Norberto Patrignani
email: norberto.patrignani@polito.it

Diane Whitehouse
email: diane.whitehouse@thecastlegateconsultancy.com

Slow Tech: The Bridge between Computer Ethics and Business Ethics

Keywords: Business Ethics, Computer Ethics, Corporate Social Responsibility, Information and Communication Technology (ICT), Slow Tech

This paper addresses the difficult task of implementing the concept of Slow Tech, that is, information and communication technology (ICT) that is good, clean and fair, in a business environment. It investigates the democratic, environmental, and social challenges currently facing ICT vendors. More specifically, it examines the opportunities available for these companies to use Slow Tech as a bridging mechanism between their Computer Ethics and their Business Ethics strategies, based on Corporate Social Responsibility. Last but not least, it highlights what some "next step" questions for further investigation and implementation might be and the challenges of implementing these.

Introduction

Today, internationally as well as in Europe, large-scale corporations are getting ready for the next phase in social, economic and environmental developments by preparing appropriate corporate social responsibility strategies. Information and communication technology (ICT) vendors are a specific case in point: they sell large quantities of technologies which are currently helping to re-shape society through resulting significant social and environmental changes. Largely in response to policy and regulatory changes, some large ICT companies are now filing social and environmental balance sheets in addition to completing their annual financial reports. However, very few ICT vendors currently consider the computer ethics side of their businesses even while they are beginning to adopt the notion of corporate social responsibility: even fewer undertake social and environmental audits of the ICT that they sell. For the sake of consistency, ICT vendors should begin to examine their own business and investigate the specific ethical, environmental and social impacts of the products and services they provide to their customers. Thus, this paper suggests that ICT vendors should be among the first companies that start to develop an applied ethics that examines the ethical challenges related to computers, i.e., computer ethics. It proposes Slow Tech as a tool to facilitate companies' efforts to analyse the ethical, environmental, and social impacts of the ICT that they design, develop, produce, and sell. Whenever business ethics is used as a form of applied ethics that examines the ethical challenges that arise in a given business scenario, Slow Tech is able to provide a suitable bridge between those computer ethics and business ethics.

The paper is structured so as to introduce Slow Tech as a concept, and describe briefly its relationship with Slow Food. This introduction is followed by a discussion of the role of computer ethics and business ethics in today's society. In particular, the paper outlines the relationship between business ethics and corporate social responsibility. It then examines the formal annual reporting processes of ICT vendors: it shows how these vendors are increasingly responding to requests to make public their corporate social responsibilities, and yet are still doing so in quite limited ways. It highlights a number of important challenges for the ICT industry, and indicates in what way this industry might take a number of steps on the journey to becoming more Slow Tech. While the paper takes an optimistic view of the opportunities that lie ahead, it does not shirk from facing the challenges that are implicit in beginning this new way of thinking and acting.

2

Slow Tech and its Parallels to Slow Food Some forms of Slow Tech have been around for at least a decade [START_REF] Hallnäs | Slow Technology; Designing for Reflection[END_REF][START_REF] Price | Slow-Tech. Manifesto for an Overwound World[END_REF]. These earlier approaches either considered designing Slow Tech to be about the creation of periods of reflection and mental rest [START_REF] Hallnäs | Slow Technology; Designing for Reflection[END_REF] or they focused on the need for robust engineering practices [START_REF] Price | Slow-Tech. Manifesto for an Overwound World[END_REF]. Since 2010, the Slow Tech notion has been further revised and refined [START_REF] Patrignani | Slow Tech. Manifesto for a Social and Ethical Governance of Converging Technologies[END_REF][START_REF] Patrignani | Slow Tech: towards a good, clean and fair ICT[END_REF]. Today, Slow Tech is being re-formulated as a concept that invites people to reflect on the social and environmental impacts of ICT [START_REF] Patrignani | Slow Tech: towards a good, clean and fair ICT[END_REF][START_REF] Whitehouse | From Slow Food to Slow Tech: a reflection paper[END_REF]. It encourages concentration on the entire technology value chain, i.e., the whole chain of activities performed to create ICT products and services. This contemporary version of Slow Tech proposes that ethical ICT should have three characteristics: it should be good, clean and fair. There three terms -good, clean and fair -explicitly replay the Slow Food movement's appeal to reflect on the whole food-chain, so as to ensure that food should be: of good quality, clean (it should respect the environment, promote biodiversity and sustainability) and fair (i.e., the cultivation and production of food must respect the rights of farmers) [START_REF] Petrini | Slow Food Nation: Why our Food should be Good, Clean and Fair[END_REF]2011). In other words, good ICT is based around notions of humancentredness, user involvement, participatory design, enjoyment, aesthetics, and a balance between work and home life. Clean ICT means taking into consideration the environmental impacts (such as materials and energy consumption) of the manufacture, use and disposal of ICT products. Fair ICT means ensuring fairness and equity of the conditions of workers throughout the entire supply chain. Detailed explanations of the basics of Slow Tech are outlined in other papers [START_REF] Patrignani | Slow Tech: towards a good, clean and fair ICT[END_REF][START_REF] Whitehouse | From Slow Food to Slow Tech: a reflection paper[END_REF].

Slow Tech should not be misunderstood as an appeal necessarily for technology to "go slow". Rather, in terms of the ICT industry, it should be seen as a plea for its these three aspects of concern -goodness, cleanliness, and fairness -to be viewed holistically rather than each being addressed in very different ways, and separately. Slow Tech should be viewed as a proposal to look at ICT in a new, more holistic, manner that represents an innovative approach to technology for the 21st century.

Computer Ethics and Business Ethics

In terms of the holism with which ICT should now be regarded, it is important to examine both computer ethics and business ethics. While a trend against technological determinism was already evident in the 1930s, these two ethical domains, computer ethics and business ethics, have developed most swiftly since the 1970s over a similar time-horizon although largely separately. These two ethical domains show certain similarities: in particular, their current focus is on stakeholder collaboration and the co-shaping of technology and society by people themselves. On the one hand, computer ethics has possibly been more limited in its sphere than business ethics. While academe has shown considerable interest in it, at least some computer societies have applied its principles. On the other hand, business ethics has been taken up rather more obviously: this is perhaps due to its commercial setting or because of the many ethical and behavioural weaknesses in business that have been so publicly pointed out over the last decade and a half. This uptake has occurred on the part of at least three distinct sectors: academe, business organisations and associations, and policy fora. Now is the time to examine the similarities and synergies between the two fields of ethics and, as appropriate, to bring the two forms of ethics together. This section of the paper concentrates on a comparison of computer ethics and business ethics.

