions are needed to empower the water facilitate communication among the sector. In fact, software deployment is not the key solution, rather it is stake- community of water and tech partici- holder buy-in and human interaction with the water system that matters. pants. Since Ambassadors needed to Solutions are a dime a dozen, but if one cannot create a win-win venture to possess excellent communication skills, benefit the people then nobody will adopt the system. This has been my role in participants were asked to nominate designing value propositions that create win-win ventures with all sector play- the person they felt was best qualified ers. A daunting task, but all the more fulfilling. to act as a community representative. Water HackatHon report 26 the process Approach IncuBAtIon prototypes Effort was made to collaborate with incubation facilities in order to streamline sup- port for the most promising prototypes to emerge from Water Hackathon. Incuba- The Catalyst for a New tion typically involved a combination of access to office space, internet access, and Conversation in India ongoing mentorship from experienced startups. The Department of Information Technology, the Ministry of Urban Development and the Water and Sanitation Program of the World Bank Incubation in Cairo organized a follow-up event to the Two of the tech sponsors of the Cairo Water Hackathon, Nokia MLabs and Bangalore Water Hackathon in February 2012, in which the six winning teams TA Telecom, offered incubation possibilities as awards for hackathon par- were invited to present their apps to a ticipants. These incubation possibilities included access to networked and wider audience in a workshop held in one well-equipped facilities/labs as well as access to mentors who could provide of the premier conference venues of the guidance on product development and marketing. Each of the three winning Government of India. teams received a three-month voucher for Nokia mLabs and one of the teams, The purpose of the follow-up Abou Erdaan, received the Best Wireless Award, which included two months event was to focus on implementation, of incubation and $2000 for expenses from TA Telecom. While all the winning continuity and ownership. So while teams continued to develop their products further, many decided against the original hackathon was 90 percent hacker, 10 percent establishment, the using these vouchers. Team Run Time, for example, has significantly expanded follow-up event was 10 percent hacker, their application but, due to other commitments by team members, chose to 90 percent establishment. This approach delay incubation with Nokia mLabs. seems to have worked very well in terms of deepening roots. At the same time, Incubation in Tel Aviv the platform was used to showcase some existing applications for mobile IBM, one of the main sponsors of WaterHackathon Tel Aviv, was responsible for technology in the development sector rewarding the winning teams. The winning team received three months-worth already in use in India, especially in water of access to resources and mentoring from IBM to actualize its solution, while and sanitation. the second- and third- place teams received two and one month respectively. The event attracted more than 100 The first- and second- place teams are in the process of developing their ideas participants from mobile companies using the resources offered by IBM, while the third-place team decided to uti- (Nokia, Samsung, Vodafone and On lize the prize at a later stage. IBM has assigned an IT architect to examine the mobile) and government, including the participation of the Secretary of the suggested solutions, mentor and advise the teams regarding technical issues Ministry of Urban Development. The and recommend relevant IBM products and services that could be integrated Secretary pointed out that, although the with the product. Government allocates more resources to urban development and public services than before, satisfaction among the follow-up events public has decreased. “Citizens should not allow decision makers to tell a lie Follow-up events offer further opportunities for programmers to engage with their and get away with it. Applications for water counterparts. In some cases, this has led to financing startups and the monitoring expenditure are needed,� recruitment of local developers by government. he said. India’s developer community appears eager to contribute. Water HackatHon report 27 procurement Implications for procurement tAsK mAnAger fInds vAlue In defInIng A proBlem AlongsIde tor One Task Manager of the World Bank’s procurement timeframe, but at worst it Water and Sanitation Program em- could illuminate the software develop- braced the hackathon process as a ment limitations in the local context means to develop a citizen feedback without losing the chance to pick up mobile-to-web solution in Kenya. As the well-progressed procurement for an a Steering Committee member for a international ICT firm. Water Services Regulatory Board During the 48-hours of the Hackathon (WASREB) social accountability in Nairobi, members of the Steering initiative, commitment had been built Committee watched as 10 out of 12 internally to embrace technology as a teams, not only demonstrated their condition for scaling up countrywide the competence to construct the feedback lessons learned from an 18-month pilot. application but added creative features Standard World Bank Terms of Refer- to enhance the consumer, utility and ence, Scheme of Works, and Request sector oversight agency experience. Nairobi Water Hackathon for Proposals were prepared for the The competition was stiff, and although development of the WASREB-managed a clear winner was identified by the application. It is likely that the citizen citizen mobile-to-web feedback applica- judges, the capacity of all local Kenyan mobile-to-web application will be tion. By the time of the Hackathon in hacker teams to provide a reliable ICT operational in selected service areas in November 2011, an invitation for application for WASREB’s purposes Kenya by the end of June 2012. Expressions of Interest by international was beyond doubt. The Hackathon ren- firms was to be launched pending dered meaningless the effort to secure The lesson learned is that the clearance from the World Bank international firms with requirements hackathons can provide a means for procurement specialist. for international travel, accommodation identifying and developing local talent and back-up support. Three months and engaging the youth meaningfully World Bank WSP colleagues then later the winning Hackathon team was in the development process. From a persuaded the Task Manager to explore working quietly and efficiently with procurement perspective, in addition solutions to the problem through the the WASREB Steering Committee as to time savings, Water Hackathon Nairobi Water Hackathon. With modest local consultants. The team undertook demystified the task and reduced the expectations and without discontinuing a baseline survey on existing practice administrative and financial scope of the original RFP procurement process, within 10 diverse water utilities, the contract significantly, with visible the Task Manager negotiated this turn engaged in multiple stakeholder advantages for the World Bank WSP of events with the WASREB Steering consultations and applied user feed- and the client, WASREB. Committee. The argument was that at back to inform the Beta version of the best a positive result could shorten the next steps 1. A hackathon focused exclusively on sanitation is planned for late 2012. It will build on the momentum created by Water Hackathon and extend it to new countries that may not have participated in Water Hackathon. 