Grassroots Revolution

Article

Writing for Vodafone’s Receiver magazine, Ken Banks reflects on how dramatically mobile technology has transformed everyday life in small African towns since his first visits a decade earlier, using the Ugandan town of Masindi — once reachable only by an unreliable post office phone line, now dense with mobile phone dealerships and branded advertising — as a case study. He traces the continent’s growth to nearly 300 million mobile subscribers to factors including thriving second-hand handset markets, the GSM Association’s push for sub-$20 phones, and grassroots-driven services such as “Call Me,” which formalised the practice of “flashing” a contact to request a free call-back.