Computer Ethics

Writing in rejection of technological determinism was evident at least since the 1930s on the part of several philosophers and social scientists. See, for example, the work of such writers as Lewis Mumford and Jacques Ellul [START_REF] Mumford | Technics and Civilization[END_REF][START_REF] Ellul | La technique ou l'enjeu du siècle[END_REF]). Yet, it was Norbert Wiener -a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) -who was probably the first scientist to reflect on the social and ethical impacts of computers, with his recommendation to shift "from know how to know what" [START_REF] Wiener | The Human Use of Human Beings: Cybernetics and Society[END_REF]. The first research engineer to follow up on Wiener's ideas was Donn Parker with his Rules of Ethics in Information Processing [START_REF] Parker | Rules of Ethics in Information Processing[END_REF]). Joseph Weizenbaum, another professor at MIT, described the risks related to the use of computers for military applications [START_REF] Weizenbaum | Computer Power and Human Reason: From Judgment to Calculation[END_REF]). However, the term "computer ethics" was used for the first time in 1978 by Walter Maner in his taught course, the notes from which were eventually published as a Starter Kit in Computer Ethics [START_REF] Maner | Starter Kit in Computer Ethics, West Virginia[END_REF]. A later description of computer ethics was introduced by James Moor [START_REF] Moor | What Is Computer Ethics?[END_REF]. It was based on a perceived lack of policy and guidance in terms of the use of computers: "... there is a policy vacuum about how computer technology should be used. ... A central task of Computer Ethics is to determine what we should do in such cases, that is, formulate policies to guide our actions ..." (Moor, 1985, p.1). This description of computer ethics was focused on the end-uses of ICT and on the social and ethical implications of this use. At this period, some 30 years ago, the role of the ICT industry -itself at the very core of the information technology development process -did not appear to be questioned. Following the work of Deborah Johnson, which took place around the same time, it was, however, realised that "... technology is not just artifacts, but rather artifacts embedded in social practices and infused with social meaning" (Johnson, 1985, p.16). This shift in thinking enabled a new way of looking at ICT systems as socio-technical systems: a context in which technology and society shape each other. This focus on co-shaping means that people have the opportunity to steer technology developments in different directions: they are not bound by a framework of technological determinism.

It is precisely in the field of computer ethics that Slow Tech can play a fundamental role, by creating a positive form of computer ethics rather than one which has a negative orientation. Slow Tech offers a potential enlargement of the scope of analysis, and application, of computer ethics by including the entire ICT value chain: thus, it covers both the development process of ICT as well as its use. Slow Tech's view of ICT ranges from the extraction and processing of raw materials, and ICT manufacturing processes, through to responsible renewal, recycling and disposal. The supply chain does not start in the warehouse or the store. This stance is particularly valid for ICT vendor organisations because, today, they are the main actors involved in designing, developing, producing, and selling computer technologies.

Business Ethics

The classical definition of business ethics is "... the applied ethics discipline that addresses the moral features of commercial activity" [START_REF] Marcoux | Business Ethics[END_REF]. This form of applied ethics tries to provide answers to such difficult questions as: "Is the corporation a moral agent? How and in whose interests ought the corporation to be governed?" In terms of the establishment of its associations and societies, business ethics has appeared only relatively recently on both sides of the Atlantic. The Society for Business Ethics was founded in the United States in 1980 by Richard De George, while in Europe the European Business Ethics Network was launched in 1987.

Yet, for at least the last forty years, a vigorous debate has taken place in both American and European business schools about the role of the corporations in society. On the one hand, the work of Milton Friedman was concentrated on shareholder theory, in which the mission of the corporation is to maximise profit for a company's shareholders [START_REF] Friedman | The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase its Profits[END_REF]. On the other hand, Edward R. Freeman's work was based on stakeholder theory, where business ought to be managed in such a way that it achieves a balance among the interests of all who bear a substantial relationship to the firm -the firm's stakeholders. According to [START_REF] Freeman | Strategic Management: A Stakeholder Approach[END_REF], the purpose of the corporation is its joint service to its stakeholders.

However, discussion about computer ethics and business ethics does not only take place in business schools. A parallel discussion has been conducted in the business world, and has been articulated in the field of European and international policy: it is called corporate social responsibility.

Corporate Social Responsibility

Corporate social responsibility is a form of corporate self-regulation, that is integrated into a company's business model. In other words, the policy of corporate social responsibility functions as a built-in, self-regulating mechanism that ensures compliance with prevailing legal and ethical standards and international norms (Wikipedia, 2014a). Corporate social responsibility is in line with stakeholder theory, since it includes all those entities, groups and individuals on whom a corporation has an impact. It enables a profile to be drawn of the effects that a corporation has beyond its own shareholders. This wider, holistic picture includes employees, consumers, communities, and the environment. It is for this reason that the proponents of corporate social responsibility argue that organisations with this perspective are more able to make profits in the long-term. If a company that embraces a business ethics approach is willing to examine the ethical challenges that likely to arise as a result of the business scenarios that it is applying, then two actions will occur. It will extend its concerns beyond the strict interests of its shareholders, and it will have a strong corporate social responsibility strategy.

