Kenya Set to Join Digital Revolution — Finally?!

ABC's Dana Hughes reports from Nairobi: In Kenya anything that requires the internet: sending an email, downloading a song, or watching a video on you tube is an arduous process.  Most people here don’t even bother.  However, Kenyans' lack of internet savvy has very little to do with class, and everything to do with the fact that watching a two minute video can take up to 30 minutes. Despite what telecommunications companies advertise – there is no real broadband here.  Everyone that uses the net shares the same satellite space.  Some people (like myself) pay a little bit more for dedicated IP addresses that claim to be 3G fast; which it is – at two o’clock in the morning when everyone is asleep and no-one is online.  But try to do anything that requires a faster speed than dial-up during the day and you’re going to have real problems.   “Sometimes, the net is so slow we can’t send an email all day,” one woman who works for a talent recruitment firm in downtown Nairobi told me.  “So if you want to get any research or business done that needs the Internet, you either need to be in before 7 am or you have to stay at work until at least 8 o’clock at night.” But that is all about to change.  Seacom, a telecommunications project owned by European, African and Indian investors, has laid more than 8,000 miles under water fiber optic cables connecting East and Southern Africa with global networks in Europe and India.  The project promises connectivity speeds that will rival any country in the world, including the United States. Today, Seacom went live successfully, following another fiber optic broadband venture TEAMS, the East African Marines System.  TEAMS, a public-private partnership between the Kenyan government, local firms and a United Arab Emirates telecommunications company, went live successfully last month. Here’s the catch – the companies are still in the testing phase, so broadband Internet still isn’t available to consumers. Both companies claim they’ll be operational by September.  But because this is Kenya, where corruption often trumps efficiency, people aren’t holding their breath. One thing everyone can agree with is that whether it takes six weeks, six months, or even (gasp) six years, broadband is coming to this part of the world, allowing more Africans to join the digital revolution. This reporter hopes it happens soon.  Maybe my reasons are selfish, but it would be nice to be able to send three minutes of video in less than three hours; to download just one Itunes song in less than 20 minutes.  And of course to be able to watch videos on ABCNews.com.  Now that's really something to look forward to.