2. The water practice will develop a Project Concept Note for a “Water Hackathon 2.0�. Water HackatHon report 28 Annex 1 - prototypes from meet-ups to start-ups Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management During the hackathon, five different types of tools emerged to address water problems across various sectors. This key can be used to define the purpose of each start-up formed during the hackathon events. jugAAd sensors Jugaad Sensors’ prototype used the concept of “frugal engineering� to develop a portable and cheap water testing kit connected to an Android device. A not-for- Bangalore profit organization in Bangalore is sponsoring the winning team to take forward the prototype by providing funding. More info at metamap.in s3v2K “S3V2K� is in the final stages of being presented to a very large water utility that wants to use its winning idea of customer complaint and redressal for outreach to its Bangalore citizens. In India, adoption and scale-up by the government requires a bit of perse- verance and patience, and this Water Hackathon team is exhibiting exactly these qualities. ABu erdAn Abu Erdan is a GPS-enabled smart phone app for crop planning, monitoring and irrigation optimization. This solution was developed in response to a problem cairo submitted by Farm Frites Egypt, Egypt’s largest potato grower in the retail and fast food sector. The team behind Abou Erdaan formed an enterprise shortly after the hackathon and invested in equipment, all without relying on the incubation vouchers from TA Telecom. They continued to develop their hack into a marketable product and submitted their idea to the Google Business Competition, where they were shortlisted as one of the top 50 contestants. They remain in touch with Farm Frites about the development of their product and have received enquires from small- and medium-size agribusinesses. The team is facing delays with customs for the import of the necessary hardware to scale-up their product sales. More info at abuerdan.com Water HackatHon report 29 Annex 1 - prototypes sAlt And rocKs Team Salt and Rocks created an application that plans, monitors and regulates the water distribution system, connecting the Ministry of Agriculture, farmers and cairo the telecommunications sector. They continue to develop their business plan and fine-tune their code for the application. They have also been in contact with Nokia mLabs. However, as they did not wish to develop the application for Nokia, they are likely to remain an independent start-up after their incubation voucher expires. More info at water.amahdy.net tAArIfA Taarifa is a tool that enables citizens to report water and sanitation infrastructure problems via SMS and the Web, allowing the service provider to track repairs and London send updates to reporters. The developer team includes technologists and sector specialists with a range of expertise. After winning first place at the London Water Hackathon, interest from the World Bank to pilot the tool in Uganda, and interest from the growing group of hackers to further develop the tool, led to a follow-up hackathon in February 2012 to address bugs and add features. To increase its po- tential impact, the tool was redesigned for use on all phones, instead of on Android systems exclusively. The potential piloting of Taarifa was met with enthusiasm when demonstrated to the Ugandan Ministry of Local Government in February 2012. The developers have continued to refine the tool based on feedback from the Ministry and are adding features such as offline use and easier creation of new menus for adaptation to a range of reporting/surveying needs beyond water and sanitation. The tool’s strength and improved design reflects the team’s commitment to open-source development, engaging developers from around the world to contribute and collaborate. More info at taarifa.org IrrIdIon Irridion Dynamic is tool to optimize usage of non-potable water. The group’s main focus is to build a prototype that allows for the real-time management of salinity Tel Aviv levels of sensitive agricultural crops by fusing potable and non-potable water. The Irridion Dynamics group have defined the first draft of the SDD (Software Design Document) of the system. During their last meeting, the SDD was reviewed and mapped to relevant IBM products. Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 30 Annex 1 - prototypes mAjIvoIce MajiVoice is a platform for two-way communications between citizens and water providers using affordable, accessible and user-friendly technologies. Through nairobi MajiVoice, water consumers can use a mobile phone or website to share their concerns with providers about service delivery and receive timely feedback on how those issues are being addressed. The platform also enables utilities to provide SMS broadcast to consumers on priority issues, such as changes in anticipated ra- tioning schedules, or important notifications on times, dates and venues of public consultations and events, thereby strengthening their public relations and linkages with the client. MajiVoice further enables communication between utility field- and office-based staff, as it will be tailored to the work flow of each utility, smoothing communication and activity between various departments and enhancing man- agement by results. MajiVoice is currently being developed by the winning team of the Nairobi Water Hackathon for Kenya’s Water Services Regulatory Board (WASREB) to strengthen dialogue between citizens and water service providers and to ensure timely and transparent resolution of consumer concerns. The aim is to improve efficiency, ac- countability, responsiveness and transparency of urban water service providers in Kenya. All these ultimately lead to improved service delivery. More info at majivoice.com open peruvIAn wAter mAp Open Peruvian Water Map was developed to address the need for open access to updated information on surface water resources in Peru. The map includes all water Lima resources—rivers, watersheds, lakes, snow peaks, etc.—which are now available through Map Box. This solution will also allow citizens to report water-related events (pollution, social conflicts, floods, etc.). This tool makes official data available in a public, user-friendly and collaborative way, creating for the first time in Peruvian history a digital map that consolidates all available water resources data in a central and open form. The tool is still being developed; the developers meet periodically to improve the prototype and they are looking for new strategic partners to implement it. The objective is to develop a tool that can be adopted by the National Water Authority (ANA). More info at escuelab.org Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 31 Annex 1 - prototypes wAter voIces Water Voices is focused on helping improve First Nation access to water and sani- tation in Canada. There are three inter-related project components that compre- toronto hensively engage, promote, and improve access: 1. Front line community engagement. The messaging platform uses SMS messag- es from community members that have water challenges, geocodes their loca- tion, puts it on a map, and tweets it out to Canadian politicians and the media. 2. Comprehensive database. The database that powers the messaging platform centralizes information on various aspects of water quality, infrastructure, and socio-economic indicators. 