We aim to close digital divide in the new era of generative AI in two ways:
1) by triggering the activation of an International AI governance law driven by the Global South by January 1, 2026. We call this effort the AI Moonshot. Here's our FAQ
2) by activating Meaningful AI, which is DDI's own AI model offered to nation-states beginning with Indonesia. This model builds on our past activity promoting Meaningful Broadband in Asia.
AI Moonshot
At the Digital Divide Institute, we are activating a global AI governance model to close the Digital Divide that aims to be converted into international law by the end of 2025. The approach would be driven by the six key nations of the Global South – Indonesia, India, Mexico, Brazil, South Africa, and Saudi Arabia. -- these G21 nations would be the sole platform for the initiative. The Moonshot would emphasize the role of two leaders the Global South who chair G20. They are Lula da Silva in Brazil in 2024 and Cyril Ramaphosa in South Africa in 2025. The Moonshot would leverage innovations across geographies on a South-to-South basis. Can it happen? Maybe... but maybe not. It took 18 years to activate the START treaty to protect us all from nuclear war. Now, we have only a few months to optimize AI. We need to create a global governance model to prevent Rogue AIs (or rogue humans) from using AI to create harm.
The moonshot would produce the incentives needed for China and USA to join forces on the single global AI governance regime.
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Our plan would be the first to foster collaboration between two members of G21, the USA and China which nowadays foolishly compete for AI dominance on a winner-takes-all basis. Their AI partnership could uplift the economies of both nations. And, for the world at large, it would produce a more equitable civilization. AI Moonshot begins in 2024 in Jakarta .
UPCOMING EVENTS
All events for 2024 are at no cost. Please RSVP by telling us about yourself and why you are interested in attending.
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THE PEOPLE, PLACES AND IDEAS BEHIND DDI
1999’s Battle of Seattle, pictured her, led to the creation of the global movement to close digital divide and to the Digital Divide Institute. Meaningful Artificial Intelligence (MAI) emerged as a project of the Institute in 2023. Slide 1 of 4
What drives this model? Ancient wisdom. In the 9th century, leaders built a monument to human development. Called Borobudur, pictured here. It looks from the sky like a computer chip. It challenges us now to activate AI meaningfully for human development. . Slide 2 of 4
The green stripe on the left symbolizes our demographic focus. Several test-market nations – India, Indonesia, Mexico, Brazil, South Africa. These nations, in the middle of the economic pyramid, may use AI to produce a balanced human civilization. Slide 4 of 4
1999’s Battle of Seattle, pictured her, led to the creation of the global movement to close digital divide and to the Digital Divide Institute. Meaningful Artificial Intelligence (MAI) emerged as a project of the Institute in 2023. Slide 1 of 4
After a successful six-year campaign to build "political will" on behalf of DDI's Meaningful Broadband model, it was finally activated by the Indonesian government. Here DDI's Meaningful Broadband Action Plan was formally accepted by Ilham A Habibie, who heads the nation's inter ministerial ICT Council. Later, Habibie invited DDI's Craig Warren Smith to advise the government's implementation of the Meaningful AI model.
As an event organized by The World Bank and the Indonesian government, the leaders of 38 regional governments agreed to join into test-market deployment of Meaningful Technologies, an ethical-based framework conceived by Digital Divide Institute.
Here are the "five domains of innovation" which must be operationalized and integrated to encourage ethical impacts of AI as it reaches mass markets. This framework is a "design principle" which leads to an ecosystem of products and services that interact to empower consumers. Indonesia is the "proof of concept" location for testing this model with help from the World Bank Group.
China's top academic institution, Peking University (PKU), has signed an agreement to host Meaningful Broadband-China. The dean of PKU's Department of Information Management invited DDI's Craig Warren Smith to become a Visiting Professor, charged with making plans to use China's new broadband infrastructure to boost AI and reduce carbon emissions in impoverished Western Provinces.
Digital Divide 2.0
For a firsthand view of the moment when “closing the digital divide” became the basis of a worldwide movement.
Since then, the close-digital divide movement went through stages leading up to the launch of Meaningful AI in 2023.
Our Model
DDI does not have a long wish-list for closing Digital Divide. We just have one all-in-one concept: Meaningful Broadband.
Indonesia Up-Date
Indonesia is DDI’s “proof of concept” for our model. Partnering with World Bank, we began test-market deployment in local districts.
Meaningful AI - Indonesia
Here is our plan for bringing Meaningful AI to the nation: : AI Governance to Close Digital Divide and Protect the Nation. Our plan builds on the Indonesian President’s 2020 AI Strategy.
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