A number of policy bodies have taken up this concern with corporate social responsibility. This movement can be seen both in Europe, in the work of the European Commission, and more widely internationally in the context of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). A preoccupation with corporate social responsibility has been present in European policy for over a decade. In the five-year period at the start of this century, the European Commission published two relevant policy documents (European Commission, 2006;2011). More recently, the Commission has tightened up its concept of social responsibility relative to its earlier definition. In a 2011 Communication, it defines it directly as "the responsibility of enterprises for their impacts on society" (European Commission, 2011, p.6). This policy document also states that, to fully meet their social responsibility, enterprises "... should have in place a process to integrate social, environmental, ethical human rights and consumer concerns into their business operations and core strategy in close collaboration with their stakeholders" (Op cit, 2011, p.6). This Communication includes a set of eight recommendations, which range from awareness-raising to international discussion and collaboration. They form a list of corporate social responsibility guidelines or clauses. Similar statements occur in the ISO's voluntary guidelines, ISO 26000, launched in 2010 (ISO, 2010). Among others, these include: -principles of social responsibility (accountability, transparency, ethical behaviour, respect for stakeholder interests, respect the rule of law, respect for international norms, respect for human rights); -fundamental practices of social responsibility (recognising social responsibility, stakeholder identification and engagement); -social responsibility core subjects (human rights, labour practices, the environment, fair operating practices, consumer issues, community involvement and development) (ISO, 2010).

Even though these guidelines are voluntary in character, they are beginning to influence the ways in which international, large-scale businesses view the importance of their corporate social responsibility.

ICT Vendors and Corporate Social Responsibility

ICT vendors constitute a specific category of firms within this corporate environment.

They have a major influence over the shaping and co-shaping of the digital world in which a considerable proportion of the population of the planet currently lives. ICT vendors are members of a group of organisations that need to examine -in conjunction with all businesses -their business ethics generally. In addition, given the corporate sector in which they operate, they also particularly need to explore their computer ethics. This dual approach to both business ethics and computer ethics forms an integral part of ICT businesses' corporate social responsibility.

Given the growing importance of corporate social responsibility, 2014 provides an opportune moment to explore how this strategy is handled by ICT vendors. If an ICT vendor would like to develop a coherent and consistent corporate social responsibility strategy based on the triple bottom-line approach of "profit, people, planet" [START_REF] Spreckley | Social Audit. A management tool for co-operative working[END_REF][START_REF] Elkington | Cannibals with Forks -The Triple Bottom Line of 21st Century Business[END_REF][START_REF] Orse | Observatoire de la Responsabilité Sociétale des Enterprises, www.orse.org[END_REF], then computers -or ICT in general -will have to be included in any analysis of the company's own behaviour.

The ICT market is made up of various components: it includes, among others, hardware, software, ICT services, networking devices, social networks, and ecommerce sites. This market is one of the most important at the global scale. In 2013, its value was estimated to be around 3,700 billion US dollars: in the 12-month period since, it has seen a slight increase of +4.2%, despite the financial and economic crisis [START_REF] Gartner | Gartner Says Worldwide IT Spending on Pace to Reach $3.7 Trillion in 2013[END_REF]. The world's ICT companies have experienced a strong process of consolidation over the last decade. The few remaining competing firms have become, or are in the process of becoming, global giants. The 2013 ranking of ICT companies in terms of their revenues shows that the main ICT vendors are corporate behemoths. Table 1 shows the largest ICT vendors in terms of their 2013 revenue [START_REF] Forbes | The World's Biggest Public Companies[END_REF], together with the official documentation related to their corporate social responsibility strategy.

Table 1. Corporate Social Responsibility Reports in 2013 -Main ICT Vendors

For ICT vendors, it is clear that one critical success factor could be to articulate a strategy that stipulates their corporate social responsibility. The publicly available documentation of the largest international ICT companies (cited in Table 1) indicates that, for the majority of these corporations, corporate social responsibility means only developing a number of generic activities relating to social concerns, for example, by funding projects in various charitable areas. These companies appear to report very little activity that would have a direct impact on their responsibilities in terms of the ICT sector itself or that would address the very specific social and environmental challenges posed by their own companies in relation to ICT.

While it is difficult to consolidate a single view of these very different companies in terms of their corporate social responsibility strategies, it is obvious that it is becoming more and more important for them to show -with a degree of transparency -to both their investors and their customers the factors that contribute to their economic results. Some large ICT vendors -in particular in the ICT manufacturing area -do have their own codes of conduct. For example, the Electronics Industry Code of Conduct, a non-profit corporation established in 2009, states that it "was established to ensure worker safety and fairness, environmental responsibility, and business efficiency" (EICC, 2012, p.1). However, two years after the code was set up, many limitations were still found to these approaches due to the general lack of international standards, the low level of commitment, and a lack of verification and enforcement mechanisms [START_REF] Martinuzzi | Sector profile CSR Activities and Impacts of the ICT Sector[END_REF]). e-commerce sites and online retailing, as industries, have been scrutinised from an ethical perspective (Agag and Elbertagi, 2013). This study's findings demonstrate the importance of business ethics and corporate social responsibility for companies "... ethical problems like security, privacy, reliability, non-deception and corporate social responsibility on [sic] Internet are core issues that limit the growth of online retailing" (Op cit, 2013, p.15).

As can be seen from the above discussion, ICT vendor corporations have a special accountability in terms of society and the planet. Thus, their reporting should take a step beyond the traditional corporate social responsibility reporting of companies in other industries. In their corporate social responsibility strategy or, more generally, in their business ethics strategy, ICT vendors should also incorporate a computer ethics strategy. Presumably, developing such a stance on corporate ethical and social concerns would help them to improve the companies' performance, growth and profitability.

6

Slow Tech as a Bridge: Good, Clean and Fair ICT Slow Tech is proposed as a tool for bridging the two fields of computer ethics and business ethics. It could ensure the incorporation of appropriate corporate social responsibility codes and behaviours for ICT vendors. How precisely can Slow Tech (good, clean, and fair ICT) help ICT vendors in their definition of their triple bottom line (ORSE, 2010)? How can Slow Tech help in bridging business ethics and computer ethics? It can do so at three levels: it brings together in a succinct and straightforward manner the three notions of good, clean and fair with those of profit, planet and people. In Figure 1, a representation is provided of Slow Tech as a possible bridge between computer ethics and the classical corporate social responsibility triple bottom lines that are embedded in business ethics.