3. Youth Engagement. Starting summer 2012, the team will be working with Ea- bametoong First Nation to provide a module on water quality to middle school students, involving portable microbiology test kits to track, test, and publish water quality. The team is also working on integrating voice to the SMS infrastructure in order service those communities that do not have wireless access. More info at watervoices.ca mAzzI trendz Mazzi Trendz is a service that enables daily water users to keep track of their water usage patterns over time. Users supply the system with meter readings, which can kampala be added via phone or online. The application then performs the required analysis in order to return organized information on how one has been using water over a given period of time. The service also enables water users to specify how much they would like to spend on water over a given period of time, and should they exceed that specified amount, the system provides them with tips on cutting water usage. Mazzi Trendz is built for the Android platform and, with time, will be available on other platforms, such as Nokia. More info at mazzi-app.appspot.com Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 32 Annex 1 - prototypes mAp tHe crAp Map the Crap is a tool that helps users accurately locate and report on the status of their pit latrine. This information is useful to pit latrine emptiers, who can waste kampala a great deal of time and resources trying to empty sewage pits and septic tanks in the same neighborhood in an uncoordinated way. This application was designed to provide a platform that enables the visualization of latrines and rubbish dump areas that need servicing in order to enable pit latrine emptiers as well as garbage collec- tors to work effectively, saving time and promoting a healthy environment. The team has plans to meet the Kampala Capital City Authority, which has expressed interest in integrating Map the Crap onto their portal. More info at appcircus.com/apps/map-the-crap mwAter mWater is a technology startup that offers a crowdsourced, ICT-based water moni- toring solution for communities that lack water monitoring capacity. The organiza- rHok Montreal tion drew its inspiration from the successful bacteria-counting Android app devel- oped at a RHoK event in Montreal. The problem that seeded this innovative tool was initially published online for the Water Hackathon, but it was only later that a group of civic hackers in Montreal with the right combination of skills managed to build the initial prototype. The group is working with UN Habitat in Tanzania in summer 2012 to validate water testing technologies and will field a beta version of the Android app that will assist in reading results. mWater is developing three products: low-cost test kits that use off-the-shelf com- ponents, an Android mobile app that reads water test results from a variety of tests and uploads them, and a social network that allows community members to find test results or post information about the safety of their water sources. mWater is a semi-finalist for the Echoing Green social enterprise fellowship and is seeking investors to expand services to new locations in low- and middle-income countries. More info at mwater.co Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 33 Annex 2 - problems problem definitions The problems submitted to WaterHackathon covered a wide range of issues and technological innovations, from the need to make water quality data more accessible to the promotion of water conservation through games. locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Atlanta Legal Compliance monitoring Create a database system for the in Latin America constitutional court of Costa Rica (and Colombia) to help them keep track of court orders (i.e. fix someone’s broken water system) and make them acces- sible to those who they support and who must provide the service Baltimore Social Networking Climate To use a social networking game (e.g. Game Farmville) to teach people about climate change and mitigation and adaptation strategies Bangalore Mathematical Distribution Create an analytical model for devel- of the Water Distribution oping optimized distribution systems System Bangalore Monitoring and Incentiv- Create a mobile application to track izing Use of Community household use of community toilets Toilets in Indian Cities to both incentivize use and provide in- formation on use of the facilities and effectiveness of incentives to induce behavior change Bangalore Data Repository and Infor- Create a web application to assimi- mation Dissemination late water quality data from various sources, do some analysis, and pres- ent the information geographically for users to reference Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 34 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Bangalore Water Tankers in Urban India- Develop a system to track water Enhancing Accountability tanker delivery and alert users to its and Accessibility schedule so that they do not have to spend their day waiting for it Bangalore Status of Application for Create a system to track the applica- Subsidy tion for toilet construction subsidies so that households are informed of the status of their request by SMS and can send in a mobile photo when the construction has been completed Bangalore Farmer Weather Alert System Create a mobile application that sends farmers forecast info, and contact info for advice on planting, fertilizers, irrigation, etc Bangalore Inconsistent and Unpre- A mobile application that sends a text dictable Water Supply to message to residents to give them Slums sufficient notice of and information about the impending water supply (timing and duration) Bangalore Disease/Sickness Reporting A mobile reporting application on System sickness to provide information to water or sanitation providers Bangalore Water Lottery: Linking Digital metering data is sent to mo- Water Meters to Mobile biles so users can track consumption; Phones they are entered in a lottery to win an award for lowest water consumption Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 35 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Bangalore Donate a toilet, donate An application that enables an indi- a tap vidual to donate money (from bank account, mobile money) for a toilet/ tap. Donors would be informed about the toilet tap they have paid for to connect the directly to the impact Bangalore Mobile Phone as a Policy Create a way for people to track policy Watch Application implementation; eg. Rainwater Har- vesting in Bangalore Bangalore Service Delivery in the water An SMS-based water delivery service and Sanitation Sector that will track user informatation to make future orders easier Bangalore Locating and rating of Create a mobile application that uses GPS Public Restrooms in Indian to find and list the nearest available rest- Cities rooms categorized by gender preference Bangalore Decentralized Data collection Create a mobile application that al- through SMS lows anyone to collect data Bangalore Customer complaint Create a mobile application that lets redressal users report on water infrastructure problems and receive a report back Bangalore App to monitor biodiversity Create an SMS-based biodiversity monitoring system that allows users to send in SMS reports of bird sight- ings according to location Bangalore Peer Water Exchange An SMS-based system designed for collection of field data for tracking of water and sanitation projects and milestones, built on a concept from the Peer Water Exchange Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 36 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Bangalore Water Shortage voting reports To allow utilities to send information to from SMS to locate and sup- users about available water supplies ply on demand basis after users report on their local water supply conditions during a water shortage Bangalore Jugaad Sensors Low-cost portable test for water qual- ity and measurement. Test can also be connected to an Android device to geolocate testing coordinates Cairo Data Analysis of Demographics To allow the utility to collect data for Conservation Awareness about users (legal and non-legal Campaign connections) and create a channel to communicate alerts, updates, and conservation messages to users Cairo Water Gauge Monitoring in To reduce water usage in industry Industrial Line Production with digital meters to detect water overuse in real time Cairo Water Saving: Efficient Build a mobile application that will Agriculture Data Manage- collect and download pivot station ment data about crop development, soil moisture, etc Cairo Early Warning Remote Deploy a system of remote sensors System for Water Table in local groundwater wells in order Management to