"The Strategic Guide to Responsible Platform Business highlights alternative strategies that platform organisations can pursue to acknowledge and mitigate platform capitalism’s problematic tendencies. While it is informative for policymakers and civil society, the Guide is mainly meant to be a res
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ource for decision-makers in European platform firms. It outlines key ethical concerns and trade-offs, to then point to possible responses that have been tried by platforms operating in the market." (Publisher description)
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"In recent years, Africa has seen a digital entrepreneurship boom, with hundreds of millions of dollars poured into tech cities, entrepreneurship trainings, coworking spaces, innovation prizes, and investment funds. Politicians and technologists have offered Silicon Valley–influenced narratives of
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boundless opportunity and exponential growth, in which internet-enabled entrepreneurship allows Africa to “leapfrog” developmental stages to take a leading role in the digital revolution. This book contrasts these aspirations with empirical research about what is actually happening on the ground. The authors find that although the digital revolution has empowered local entrepreneurs, it does not untether local economies from the continent's structural legacies. Drawing on a five-year research project, the authors show how entrepreneurs creatively and productively adapt digital technologies to local markets rather than dreaming of global dominance, achieving sustainable businesses by scaling based on relationships and customizing digital platform business models for African infrastructure challenge. The authors examine African entrepreneurial ecosystems; show that African digital entrepreneurs have begun to form a new professional class, becoming part of a relatively exclusive cultural and economic elite; and discuss the impact of Silicon Valley's mythologies and expectations." (Publisher description)
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"Analyzes the growth and evolution of mobile telephony, including the rise of data-based services delivered to handheld devices through “apps” (applications) and other ways. Summarizing current thinking and seeking to inform the debate on the use of mobile phones to improve livelihoods, the repo
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rt looks, in particular, at key ecosystem-based applications in agriculture, health, financial services, employment, and government, with chapters devoted to each, and explores the consequences of the emerging “app economy” for development. The global conversation is no longer about the phone itself, but about how it is used and the content and applications that it opens up. These apps and “mash-ups” of services, driven by high-speed networks, social networking, online crowdsourcing, and innovation, are helping mobile phones transform lives in developed and developing countries alike." (Back cover)
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