Organizational, social and operational implications in delivering ICT solutions: a telecom web case-study

Delivering new technology solutions in a well established IT-educated consumer market largely depends on the usefulness and usability of the solution. However, this is very different from delivering ICT solutions in developing regions where there are multiple factors that affect technology adoption, which seem to be at least as important as the technology itself. This paper revolves around a case study of World Wide Telecom Web (WWTW), commonly known as Spoken Web, a voice based content-creation and dissemination platform. The study reflects different challenges in adoption and different ways of evolution of WWTW in the varied organizational, social and operational settings in rural India. The case study uses pilot deployments in four regions in India, each involving at least 500 users. All the four deployments had a different organizational, social and operational model. This paper presents the implications of these differences on the WWTW technology adoption. The study shows that organizations have a strong influence in the adoption, social settings play a major role in the evolution of the solution and operational model influences the quality of the solution.