measure and manage water table levels; can alert when it has dropped to a level where the salt concentration exceeds threshold Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 37 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Cairo Alerts for water-related emer- Create a platform to disseminate infor- gencies mation about low water quality/quan- tity to communities—often those who receive water that can cause disease Cairo Tracking tool for com- Information dissemination for house- munity sewage disposal holds to coordinate the disposal of system in Egypt their sewage Cairo Awareness Raising about water Use ICT to increase awareness of purification in urban areas household water treatment methods (Ezbet Khairallaha) and health issues in urban areas Cairo Irrigation Scheduling Use a mobile application to help farm- ers use the “checkbook method� (soil water balance) to schedule appropri- ate irrigation Cairo Farm level Irrigation Create interactive software to aid Modernization in Egypt’s farmer consultations and construc- Nile Delta tion supervision on an irrigation project, linked to simple web-based GIS program. Would show farmers proposed improvements and record views on it Cairo Inadequate billing and Create an automated system that collections sends customers SMS messages when their bills are due Cairo Tool for more equitable Sensors to show and report wa- water distribution in Egypt ter usage among upstream and downstream usage to enable more equitable use Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 38 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Calgary Apps for water To have water apps developed from recently launched open web platform to aggregate and connect water and environmental data, making it available to users through an API Cape Town Ceasefire in the toilet war? Create a mobile platform for citizens Can a community-driven to report broken/vandalised commu- mobile phone application nity toilets to janitors and the city restore dignity in Cape Town? Cape Town E-billing and e-filing for small Create a mobile app that delivers town water-app with NGO and water bills via SMS and allows them commerical potential to be paid by SMS. Integrate this data from many small schemes to send to regulator Cape Town Map the Crap App Mobile application that helps pit emp- tiers plan their routes to improve their business and reduce unsafe dumping Geneva Ecosystem Services must Using filed data from Tanzania to de- be taken into policy circles velop a static (and possibly dynamic) representation of the feedback loops and delivery of ecosystem services to society Jerusalem Provide real-time alerts Create a system that senses abnor- to households about in mal water usage and reports it to the efficient use of water utility, which then can alert homeown- ers by phone or SMS Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 39 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Kampala MET-water App Combine meteorological data with water data to provide an early warn- ing system for rapidly changing conditions Kampala Water Bubble Bath Game Create a mobile game that sends for Water Education players messages with water conser- vation tips Kampala Water Aggregator App to deter- Create an application that can ag- mine water available in Uganda gregate data to tell a community how much water is available and how long it will last Kampala Water usage and billing Build an app that lets you take a pic- visualizations app ture of or scan your water bill and can translate this into trend data about your water use Kampala DEWS (Disaster, Environ- An app that crowdsources water- ment, Water and Sanita- related problems from around a com- tion) munity and visualizes them on a map, giving communities a voice Kampala WASH Reporter A crowd-funding and geo-visualisation app that helps communities report WASH problems and fundraise for them using Mobile Money and other payment systems Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 40 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner lagos Water purification mobile A mobile application that can be used application to check the purification level of wa- ter by taking a photo and uploading the image to a server that can assess the purity lagos Water Resource Reporting Create better system to detect and inform utility of service problems lagos Water Companion A companion website for the water corporation with which to educate and inform communities about water issues lima Strengthen municipal Capacity-building system for munici- capacities of water pal authorities working in rural sanita- resources management tion through a content management and the regulations in the tool with easy access and functional- water sector ity (Yacu Portal) lima Improve proper education Bilingual multimedia module (web- on water issues (Water site, mobile applications, comics) in Culture) through rich Spanish and Quechua aimed at chil- content materials such as dren. They will learn water concepts, Infographics, multimedia, problems and how to help to solve OLPCs, etc. them through games. (Cooltura del Agua) lima Poor water quality (water Multiple devices with a protocol for quality detection) measuring different aspects of qual- ity, chlorination, presence of metals in water Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 41 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner lima Risk for natural disasters- Create an early flood/landslide warn- landslides ing system: river sensors detect high levels and send messages by SMS lima Inefficient Irrigation water Develop a low-cost monitoring and use control system for drip irrigation lima Poor access or do not know Create an open data platform for where to find information the government to provide water resource data to users lima Desertification and Loss Fog capture as a source of water. Cre- of Water in the desert ate more fog catchers and a tutorial landscapes on the coast to help replicate the model: Lomas de Atikipa experience lima Poor understanding of Offer strategy for conservation of basic concepts or needs of water resources, including basic water conservation watershed info lima Make more efficient the Low-cost device to save water in the use of water in toilets use of toilets (Cada Gota Cuenta) london Water Monitor: Refining Provide users with advice on con- Water use to improve the servation actions based on seasonal quality of aquatic ecosys- changes or emergency situations tems (e.g. combined sewer overflow events) and connect users with their local watersheds Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 42 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner london How to incentivize water Create a social network game that use efficiency? A social allows users to compare water usage, network water footprint encouraging conservation efforts game (Waterville?) london How to chose among water An open-source supply-demand supply-demand options? planning tool that picks the least-cost schedule of supply-demand mea- sures that allows to meet demand into the future. Optimisation tools likely needed london Online water trading map- A platform that allows water rights based portal or abstraction licence holders to buy and sell, informed by recommenda- tions based on connectivity through mapping. Current water brokerage sites don’t have the mapping london Waterwise ‘Stop the drop’ Influence water use behaviour App Game through a game about using 120l water per day for a 4-person family london Systems for reporting wa- Build a dashboard that can interface ter problems and provid- with Ushahidi reports of water and ing feedback drainage problems in Tanzania and Zanzibar. The dashboard would en- able providers to respond to users about the status of problem fixes as they are managed Madurai, Water Calculator Make a mobile water calculator to India show the amount of water used (for home, farm, industry, etc.) Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 43 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Milwaukee Polluted Stormwater Create a tool that can help people Runoff understand the seriousness of storm water pollution and feel empowered to help reduce it Milwaukee Unnecessary water use dur- Create a mobile tool to educate ing storms constributes to people about reducing their house- sewer overflows and basement hold water use during storms to backups prevent CSO and to alert people when they should take action to do this and be on alert for basement backups Milwaukee Build Community knowl- Create a tool that enables easy edge and ownership of updating of restoration projects to local waterway restoration the general public and allows them project to submit responses and potentially photos Milwaukee Live water quality tracking Create a way for people to quickly check on the water quality where they live Milwaukee Virtual Aquaponics system Create a visual aquaponics system (system that grows fish and plants to- gether) that lets users model outputs by changing different variables Milwaukee Dashboard visualizing wa- Develop a dashboard visualizing ter data from Watertech water data from the complex water of America sensor equipment used by Water- tech of America, in order to compel industrial plant managers to be more water efficient Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 44 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Nairobi Drought Monitoring Gather precipitation data from crowd- sourcing to help with an early drought warning system Nairobi Making Nairobi Water Quality Provide a web-based, geographic Data More Accessible interface to allow users to access the water quality testing data that is already regularly collected, but inac- cessible Nairobi A mobile-to-web com- To develop a digital complaint system plaint system for Kenyan for water services that allows users Water Sector to send complaints by SMS or USSD to an online system that registers and tracks the complaint, providing the user with a reference number and updates Nairobi Self-reading water meters For Nairobi water utility: use an SMS via text messages or USSD application to submit self meter readings instead of problem- atic staff collection Nairobi Global Flood Prediction Create a tool that connects govern- ments, NGOs and researchers to the data they need—in an accessible format--to make better predictions about flooding, and use ICT to warn people Netherlands Innovative Water Footprint Create an online/mobile visualiza- Visualization tion of recent water footprint data for countries (click on country to see usage footprint) Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 45 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner New York Bacteriacounting app for Develop a mobile app that can take low-cost water kit photos of bacteria growing plates and count the number of colonies, saving time and enabling the rapid transmis- sion of these photos- OR an Ushahidi modification to receive and send photos Rockville, World and regional Water Create a price index for real residen- US price index tial water prices based on the IBNET water tariff database San francisco Mapping water/sewage mix An SMS reporting system for water/ ups sewage mix-ups with locations and reporting system to track outbreaks of diarrhea; user receives SMS back with suggestions to safegaurd against possible health risks Tel Aviv Monitoring system of the Develop meters that show custom- water counter for the ef- ers how much water they have used ficiency, transparency and per week, by day/night and relative to savings in consumption others in their area. Tel Aviv Happy Bird Mobile App Use crowdsourcing to create a base- line migratory bird survey to help ana- lyze potential environmental impacts Tel Aviv Gaining anayzed informa- Transfer weather and water info tion in worldwide farming collected in developed countries to farmers in developing countries so they can cut their water usage Tel Aviv Water Treatment and Bio- Build cost-effective and simple systems gas at the local level to treat wastewater and create biogas for energy needs in small farming com- munities Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 46 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Tel Aviv Optimization of the opera- Create an online decision support tool tion of water and sewage that analyses software data, sensor systems data, basic parameters, cost data, regu- lation parameters Tel Aviv Service Delivery in the Wa- Create an SMS system for customers ter and Sanitation Sector who order water deliveries so that or- ders will be tracked more efficiently, and locations can be determined by GPS Floods early warning systems Incorporate on-the-ground, local Tel Aviv reports on flooding to early warning flood systems Tel Aviv Integrated Algorithms for Create an algorithm that uses dif- hydrogeophysics ferent physical properties that can be detected in contaminated water to better characterize groundwater plumes without sampling wells Tel Aviv Improve efficiency and in- 1-improve computation time, memory terface of climate models consumption and storage space used by climate models, 2-improve model interface and accesibility by creating outputs that don’t require advanced software to read Tel Aviv The challenges of water Use sensors to create an online sys- quality in drip irrigation in tem that shows farmers the ACTUAL Israel 2011 water quality parameters, as the wa- ter (typically from tertiary treatment) often does not meet the water quality standards advertised Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 47 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Toronto www.watervoices.ca Messaging platform designed for members of Canadian communities experiencing potable water, sanitation, or other water quality challenges. The goal is to encourage governments and First Nation community leaders to work together towards solutions. The tool works by receiving SMS messages from community members that have water challenges – it then geocodes their location, puts it on a map and tweets it out to Canadian politicians and the media Vancouver Making Water Saving Technolo- Helps people learn how they can save gy Transparent and Accessible the most water and evaluate their “water savings� to be prepared with clear water ahead of a disaster Vancouver Instilling a water contin- Allow regional water managers to gency ethic communicate about “contingency supplies� in real time to be prepared for an emergency Vancouver The problem of water Database to show best practices in leakage leakage reduction for utilities Vancouver Responding to Information Provide people with seasonal infor- on Water Demand mation about water availability and demand so they understand the costs of their use and will change their behaviors Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 48 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Washington Water Access Map of the Create the mobile and web applications DC World for crowd sourced data to bring water access information to a GIS platform that can be accessed by anyone Washington Real Time Climate Data Com- To bring together satellite and ground DC parison Platform meteorological data and create a tool that will produce a geospatial representation of both types of data; to generate an “averaged� geospatial map from the combination of MSI and ground data Washington Webcam water flow Use webcams as an affordable alter- DC monitor native to sensors for monitoring flows (by providing images that can be analysed by using pattern recognition software Washington Education and Obtaining Design an educational game that DC Data about WASH through is also a survey tool to gather data computer games on player’s behaviours, knowledge, preferences, and priorities regarding water, sanitation, and hygiene Washington Really simple Citizen- Create a simple polling tool to get DC Generated Performance citizen feedback before and after Metrics urban improvements. The tool should have a