Figure 1 acts as a reminder that the basis of computer ethics has traditionally been about the use of ICT. Slow Tech widens that limited scope to explore the whole of the ICT value chain. The diagram shows that both Slow Tech and business ethics -in which corporate social responsibility is implicitly included -outline a trio of concerns. For Slow Tech, this triad is based around the three notions of good, clean and fair. The three notions incorporated in corporate social responsibility are profit, people and planet. In this figure, therefore, good ICT can be equated with the capacity to make a long-term profit; clean ICT is linked with the planet; and fair ICT is associated with people. Each of the three sets of relationships are explained below in more detail.

Fig.1. Slow Tech as a Bridge between Computer Ethics and Business Ethics

Good ICT and profit

Starting from the creation of a bridge between the ability to make a profit in the longterm -and hence to maintain financial sustainability -with a good form of ICT, good ICT is an ICT that should be human-centred. Thus human-computer interaction, and participatory design are the core starting requirements in ICT design. Good ICT should be designed by using either a design-for-all or an inclusive approach. Good ICT can therefore be associated with profitable i.e., financially sustainable ICT.

ICT that is desirable, and yet also financially sustainable, requires a continuous investment in innovation. Organisations that would like to stay at the forefront of ICT innovation need to design high-quality and advanced products. This ambition requires a considerable investment in knowledge-workers. Most ICT companies are aware that, in terms of achieving success, their work is founded on knowledge intensity, human capital, and investments in research and development [START_REF] Martinuzzi | Sector profile CSR Activities and Impacts of the ICT Sector[END_REF]. Being innovative means being able to attract talented personnel from around the globe, as part of those large industrial clusters and cooperative networks that include universities and research centres.

Innovation in ICT means being ready to develop a continually updated research agenda. In 2014, for example, it should include such areas as: Big Data, Intelligent System and Decision Support Systems (for which data scientists will be people highly requested by companies), Cloud Computing and Internet of Things (that aspect of the cloud based on the use of sensors), Information and Knowledge Management (the new web or network science), Organisational Models and Information Systems (which offer new roles for Chief Information Officers), Mobility (in which the vehicle, such as a car, is the computer), and Human-Computer Interaction (which might eventually mean bidding farewell to computer keyboards).

Clean ICT and planet

For an ICT vendor, creating a bridge between clean ICT and the planet means undertaking a profound analysis of the impact of both hardware and software production, and their use and disposal. This clean approach takes into account those limits to growth that result from the limits of the planet [START_REF] Meadows | The Limits to Growth. A Report for the Club of Rome's Project on the Predicament of Mankind[END_REF]. Indeed the ICT sector could play a fundamental role in developing the domain of cleantech, that field of clean technology for which there is not yet any standard definition, yet which can be termed "any product or services that improves operational performance, productivity, or efficiency while reducing cost, inputs, energy consumption, waste, or environmental pollution" (Wikipedia, 2014b). Clean ICT could help people to minimise their consumption of conventional fossils fuels, and non-renewable materials (through de-materialisation), thereby reducing pollution. The reduction would occur by applying innovative science and technology and introducing new life-styles and cultural changes, in the long-term.

At the same time, this would mean two approaches: maximising the contribution of renewable resources in energy production by incorporating information technologies in new technological and organisational systems; and finding the most appropriate materials and form of energy by diffusing knowledge of cleantech. More specifically, ICT devices should be recyclable-by-design; their lifetime should be extended and lengthened; and interoperability standards between modules should be made mandatory.

Last but not least, the rebound effects of ICT should be analysed in-depth and clarified at all three levels of their impact. The first-order effect relates to resource and energy consumption, green-house gas production, and e-waste. The second-order effect to the impact of the continuing use of ICT, de-materialisation, e-procurement, tele-work, transactions speed, and transparency. The impact and opportunities created by the use of ICT by large numbers of people, their productivity, well-being, and lifestyles, are the third-order effect [START_REF] Yi | Review of research on the environmental impact of ebusiness and ICT[END_REF]. Further research is needed on the long-term sustainability of ICT since, as demonstrated in several simulation studies, there is a risk that the positive and negative effects of ICT may counterbalance each other: the rapidity of the development of ICT may induce more material and energy consumption and more e-waste generation [START_REF] Hilty | The relevance of information and communication technologies for environmental sustainability. A prospective simulation study[END_REF].

Fair ICT and people

Bridging fair ICT with the needs of people means that an ICT vendor needs to create transparency in the supply chain with regard to its employees' working conditions. In particular, the corporation should pay special attention to human rights. A company needs to ensure that human rights are respected, for examples, in the mines of Africa and those other countries that are the main sources of the materials (such as coltan and the rare-earths) used to build its computer equipment (Vazquez-Figueroa, 2010). It should commit to enforcing the respect of human rights, health, and safety of working conditions in all its suppliers' manufacturing and assembly plants, and ensuring that workers are not forced to undertake monotonous and repetitive tasks, or to work for very low wages. In other types of organisational context, the pressure of the work undertaken by knowledge workers should be counterbalanced by improvements in the quality of the work environment. Fair ICT should also include offering users the opportunity to change their ICT provider through the use of proper "spanning layers" with open interfaces. A fair ICT vendor should not lock its users and developers into "silos" that possess proprietary formats and application programming interfaces [START_REF] Madrigal | Bruce Sterling on Why It Stopped Making Sense to Talk About 'The Internet' in 2012[END_REF] One of the main features of Slow Tech as a tool is the improved capability of the corporation to design a complete stakeholders' network. For an ICT vendor this means the opportunity to identify both its downstream actors and its upstream actors. The stakeholders covered include not only those which are present after the vendor's products and service are released onto the market, but also those involved in the extraction and processing of raw materials, and in the manufacture of the ICT products. Key questions for ICT vendors -and for all other stakeholders in the ICT value chain -become not only where the technology itself comes from, but also their social and environmental costs. Being able to ask, and answer, these kinds of questions openly and transparently will initiate a means of approaching an innovative ethical, social and environmental good, clean and fair ICT for the 21st century.

Conclusions, Challenges and Next Steps

This paper starts with a discussion of the origin and development of Slow Tech, and its basic characteristics. It argues that Slow Tech can be broadened to provide a means of looking at ICT in a more holistic manner, by taking into account the extent to which the creation and sale of ICT services and products can be characterised as good, clean and fair. Thus, Slow Tech as an approach provides a specific business opportunity for the computer industry, especially for ICT vendors. ICT vendors' challenge is how to ensure that, when they examine and test their own levels of corporate social responsibility, they concentrate far more than at present on their computer ethics. Thus, Slow Tech provides a tool for developing a more robust and comprehensive business ethics for ICT vendors. It enables them to construct a computer ethics strategy, which focuses on both the end-uses of computers and questions the technology in itself. This paper indicates how a bridge can be built between each of the three following notions: good ICT and profit -i.e., financial sustainability -or the achievement of profit in a financially sustainable way; clean ICT and planet; and fair ICT and people. Slow Tech does this in terms of providing a concept and overview of appropriate business ethics.

Challenges

Of course there are many challenges in building these bridges, both conceptually and in terms of implementation. In conceptual terms, the basic ideas behind Slow Tech mean thinking more holistically, more aesthetically, more sustainably, more democratically in an organisational sense -and ultimately less opportunistically, less egotistically, and less short-term -than perhaps many ICT companies have had the habit of doing. These conceptual shifts may prove to be a challenge for some of the more recently established corporations.

In practical term, the world-wide economic crisis that started around 2007 could shorten the long-term view of many ICT companies and remove the motivation from them to maintain a sound approach to business ethics based on a solid understanding of computer ethics. How can a corporation begin to be willing to go beyond its legal requirements? What would be its first steps? For some companies, led by ethical and social visionaries (see Patrignani and Whitehouse, 2013, for at least three case studies), those steps are already being made. For the late adopters and laggards, other mechanisms are also evident. One way is for companies to realise that the pressure from stakeholders will grow: users, computer professionals, and policy makers, for example, can all steer the markets in appropriate directions. The more often that stakeholders' networks are defined, the more transparency and awareness will grow in society. In any event, transparency may well expand, since interested parties can in any case use social media and Web 2.0 to facilitate the exposure of inappropriate business practices on the part of ICT vendors.

Next steps

Further investigatory steps are now needed in relation to Slow Tech. Among these are assessments of how corporations can actually answer the questions posed in this paper: i.e., what kinds of internal processes are needed in organisations; what types of methods should be used; and how do firms interpret and address the three spheres of goodness, cleanliness and fairness. Special attention needs to be paid to how companies not only perceive, but also analyse, their own stakeholder network, and how they can work more closely and intensively with the full range of stakeholders whom their products and services affect -from design to manufacturing, and from sale to use to disposal or re-use. In Europe (for example, European Commission, 2011), some helpful proposals are being proffered. The anticipated establishment of a European multi-stakeholder platform, in early 2014, might prove especially positive in this regard. Techniques are also being cited that can influence the thinking and acting of those who may not yet be working in the corporate sector but who may still be members of the generation undergoing education and training. Globally, the work of the ISO also offers a means of encouraging the corporate social responsibility that is now needed on the part of ICT vendors (ISO, 2010).

Today's challenges to the production and use of good, clean, and fair ICT, both conceptual and concrete, can of course act as incentives for action: they can further applied research or encourage social activism. Encouraging the study, and the application, of Slow Tech is intended as a deliberate -and positive -first step in this direction.

  . The growth of the open data, open software, and open hardware movements are three examples of Slow Tech good practices.


Jackie Phahlamohlaka
email: jphahlamohlaka@csir.co.za

Zama Dlamini
email: idlamini@csir.co.za

Thami Mnisi
email: tmnisi1@csir.co.za

Thulani Mashiane
email: tmashiane@csir.co.za

Linda Malinga
email: lmalinga@csir.co.za

Towards a Smart Community Centre: SEIDET Digital Village

Keywords: Community Centre, Digital Village, SEIDET, Siyabuswa, Smart Community Centre, Village Operators

Introduction and Background

The question as to whether the Siyabuswa Educational Improvement and Development Trust (SEIDET) was like Linux was raised in 2003 by Tom Siebeling [START_REF] Siebeling | Why People Contribute Voluntarily to Innovation: Insights from South Africa's Siyabuswa Educational Improvement & Development Trust[END_REF]. Broadly speaking, Linux is associated with open source and innovation. SEIDET is also an organisation that encourages the collaboration of individuals in order to achieve the common goal of uplifting the village of Siyabuswa. With these characteristics of being open and innovative in its outlook, a question as to whether it could successfully morph into a Smart community centre within the envisaged SEIDET Digital Village could be asked. Smart community centre concept could be defined by looking at the smart city definitions. According to Caragliu, Belbou and Nijkamp (2009), a city can be referred to as 'smart' when investments in human and social capital, traditional and modern Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) communication infrastructure fuel sustainable economic development and a high quality of life, with better management of natural resources, through participatory action and engagement [START_REF] Caragliu | Smart cities in Europe[END_REF]. While Chourabi et al. (2012) believe that a smart city concept essentially means efficiency [START_REF] Chourabi | Understanding smart cities: An integrative framework[END_REF]. But efficiency based on the intelligent management and integrated ICTs, and active citizen participation, resulting to a new kind of governance, genuine citizen involvement in public policy [START_REF] Chourabi | Understanding smart cities: An integrative framework[END_REF] From the above definitions, the notion of 'smart' of ICT infrastructure, education, learning, social and human capital development and innovation is emphasised. With an emerging drive by the SEIDET board towards ICT enabled entrepreneurship, the authors were curious to investigate how the Smart Community Centre idea would be pursued within the envisaged Digital Village. The authors were also aware of studies currently undertaken within the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in South Africa and globally on Smart Cities and wanted to explore possibilities for collaboration between SEIDET and the CSIR on research, development and innovation. Since the definition of 'smart' has as its core, access to and use of ICT infrastructure, a short background on ICT related work at SEIDET is in order.

This paper is part of a long term project made up of three phases as illustrated in Figure 1. It focuses on the first phase of the project and it aims to formulate a smart community centre model as well as analyse it in SEIDET community centre context. This is achieved by conducting a literature study on SEDEIT community centre, smart city and smart community. The rest of the paper is organised as follows: Section 2 presents the background on elements of the ICT enabled entrepreneurial drive contextualised within SEIDET is outlined and a literature study on smart cities and smart communities is undertaken; the proposed model that SEIDET could consider as it moves towards becoming a smart community centre is presented in Section 3. The paper concludes in Section 4 with a discussion on analysis which further motivates for the innovative collaboration between SEIDET and the CSIR.

2

Literature Study

SEIDET Community Centre

Siyabuswa Educational Improvement and Development Trust (SEIDET) is a nonprofit organization, initiated in May 1990 by the Siyabuswa community located in Mpumalanga province of South Africa. This is a community centre consist of two ICT labs, readily available to the community under strict administration. This community centre hosts various community based projects. These projects include educational and business oriented initiatives. The goal of these projects is to involve various stakeholders in the public sector, the private sector as well as the general community participation in educational and economic development [START_REF] Seidet | SEIDET[END_REF].

ICT related work and studies at SEIDET are well documented, and span more than a decade and a half [START_REF] Seidet | SEIDET[END_REF][START_REF] Phahlamohlaka | Community-driven projects: reflections on a success story: a case study of science education and information technology in South Africa[END_REF]. Pioneering work was done by a number of academics from the Department of Informatics at the University of Pretoria [START_REF] Phahlamohlaka | Community-driven projects: reflections on a success story: a case study of science education and information technology in South Africa[END_REF]. Several conference proceedings, journal publications and a book dedicated to this work are readily available [START_REF] Phahlamohlaka | Community-driven projects: reflections on a success story: a case study of science education and information technology in South Africa[END_REF].

Two Masters dissertations and five PhD theses were completed using some aspects of ICT related work at SEIDET [START_REF] Phahlamohlaka | Community-driven projects: reflections on a success story: a case study of science education and information technology in South Africa[END_REF]. None of these studies were about the establishment of a smart community centre. Rather, they were about how ICT could contribute to socio-economic development. Since the concept of "smart" assumes ICT infrastructure access and use, all these studies are useful references for purposes of this paper [START_REF] Baskin | Towards a smart community: Rethinking the strategic use of ICTs in teaching and learning[END_REF].

The SEIDET project has helped expose members of the Siyabuswa community to basic ICT skills. Many leading professionals from both local and provincial governments in the Mpumalanga Province of South Africa touched a computer keyboard for the first time at the SEIDET community centre in Siyabuswa. Hundreds of community members and thousands of school learners as well as all primary school science teachers from Nkangala Region of Mpumalanga province were exposed to basic ICT literacy and learnt how ICT could be used to support them in their learning and teaching tasks at SEIDET [START_REF] Seidet | SEIDET[END_REF]. This makes the SEIDET community centre a profound-ideal community centre for this project to use in testing the proposed smart community centre model.

In recognition of the ground breaking work done in partnership with the University of Pretoria on ICT use at SEIDET, a national seminar leading to the launch of the National eSkills Plan of the Department of Communications (DoC), was co-hosted by SEIDET in Siyabuswa. The following quote from DoC press release in 2009 succinctly captures the recognition: "It is fitting that this first iJima be located in Siyabuswa, the site of SEIDET and the location of a partnership with the University of Pretoria including more than fifteen years of community focused research on ICT enabled socio-economic development" (Department of Communications, RSA, 2009) [START_REF]E-Skills Institute newsletter[END_REF].

All of the above sited background presents the SEIDET community centre as a well-established environment with great potential of becoming a modern state-of-art ICT community centre; overcoming most of the day-to-day ICT challenges through ICT utilisation, especially distracted governance, decentralisation of resources which often result to limited sharing of skills, knowledge, services and resources. This paper proposes a model that could be used to overcome these challenges using smart community centre concepts.

There are a number of ICT initiatives that are taking place at the SEIDET community centre. Some of these initiatives involve the South African government, Mpumalanga province municipalities, public and private sector, academic and research institutions (such as University of Pretoria and CSIR) who currently solely working with SEIDET on research and community development. These isolated collaborations can be better managed using the existing ICT resources and infrastructure, such that SEIDET community centre houses the centralised system that manages both the service providers and the consumers. Having such system in place could also reduce redundancy of service delivery. The current ICT initiatives at SEIDET community centre, working together with University of Pretoria (UP) and CSIR include, the eentrepreneurial training and eSkills programme, Cybersecurity awareness training and CSIR broadband for all (BB4All) and village operators project [START_REF] Seidet | SEIDET[END_REF], [START_REF]E-Skills Institute newsletter[END_REF][START_REF] Stillman | Digital doorway: social-technical innovation for high-needs communities[END_REF]. All these initiatives are discussed in details in the following subsections.

E-entrepreneurship Training and eSkills Programme

The first entrepreneurship training of sixteen members from the SEIDET Community was done in 2011 by the Department of Economics at UP. This was followed by further training of fourteen members from the broader Siyabuswa Community in 2013 at the SEIDET community centre in Siyabuswa. On the part of the Board of SEIDET side, the training was in line with one of its objectives, to enable communities to participate in economic development [START_REF] Phahlamohlaka | Community-driven projects: reflections on a success story: a case study of science education and information technology in South Africa[END_REF].

Linked to this entrepreneurship training was also the eSkills training component, facilitated once again by academics from the Department of Informatics, UP. The second training at the SEIDET community centre in Siyabuswa was the collaboration between SEIDET, the University of Pretoria and the CSIR; with the CSIR focusing on Cybersecurity Awareness Training [START_REF] Seidet | SEIDET[END_REF], [START_REF] Kaplan | The fairyland of Second Life: Virtual social worlds and how to use them[END_REF][START_REF] Roux | Broadband for all (BB4all) TM[END_REF]. The eSkills component was conducted as part of the broader eSkills Programme of the Department of Communications mentioned earlier in the introduction. The combination of the entrepreneurship and the eSkills training was dubbed e-entrepreneurship training.

The SEIDET Digital Village concept referred to in this paper is an outcome of the e-entrepreneurship training programme [START_REF] Seidet | SEIDET[END_REF]. It is conceptualised as a variant of the SEIDET Model which focuses on enabling communities and individuals to participate in economic development. It is envisaged that the conversion of the SEIDET community centre to a Smart community centre will be pursued.

Cybersecurity Awareness Training

In an effort to prevent innocent internet users from becoming victims of cyber-attacks, the CSIR has initiated an intensive cyber security awareness program developed specifically to educate novice internet and technology users with regard to basic cyber security. As part of the e-entrepreneurship training initiative, the entrepreneurs were trained on the safe and secure online behaviour to ensure their safety if they were to consider using the Internet to either market or sell their products. They were further given a better view of the vulnerabilities that comes with the advantages of the Internet [START_REF] Roux | Broadband for all (BB4all) TM[END_REF].

The topics that were covered in the training session include: Cybersecurity in the Enterprise, Physical Computer Security, Mobile Security, Password Protection, Malware, Pop-ups -Adware and Spyware, Botnets, Surfing the web, Email Security, File Sharing and copyright, Internet Banking, Cookies, Phishing Attack Avoidance, Social Networking, Social Engineering, Identity Theft and Cyberbullying [START_REF] Stillman | Digital doorway: social-technical innovation for high-needs communities[END_REF]. This is a significant aspect of any ICT training for any user as it encourages safe use and good behaviour when using the internet. It further provide list of threats and best practises when using the technological devices. This training initiative is regarded as an important aspect of the smart user services on the proposed model, because it promotes safe use of any technology as on one safe guard their lives in the real life.

CSIR BB4All and Village Operators Project

Broadband for All (BB4All) is the outcome of a collaborative effort led by the CSIR's Meraka Institute to bridge the digital divide and bring the social and economic benefits offered by broadband connectivity to rural communities (such as Siyabuswa) in South Africa and other developing countries [START_REF] Siebeling | How SEIDET achieved success-an exploration from the perspective of innovation theory[END_REF]. The objective of the project is to offer broadband access to rural communities in an affordable and sustainable fashion. This is made possible by enabling low cost building and sharing of connectivity through utilising Mesh Networking [START_REF] Siebeling | A novel approach to innovation processes in community driven projects: how an extented learning selection model explains the succes of SEIDET, an educational community development project in rural South Africa[END_REF] principles and equipment to expand coverage within local communities negating the need for expensive radio equipment and high radio towers.

To ensure sustainability of the initiative, the local community and more specifically adequately skilled and trained local entrepreneur also known as the Village Operators (VO) are responsible for operating, promoting and expanding the BB4All offering within Siyabuswa [START_REF] Siebeling | How SEIDET achieved success-an exploration from the perspective of innovation theory[END_REF]. SEIDET facilitated the VOs recruitments via schools and the Mpumalanga department of Education. SEIDET is regarded as a significant stakeholder and key contributor to the BB4All initiative. They are local entrepreneurs; young people with the right attitude and approach to become VOs. The VOs undergo entrepreneurial and business mentoring, personal development and training on the BB4All network infrastructure maintenance, operation and support [START_REF] Grobler | Towards a cyber security aware rural community[END_REF].

The function of the VO is to service an exclusive area with limited number of clients, key clients being clusters of schools. The clients are connected through a peerto-peer community mesh network. The mesh community networks are linked through a backhaul network called backhaul mesh. In addition to connecting the mesh com-munities, this mesh network contains a link to an IP backbone for IP services and Internet (See Figure 2). For redundant routing, this type of network ensures that a VO's device can link to two or more other VOs from other communities. Fig. 2 CSIR BB4All Network Infrastructure [START_REF] Grobler | Towards a cyber security aware rural community[END_REF] The three initiatives discussed above could be better managed and distributed using governed technological advances that could be encompassed within the concept of a smart city. The smart community centre concept is based on the smart city concept; therefore the following subsections present literature on smart city and smart community.

Smart City

The concept of 'smart city' has become popular across the world and is currently the centre of attention for industry and governments globally [START_REF] Dlamini | Cyber Security Awareness Initiatives in South Africa: A Synergy Approach[END_REF][START_REF] Al-Hader | Smart city components architicture[END_REF]. Scholars and domain experts have presented ideas in an effort to describe smart cities; some of the definitions are presented as follows:

 Partridge (2004) believes that a smart city is "a city where the ICT strengthen the freedom of speech and the availability of public information and services" [START_REF] Hollands | Will the real smart city please stand up? Intelligent, progressive or entrepreneurial?[END_REF].  Bowerman (2000) described a smart city as "a city that monitors and integrates conditions of all of its critical infrastructures, including roads, bridges tunnels, rails, subways, airports, seaports communications, water, power, even major buildings can better optimize its resources, plan its preventive maintenance activities, and monitor security aspects while maximizing services to is citizens" [START_REF] Partridge | Developing a human perspective to the digital divide in the'smart city[END_REF].  Caragliu et al (2009) defined the smart city concept as "a concept to enable management and governance of the resources of the city through ICT, social, intellectual and the environment to create sustainability and efficiency by information sharing" [START_REF] Caragliu | Smart cities in Europe[END_REF].

 Kehoe et al (2011) consider a smarter as a city that "makes optimal use of all the interconnected information available today to better understand and control its operations and optimize the use of limited resources" [START_REF] Bowerman | The vision of a smart city[END_REF].  Rios (2012) defined a smart city as "a city that gives inspiration, shares culture, knowledge, and life, a city that motivates its inhabitants to create and flourish in their own lives" [START_REF] Kehoe | Smarter cities series: A foundation for understanding ibm smarter cities[END_REF].

From the above definitions of a smart city, the common components of a smart city can be identified as people, technology and governance. These can be regarded as the drivers to achieve a smart city [START_REF] Dlamini | Cyber Security Awareness Initiatives in South Africa: A Synergy Approach[END_REF][START_REF] Al-Hader | Smart city components architicture[END_REF] and are discussed in detail below.

Smart People

The people, who are part of a smart city, comprise of any individual or organisation that has an interest in the success of the smart city. For example entrepreneurs, education institutions and law enforcement institutes, government institutes, NGOs as well as volunteers. The people who are active in a smart city are referred to as smart people [START_REF] Chourabi | Understanding smart cities: An integrative framework[END_REF], [START_REF] Kehoe | Smarter cities series: A foundation for understanding ibm smarter cities[END_REF][START_REF] Rios | Creating' The Smart City[END_REF][START_REF] Nam | Conceptualizing smart city with dimensions of technology, people, and institutions[END_REF]. Smart people need to be properly educated and trained to operate in the smart city [START_REF] Al-Hader | Smart city components architicture[END_REF]. Once qualified, they are able to use their creativity in leveraging the city's infrastructure in order to create social, economic and environmental values. Smart people must be committed to a lifelong learning, and sharing of knowledge [START_REF] Al-Hader | Smart city components architicture[END_REF], [START_REF] Bowerman | The vision of a smart city[END_REF]. These characteristics of smart people enable them to create a sustainable smart economy, smart environment and smart education system and an overall smart living [START_REF] Al-Hader | Smart city components architicture[END_REF], [START_REF] Bowerman | The vision of a smart city[END_REF][START_REF] Kehoe | Smarter cities series: A foundation for understanding ibm smarter cities[END_REF].

Smart Technology

An important aspect of a smart city is the platform that allows the interaction between the smart people. This platform is referred to as, the technology of the city. Technology in a smart city includes all the infrastructure, ICT, applications, smart technologies, digital networks and mobile devices [START_REF] Partridge | Developing a human perspective to the digital divide in the'smart city[END_REF][START_REF] Bowerman | The vision of a smart city[END_REF]. These technologies are used as a channel or platform where smart people share knowledge, skills and services. The technology is leveraged in order to maximise the value to smart people [START_REF] Caragliu | Smart cities in Europe[END_REF]. For example, a smart person can use a smart device such as a cellular telephone to plan their route from a publicly accessible traffic web portal or an electronic board. This electronic traffic management, amongst other benefits, enables goods to be delivered on time, which increases productivity rate of the city.

Smart Governance

The interaction of the smart people amongst themselves, as well as the interaction with the technology needs to be governed [START_REF] Al-Hader | Smart city components architicture[END_REF]. Governance is the cornerstone of smart cites. This includes policies, regulations and directives that encourage collaboration, partnership and participation within the smart city. Governance ensures that the actors within the smart city act in a predictable and monitored manner. Govern-ance oversees the standardisation of how different stakeholders interact within the smart city [START_REF] Hollands | Will the real smart city please stand up? Intelligent, progressive or entrepreneurial?[END_REF], [START_REF] Bowerman | The vision of a smart city[END_REF], [START_REF] Rios | Creating' The Smart City[END_REF].

By synergising the components of a smart city, the goal of a smart city is realised and the people of the city fully harness the resources that their city provides [START_REF] Al-Hader | Smart city components architicture[END_REF], [START_REF] Rios | Creating' The Smart City[END_REF]. Examples of this harnessing can be seen in processes such as information gathering, where a city deploys an energy smart grid to monitor and manage the energy usage. This is achieved by interconnecting energy measuring sensors in predetermined locations through ICTs. These sensors send data to a central system. This data can be used for future energy resource planning [START_REF] Su | Smart city and the applications[END_REF]. Service delivery can be greatly improved by connecting government, public and private services through ICT. Emergency service personnel can be equipped with a smart device which has Internet access. The device can also be used to access a health record of a patient remotely from a public health record database [START_REF] Rios | Creating' The Smart City[END_REF]. This leads to accurate and fast treatment of the patient at the scene. Safety and Security can also be improved by inter-connecting smart devices such as cameras and motion sensors through ICT [START_REF] Kenichi | Information and Communication Technology and Electric Vehicles-Paving the Way towards a Smart Community[END_REF]. Some of the early studies on smart cities have been initiated by the CSIR Meraka Institute [START_REF] Li | Smart community: an internet of things application[END_REF][START_REF] Donne | No man is an island[END_REF].

The concept of smart city focuses on a broader view of development of a city through ICT. This study focuses on the development of the smart community centre model using SEIDET community centre as the test-bed, yet flexible enough to be adapted to any South African community. The following subsection presents the concept of smart communities.

Smart Community

The phrase: "No man is an island", is the first line and the title of the popular poem by John Donne [START_REF] Stevenson | Oxford dictionary of English[END_REF]. This line stresses that people need each other to survive. For this reason, in all parts of the world, people live in communities. A community can be defined as either a group of individuals and organisations who share an environment or a group of individuals and organisations that share common values or goals [START_REF] Rifkin | Primary health care: on measuring participation[END_REF][START_REF] Krogstad | Community participation in the control of tropical diseases[END_REF][START_REF] Blood | How blogging software reshapes the online community[END_REF].

The pervasiveness of the Internet has made it possible for new types of communities to be formed. Technologies, such as, blogs have created a platform for people with common interest to share information and experiences with each other [START_REF] Lindskog | Smart communities initiatives[END_REF]. This notion of using the Internet to work together toward a common goal is the foundation of smart communities [START_REF] Baskin | Towards a smart community: Rethinking the strategic use of ICTs in teaching and learning[END_REF].

A smart community is a group of individuals and organisations that work together to leverage Information Technology (IT) in the creation of economic, cultural and social value [START_REF] Baskin | Towards a smart community: Rethinking the strategic use of ICTs in teaching and learning[END_REF]. Smart community members can include individuals, educational, government and business organisations [START_REF] Baskin | Towards a smart community: Rethinking the strategic use of ICTs in teaching and learning[END_REF]. A smart community can be seen as group of 'smart people' as defined in Section 2.2. In other words, a smart community is a system where people and organisations use IT to enhance the way that they conduct their everyday business. This enhancement can lead to advantages, such as, new revenue streams or attaining new knowledge that can be used to improve the efficiency of a business functions [START_REF] Baskin | Towards a smart community: Rethinking the strategic use of ICTs in teaching and learning[END_REF], [START_REF] Su | