 Good morning. I'm a little bit fagged out because I actually attended this event hosted by Google where some of the code mentors and students come together just like a hangout last night and I go home really late and then I had to wake up very early to be here right on time so I'm like sorry about the door face. So today I'm going to be talking to you about the open source design movement in Africa by open source community Africa. My name is Peace Ujeme but I have a nickname Perry that I always like a lot of people to call me. I'm a design contributor at sugar labs. I'm also leading the design team at open source community Africa. I advocate greatly for accessibility inclusion and open source specifically open source design. You can find me on Twitter peace underscore Ujeme. Okay let's kick start. Africa. The first thing I want to say and I want everyone to take home today is that Africa is not a country. I was in France last year and someone walked up to me at the museum. I was like you from Africa right? Do you know Philip? Africa is a huge continent made up of so many people and from Nigeria. Who is Philip? We have so many Philips in Nigeria. So like there's always this misconception about Africa. It's been a very small space with a little group of people that know each other. So yeah please Africa is not a country. It's actually like a huge continent made up of over one billion people. So it's not possible for me to know Philip. In Africa we have 57 countries with the population of over one billion people. Now out of these 57 countries, just talking about how diverse Africa is, I'm going to be using Nigeria as a case study just to drive home how much diversity we have over there in Africa. So Nigeria is where I'm from. In Nigeria we have over 250 ethnic groups and we speak over 500 languages. Is that the rest? And then we have over 2 million people. I think before I first right here from we are actually four from Nigeria but we are from different parts of Nigeria. I am something the dark guy. We are from the southern part of Nigeria. I died from the eastern part and blood is from the northern part. So we actually speak four different languages. The only language you have in common is English. So yeah, Nigeria is that diverse. And out of this population we have 60% of this population, almost 60% of this population as youths. Youths just living high school, those getting into the university, just finishing from the university. And then in Nigeria, Nigeria has always been this oil first country where you have to actually study engineering, gas or petroleum to be actually seen as someone who is actually making progress in the society. So if you are at home always on your computer or your phone, my parents just tell me I'm very lazy. See me on my computer. It's like you're wasting your life apparently because you're supposed to be studying engineering and then if you're not studying engineering you should be studying medicine or law. So outside this field is like what are you doing with your life? Like you're just wasting yourself. So that's like the whole notion. But then in the last couple of months a lot of youths have been pushing from the oil first into technology. So most youths right there in Nigeria and Africa are getting to come into technology, learn about tech, learn how to call, learn how to design. And then you find majority of these ones actually from fields that are not related to computer science. I actually just finished from the university. I studied microbiology and now I'm designing. You find a ton of people like that back there in Nigeria who did not study computer science or are currently now into the world of tech. So the knowledge itself is like people are trying to grasp it and then there's to be a time back then where you have this bridge between developers and designers. Designers used to have this very, very, very, very small group and there we have a lot of developers as well. In the last few couple of years and months the population between the designers and developers are kind of like measured up. People are beginning to appreciate design and beginning to know that actually design is quite important. I wouldn't say even more important than code but it's like really, really important. So people are actually beginning to actually understand that and they're actually starting to get the whole idea of design. But then we have this problem of people actually know about design and people who actually know that as a designer you can contribute to open source too. In Africa we get a lot of people like this. You should take note of this with your hands because you're going to see her later on in this talk. Getting really surprised when you talk about open source designs. The few ones I know about open source feel like it's just for code contributions. So I'm a designer, open source, nah, it's not for me. So they get really surprised when you talk about open source design and then one thing about Nigeria is most of the techies are very, very willing to learn. So they come, crowd your DMs on Twitter, tag you, ask you what open source design is and they all want to like try to get into the space and really understand what it is. So what Oscar is trying to do in Africa is increase the awareness of open source. At the same time making it possible to actually tell others that open source is not just about code contributions but also includes that minority group like designers and documentation. But Nigeria is leading the documentation team back there in Africa. So we actually like kind of like include everybody. And different ways we actually do that is we host meetups and workshops where we tell people about open source, about open source, about open source design and documentation and then we kind of like link them up to organizations that actually accept design contributions. Starting up with open source, I said I was at 2017 actually, I said out with an organization that actually did not appreciate design contributions. So I have to go through really long dialogues to actually propose a design change and then you get the very technical maintenance saying it's not important after series of months of conversation on why this has to change or why we have to actually have a sprint or something. So like most some of these organizations open source organizations still aren't like really open to designers. So we kind of like try to guide designers from Africa on how to actually start contributing to organizations that actually accept design contributions. And if you want to go into organizations that are kind of like difficult to get into ways to actually go around it and then drop your contribution. So we actually also link them link them up to open source projects. Currently, we have about 15 to 20 designers who are like really willing to actually get into open source and start working on open source projects. We started out open source community Africa in 2018. So it's like barely two years and we've covered over five countries in Africa and over 11 cities and each of those cities actually hosts different meetups where they talk about open source and body people into open source open source design documentation and also code. Now this month I almost said next month is actually funny because it's like really close. We're actually hosting the first open source conference in Africa called the open source festival and we are hosting the first sustained summit also in Africa. So it's like a three days festival where we have the sustained Africa conversation on how to actually sustain open source in Africa since it has come to stay and then the remaining two days are actually for the conference. So yeah, I don't know. Did you remember Abigail from the previous? So Abigail is actually giving a talk on designers can be open source open source errors too. So Abigail this year actually became a Google coding mentor from actually learning about open source and she has made tremendous progress since then. So she's coming to the festival to actually tell all the designers about her journey so far and how she's been able to tackle being an open source error in that really minute circle. The goal of OSCAR is actually to onboard as much open source errors. So it is word designers especially and then like those just in the minority group getting them to understand that open source is not just about contributing code. It actually goes beyond that. If you are a designer, we are here for you. You can find us on Twitter, the open source community Africa can find a hundred there. And this is to get more information about the festival, festival.oscarafrica.com. Receipt questions. Yeah. Oh, OK. Oh, OK. Yeah, we still have, we still, OK, I have to repeat the question, right? OK, sorry, come again. Oh, gender balance in Africa in technology, right? Yeah, we actually still have this whole gender balance issue. That's why you have communities like Sheikot Africa, women tech. Yeah, we have that. That's like a Google program too. So there's still this more male figure than female. So I don't think Oscar is trying to do is bridge the gap. And that's why in our festival, we actually had like 300 tickets for the festival dedicated to just female technologies. And then we actually give them sponsorships so they can actually come to the event. So yeah, there's still that gender gap in Africa. A very huge one. So I'll say the narrative is actually changing because the generation of our parents, they always feel like you have to actually study engineering because the country itself is actually like an oil first country. So if you're not doing engineering, it's like, but then there are a few persons who have gone into tech and then they've been like really successful. Other people say to them like, OK, if I can do this and be this successful, why not? And then they all like start getting into it. Mention that there were you were trying to pick the open source product that would accept this kind of solutions. Would you like to name a few that were particularly welcoming? Yeah, so I actually contribute to sugar labs. At that time, when I say contributing, it was really difficult to actually on both designers, but now it's quite easy because like I've been there and then I just get them in and open collectives and all that organization that actually accepts good design contributions. Then on open design website, you can actually see a bunch of design organizations that actually accept design contributions. You study biology. Microbiology. How the hell did you find open source software and design? I'm curious. So I would say I'm from that typical Nigerian home that my parents actually wanted me to study medicine. And then it was like I had to stay at home for like three years, trying to tell them that I have no interest in the health department. I don't study medicine. I had to stay at home for three years. When I in the end, after the whole back and forth, they actually made me to go to university to study microbiology. But when I got to school, I stayed hanging out with meetups. So one thing in one thing very commonly in Nigeria is that we have this small meetups like Oscar, just from the GGG and the rest of them having like smaller meetups in school, talking about technology. So in my first year, I actually stayed attending some of this meetup. And then I attended one design sprint when they gave us like they gave us this persona. And then it was they gave us a problem and so actually draft out a solution. And then it was like really cool. And I say attending meetup, I said taking courses on Udacity. Everything was kind of like personal. I said taking like buying courses. I go to school in the morning at night. I'm like, oh, my computer are trying to learn. And then when I was done with school last month, I was like, that I'm done living your life. It's time to take up my two. So that's actually how I took the shift to technology. And then I knew about sugar labs from something where I met him like the first month I actually said learning about technology. So he told me about sugar labs and then I stayed making little contributions. And then just there from there. I didn't quite get the question. So something is actually a name of a person. That's something there. I don't know if that's why you're actually asking. Oh, because of the biggest because of the biggest thing in Africa, right? The population is so huge. And it's because of Nigeria influence with the continent. So you get more sense for a lot of organizations like Google, Microsoft, you know, all the Silicon Valley companies coming to like have offices. But in terms of like communities, I know for sure that this big in Nairobi, Kenya, there's one in Egypt, there's one in South Africa. I would say like a lot of countries, but the fact that they also in Asia, they always stop for this cross-country, it's due to the fact that there are like a lot of people with a lot of interest in technology. Anybody else got any questions? So we have like another four minutes before the changeover. Yeah, outside Nigeria. Yeah, we actually have, so we have a chapter, we actually call them chapters. We have a chapter in Sierra Leone. This is Nigeria, some of the sisters. We have another one in Kenya. We have in Ethiopia too. So like the goal of OSCAR is actually to get out to so many African countries as possible just to start up. So once someone reach out to us from each of this country, we just kind of like on board them and then kick up meetups. Yeah, I think we have smaller communities in school. We call them school chapters. Yeah, I don't know. I'm not sure if that's like an answer to your question. Okay, by inclusion, actually being inclusion in design, like those with disabilities and the rest of them, yeah, not like general. Then on a more general level, bringing balance in the gender between male and female. Basically. Okay, so my organization Sugar Labs, we actually have this tech-top environment for kids where we actually take inclusion and accessibility very seriously. We think about kids with color-blindness, those that have like mostly impairment seen. So when creating our components, our design component, we'll make sure that we actually have components that actually suit this particular set of people. Yeah. Okay, so we come up with like certain options and then there are people who actually go and do the actual testing. So in Nigeria, we actually don't have so many people actually using the big stop in Nigeria. We have only very few schools. So we go to those schools, actually see actual students use it and how they react to it, then get the data, try to reform it. The what? I know it's the open street in Africa, it's quite a lot. Oh yeah, I saw someone from there, I think it was yesterday. I actually just heard about it yesterday for the first time. Yeah, we got talking yesterday. We're just coming to one more question maybe. Oh yeah, when you come to power, it's actually like a big problem, very big problem in Nigeria. I'll use myself as a case study. So I used to stay around school when I was in school and then we had power issues. So I have to go to like several hubs a bit far from school. So actually get my computer charged and in the middle of the night it goes off and then I start looking for like a neighbor that has a gen, then to charge my system before I actually got a gen. So in Nigeria, the part where I stay actually have to have like a support system for power and then we have really expensive internet. You get to spend like $1,150 on internet monthly just to make sure that you are like always online. So it's like the internet consumption is crazy expensive and power too is not. But then there are some areas that actually have good power supply. Yeah. So if I could answer that, I would say so do this. Power is actually, I would say in general African problem, it's just kind of for some reason it's still pretty good. So it's all part of Nigeria and if you want to stay in a place where you you know receive 24 hours fast, you should be ready to start paying like you know start paying for a partner that is expensive as in Francisco or if you want to like have a system like 24 hours internet for a great MVPS you pay a lot. So the point is to try to leave a very comfortable lifestyle with internet of power in so far of the country Nigeria you really need to be. Unboxed. Okay. So that's the last question because we need to do our changeover. So thank you very much. Peace for me. Thank you. So I just wanted to rephrase or remind you guys that Africa is like country, please.