dashboard to easily create and analyze polls and target residents of specific areas Washington E-billing Solution for Create a system to send bill amounts DC cutting edge provider in by SMS, allow customers to check Botswana bill, and confirm payment receipt Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 49 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Washington Rainwater Toxicity Map- Create a program that lets users see DC ping what pollutant influences there may be in rainwater in their geographic location Washington Rural Sanitation Aggregator Create a mobile platform to aggre- DC (mobile groupon) gate information service provider offers or deals and send to rural households in same locality; might incentivize service providers to go to hard-to-reach places by aggregating households Washington Gender Sensitization Create a mobile application aimed DC and water decision toward raising men’s awareness of making the many uses of water and thus the need to protect the resource Washington Real Time Climate Data Working from the previous challenge DC Comparison Platform: (accomplished), which was to create second challenge a tool that will combine MSI data with ground information to produce a geospatial represenation. The second challenge is to generate an “aver- aged� geospatial map from the com- bination of MSI and the ground data Washington Overflow App for Android- Adapt an existing Android applica- DC based Huawei IDEOS tion (Ushahidi or FLOW) to allow smartphone [Tanzania] citizens and urban planning students of Tandale, TZ, to report overflowing roadside drains and culverts Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 50 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Washington Android/iPhone-based Create a tool that lets users photograph useful information of water infrastrucu- DC photo database and map- ping app for development tre and upload it to a database using the phone’s GPS information Washington Data Scraping for Dartmouth Create a data mining and scraping DC Flood Data library for flood-related data avail- able at Dartmouth Flood Observa- tory Riverwatch. The algorithm will automatically let user select the location where water and flood data are available Washington Improved weather data Create an SMS system for people DC collection and transmi- at weather monitoring stations to tion send data to central location (current method is by calling) Washington Web-based interface for Web-based tool to allow users to DC tabulating Daily Global tabulate and generate outputs in Climate Dataset an MS Excel file from the Japanese Daily Global Gridded Climate Dataset for daily max temp, min temp, and precipitation globally at half degree resolution from 1948-2006 Unknown Where does my Water Create a Google Earth add-on that Come from? identifies catchment boundaries for any point clicked. Could provide info to users in developed countries for education and awareness and be a useful tool for water managers in developing countries Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 51 Annex 2 - problems locAtIon sector tool project oBjectIve wInner Unkown Awareness Creation on Create ICT apps/games for children Water and Sanitation to play/learn about water/sanitation Issues issues Unkown Policies/programs beneficial to Create an application that informs the citizens in his/her area rural citizens about the different poli- cies and programs in their region Unkown The Catalyst Map To create a map action platform to coordinate the organizations working toward the 3 pillars of sustainability identified by the UN: environmental, social, and economic sustainability Unkown Water purity test Tool for refugee camp to know if wa- ter has been sufficiently purified Sector Tools Sanitation Agricultural Flood Supply Water Drought Water Crowd Data Mapping Games Mobile Water Resource Quality Sourcing Aggregation Management Management Water HackatHon report 52 Annex 3 - documents useful documents All documents related to the organization of Water Hackathon are available upon request from whelpdesk@waterhackathon.org. Useful documents include: • Hackathon Event Planning Guide • Partnership Package • Timeline • Media Kit • Communication Guidelines • Judging Criteria • Participant Survey • Terms of Reference for Hackathon Facilitator • Terms of Reference for Community Event Facilitator • Terms of Reference for Global Coordination • Terms of Reference for Water Ambassador • Letter of Cooperation Water HackatHon report 53 Annex 4 - partners local partners BAngAlore KAmpAlA nAIroBI Indian Institute of Human Settlement Makerere University iHub India Water Portal MTN NaiLab Hewlett Packard Ugo Google SSA International Instutite of Information Tech- National Water & Sewerage Corporation ID Modeling nology Bangalore Google Nairobi Water & Sewerage Company Mobile Monday Bangalore Mountbatten WASREB MediaNama UNICEF Ericson HasGeek Trimble Broadvision lAgos Department of Information Technology, Government of India CCHub toronto Ministry of Urban Development, Government Lagos State Water Corporation University of Toronto of India Nigerian Water and Sanitation Association Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation, Government of India tel AvIv NJS Consultants lImA StarTAU (Tel Aviv University Entrepreneur- Onmobile Escuelab ship Centre) Ista Hotels National Water Authority (ANA) Intel PepsiCo Water Utility of Lima: SEDAPAL IBM National Program for Rural Sanitation (PRO- Israel New Tech (National Energy and Water cAIro NASAR) Program) National Superintendency of Sanitation Israel Foreign Trade Administration PepsiCo (SUNASS) FarmFrites Nokia Ministry of Housing and Sanitation wAsHIngton dc TA Telecom Insomniac Design london El Gouna WASH Initiative Diwan University College London RHoK ISIS UCL Environment Institute ESRI Arabnet UCL Grand Challenges Intel The American University in Cairo Google Technology Innovation and Entrepreneur- IBM ship Center CIWEM Desert Development Center Akvo Mobile Monday Cairo Chapter Water HackatHon report 54 Annex 5 - costs cost Breakdown stAff tIme (dAys) 144 (WSP), 60 (ICT), 136 (TWIWA) cost BreAKdown By source (costs do not include staff time) Total WSP $30,427 Total WPP $70,000 Total CMU $42,500 Total ICT $17,500 Total WBI $2,500 Sponsors $59,175 total $222,102 cost BreAKdown By locAtIon (costs do not include staff time) Location total Budget World Bank known Sponsorship Bangalore $32377 WSP: $18,377 Cash and in-kind sponsorships valued at $14,000. Cairo $64,000 WPP: $2,000; CMU: $40,000 Cash and in-kind sponsorships valued at $22,000. In-kind venue sponsorship, value unknown. Kampala $3,100 WBI: $2,500 Cash sponsorships of $600. In-kind venue and post-event incubation Lagos $5,038 WPP: $5,038 sponsorship, value unknown. In-kind venue sponsorship, value unknown. Lima $7,800 WPP: $2,500; CMU: $2,500; WSP: $2,500 Cash sponsorship of of $300. In-kind venue and prize sponsorships, value London $2,000 — unknown. Cash sponsorships of $2,000. In-kind prize and post-event incubation Nairobi $9,117 WPP: $4067; ICT: $5,000; WSP: $50 sponsorship, value unknown. In-kind venue and hack incubation sponsorships Tel Aviv $20,000 — valued at $13,500. Cash sponsorships of $6,500. In-kind venue and swag sponsorships, value Toronto $275 — unknown. Cash sponsorships of $275. Washington DC $13,000 WPP: $2,000; WSP: $9,500; ICT: 2500 In-kind venue sponsorship, value unknown. Global $65,395 WPP: $55395; ICT: $10,000 $222,102 $162,987 $59,175 Water HackatHon report 55 Annex 6 - funding funding sources for world Bank staff KoreA trust fund to The two main objectives of the KST are: (i) to support measures to improve gov- ernance and institutional performance in East Asian countries and Pacific Islands, support trAnsItIons and other member countries emerging from, or at risk of sliding into crisis or ar- (Kst) rears; and (ii) to support the reconstruction and development of East Asia and the Pacific Islands and other member countries, which are prone to, currently in, or are Ms. Roisin De Burca emerging from conflict. Senior Operations Officer Tel: +1 202 458-4007 rdeburca@worldbank.org go.worldbank.org/5UM7K0PUD0 wAter And sAnItAtIon The WSP is a multidonor global partnership administered by the World Bank with the mission of helping poor people in developing countries gain access to afford- progrAm (wsp) able, safe, and sustainable water and sanitation services. The WSP has supported many of the advances made in the water and sanitation sector over the last three Ms. Jaehyang So decades. Manager Tel: +1 202 473-7654 so@worldbank.org wsp.org wAter pArtnersHIp The WPP’s goal is to enhance the Bank’s efforts in reducing poverty through two progrAm (wpp) overarching objectives: (i) sponsorship and mainstreaming of pragmatic and principled approaches for water resources management and development; and (ii) improvement of the quality and effectiveness of water service delivery. Mr. Matthijs Schuring Program Coordinator Tel: +1 202 473-3441 mschuring@worldbank.org worldbank.org/water/wpp InnovAtIon fund Sponsored by the Knowledge and Learning Council, the Innovation Fund supports planning or piloting innovative new products, practices or approaches. Adminis- innovation@worldbank.org tered by the World Bank Institute Innovation Practice (WBIIN), Innovation Fund innovation.worldbank.org supports front line teams with innovative ideas for improved development out- comes. Water HackatHon report 56 Annex 7 - water Apps sample of existing water apps Icomms Water quality This tool is specifically designed to address the challenge of water quality monitor- ing in rural settings by accelerating the process of data transfer and analysis. To monitoring application serve in low-technology settings, the mobile reporting can be done on non-smart cape town, South africa phones, via GRPS, and if necessary for more simple phones, via SMS. To assure accurate and complete entry, the mobile system checks inputs against possible values and makes sure compulsory questions are answered before moving to the next question. Once data is sent and received, it is analyzed by a web-interface and sends users back an SMS to confirm the data has been received, and alert them to any drinking water safety risks. The ICOMMS team has been using and refining the tool for four years and recently shared their learning experiences about mapping data at the Atlanta 2012 ICT4D conference. All software is open source and is readily available on their website. Organization The ICOMMS (information for community oriented municipal services) research group at the University of Cape Town, in collaboration with others from the Aquatest partnership platforms Used Mobile application (feature and android), data transfer via GRPS mobile channel, web-based reporting interface, SMS response system Objective To create a rapid communication system to send simple water quality test results from rural locations to centralized water managers and send back necessary quality alerts to rural com- munities. Data collection Method Local representatives enter water quality test results into the mobile application or simple menu (on non-smart phones). These are sent to centralized water management systems via GRPS (or saved until a connection is available). type of Data collected Water quality indicators (e.g. conductivity, pH, turbidity). Data Use(s) Water quality tests are analyzed by a web-based interface, which alerts water managers to problems and sends SMS notifications back to local representatives. Data is also presented and recorded geographically. icomms.org/index.php?page=wqreporter Water HackatHon report 57 Annex 7 - water Apps flow (fIeld level AKVO FLOW was developed initially by Water for People in 2010 and is now being used in 17 countries. Through a new partnership between AKVO and Water for operAtIons wAtcH) People, the tool is being refined and expanded to be used by more implementing Water point mapping and agencies and governments to monitor water services. monitoring tool One key feature of the tool is the simplicity of the Android application for quickly Developed in Denver, Colorado training enumerators or local monitors to use it. Another key feature is the cus- tomizability of the questions that can be input into the application to use it for & amsterdam; netherlands surveying a variety of indicators. The World Bank has used this tool in Liberia version used globally (and currently in Sierra Leone) to map the location and functionality of more that 10,000 water points. Organization Water For People / AKVO platforms Used Android application, web interface Objective The objective is to more effectively collect, analyze and display geographically-referenced monitoring and evaluation data. Data collection Method Data is collected by surveyors or designated monitors via an android application and sent via GRPS (or saved offline until there is a connection) to a centralized web-interface for perfor- mance analysis. type of Data collected The android application has a customizable menu so that different information about the water point hours of service, quality of service, and management can be recorded, along with geographical location. Data Use(s) The data is analyzed by the web-based system to provide level of service ratings on water points, which is shown geographically. This can inform local water managers and through the option of publicly published results increase transparency of water projects. It can also be used to collect baseline data of waterpoint location and functionality to inform governments where resources are most needed to repair and build infrastructure. waterforpeople.org/flow-mapping akvo.org/blog/?cat=30 Water HackatHon report 58 Annex 7 - water Apps creeK wAtcH Creek Watch is a mobile application that allows volunteers to collect information about the condition of creeks that is aggregated for use by local watershed manag- Crowd-sourcing data about ers. It was developed by IBM as part of the Smarter Planet Initiative, in 2010 and waterway conditions now has over 4000 users in 20 countries (Chen et al., 2010). Worldwide, california-based This method of “crowd-sourcing� is a relatively simple tool that is a popular feature of many mobile innovations, and the hackathon was no exception. As a crowd- sourcing technology, a key design feature is ease of use, so that anyone can report without significant effort (Chen et al., 2010). For this reason, individuals report on simple features of the creek: 1. The amount of water: empty, some, or full. 2. The rate of flow: still, moving slowly, or moving fast. 3. The amount of trash: none, some (a few pieces), or a lot (10 or more pieces). 4. A picture of the waterway. The Google map view of reports. From creekwatch.org Organization Creek Watch, IMB platforms Used iphone application, Google maps Objective Enable citizens to supply information about local waterways to water managers. Data collection Method Data is submitted voluntarily by anyone who has downloaded the application to their iphone. type of Data collected Photo of waterway with GIS location; amount of water and flow in creek (approximated qualita- tively), amount of trash in creek Data Use(s) Data is aggregated to share with local water control boards to help them track pollution and manage waterways. flow-mapping.org Water HackatHon report 59 Annex 7 - water Apps AquA repuBlIcA This game is currently under development by UN-DHI, to be completed by the end of 2012. The game seeks to encourage “meaningful play� by creating a realistic A virtual river basin scenario of water resources management decisions within a river basin. In this way management game it provides a fun and engaging learning platform for those interested in sustainable Being Developed in Denmark development and water management. Players’ progress is gauged and tracked to lead them to greater proficiency in management. (expected by end of 2012) The game can be played alone or with others, and includes demands from multiple stakeholders. The initial scenario is a river basin with a small urban area (some businesses and light industry), some farms and a power station. The player must try to build a prosperous society in a sustainably-managed environment. The game is based on actual hydrological processes, through the integration of real-time computational hydrological models. Organization UNEP - DHI Centre for Water and Environment platforms Used Downloadable computer software program Objective To utilize the concept of “meaningful play� through a game that raises awareness about the challenge of water resources management for sustainable development. Game premise It is a serious game with realistic simplification of real world watershed/river basin processes (e.g. hydrological processes and development) in which the player must make management trade-offs to achieve the most favorable outcome. Data Use(s) The data in this case is given to the game player as he or she is challenged to manage water resources between competing societal and environmental demands. target audience The game is targeted to entry-level water managers and policy makers, as well as students and staff at universities and schools, and others interested in learning about sustainable development. icomms.org/index.php?page=wqreporter Water HackatHon report 60 Annex 7 - water Apps next drop In many cities where water supplies are irregular and only flow once a day or less frequently, women and children may have to spend hours waiting at home or at SMS water delivery communal water sources to ensure they collect what little supply is available. The notification system NextDrop tool was launched to address this in 2010 and continues to be refined Hubli-Dharward, and expanded. Through simple use of mobile voice and SMS communication, the service creates a chain of information from the valve openers to water users, and karnataka, india back to utility engineers. Thus, users are both alerted to incoming supply, and can report back if there is a problem. NextDrop strives to make this a valuable service, so users must pay a small fee to receive these notifications. Organization NextDrop platforms Used Mobile Voice, SMS broadcasting, crowdsourcing for citizen feedback loop, Google Maps Objective To spare water users the trouble of waiting long hours for intermittent water supplies to be turned on by alerting them to incoming supplies via SMS. Data collection Method Data is first collected from valvemen when they call in to an interactive voice response (IVR) system to acknowledge that valves have been opened. Data Use(s) The system sends subscribers SMS notifications to alert them 30-60 minutes before they will receive water. The reports of valve openings are also sent to the utility engineers through a Google map platform which allows them to track the status of valve openings in real-time. This also enables them to see non-compliance with the schedule so they can identify and resolve issues. Data verification Residents are called, or can send in SMS messages for verification, which is reported to utility engineers. nextdrop.org Water HackatHon report 61 Annex 7 - water Apps HydroplAtform Hydroplatform is an open-source modeling program for water resources. It is designed to be an easy tool for data management and visualization so that open-source water modelers can focus on development, and work collaboratively instead of through resource management separate commercial software programs. It is set up as an intuitive graphical user modeling interface, and can function with network models in other fields (e.g. transport and energy). London-based, used globally Organization University College London platforms Used Open-source software Objective The tool makes water resource management models easier to build, use, and share; take care of data management and visualization; enable collaborative model development Data collection Method The tool helps water resource modelers to enter, verify, manage, and visualize model data. type of Data collected The platform enables the integration of large and diverse data from climate to hydrological data and can be integrated with other models. Data Use(s) Hydroplatform enables modeling of water resources to be easily managed and collaboratively developed across a single open-source program. hydroplatform.org/index.php Water HackatHon report 62 Annex 7 - water Apps moBIle wAter pAyments Making traditional cash water payments in many developing countries can be a timely (and costly) activity in which travel to and waiting at a physical pay point is Application of mobile required. In these settings, limited access to formal savings mechanisms can also money to water services make paying lump-sum water bills a challenge, particularly for low-income house- key countries of deployment holds. Mobile water payments are a means to address these obstacles, which otherwise can undermine the ability of the utility to collect the payments for cost include Kenya, Tanzania, recovery and re-invest into improving and expanding water services. Uganda and Zambia Mobile water payment options have been deployed across several countries in Af- rica by utilities of all sizes from less than 1,000 connections to national providers, as in Uganda. In rural settings, the Grundfos LIFELINK system is attracting increasing interest. It uses mobile money to pay for water an electronic tap unit, which draws water through a solar-powered borehole pump. Organization Offered by a range of mobile network operators in conjunction with water utilities (e.g. Safari- com and Airtel in Kenya; Vodacom and Airtel in Tanzania; MTN and Airtel in Uganda) platforms Used SMS, mobile money Objective The objective is to enable water users to pay their bills in a more convenient and affordable way, thereby encouraging more timely bill payment while giving utilities a more cost-effective way to collect bills. This can ultimately enable utilities to recover and re-invest more revenue into improving and expanding services. Data collection Method Water users can pay their water bill through their mobile operator’s mobile money service (e.g. Safaricom’s M-PESA). type of Data collected Depending on the level of integration between the mobile money service and the service provider’s billing system, customers may be able to receive bills via SMS, reminders about payments, and check their balance. Data Use(s) Mobile payments can provide utilities with a simplified, digital record of payments, which can reduce administrative costs. It can also be a more transferable form of payment data for sharing with regulators. oxwater.co.uk/#/mobile-water-payments/4559323117 nairobiwater.co.ke Water HackatHon report 63 references Agrawal, P. C., C. Heymans, C. Yniguez, V. Bhatnagar, and V. Mehra. 2009. “Improving Water and Sanitation Service Delivery in India: Lessons from a National Workshop on Service-Level Benchmarking.� Eighteenth meeting of the Urban Think Tank, Decem- ber 14–15, New Delhi, India. AICD. 2010. Africa’s Infrastructure: A time for transformation. Washington DC: World Bank andAgence Française de Développe- ment. Chen, Kuang, Tapan Parikh, Christine Robson and Andrea Spillmann. Digital Data Collection for Improving Service Delivery: A Framework for Decision Makers. 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Ten Protips on Avoiding Hackathon Fail. http://blog.programmableweb.com/2012/03/22/ten-protips-on- avoiding-hackathon-fail/ Stumptown Syndicate, Event Planning for Geeks, http://assets.en.oreilly.com/1/event/61/Event%20Planning%20for%20 Geeks%20Presentation.pdf United Nations Foundation, Disaster Relief 2.0: The Future of Information Sharing in Humanitarian Emergencies, http://www. unfoundation.org/news-and-media/publications-and-speeches/disaster-relief-2-report.html World Bank. Directory of Programs Supported by Trust Funds, As of March 31, 2011. Global Partnership and Trust Fund Opera- tions Concessional Finance and Global Partnerships Water HackatHon report 64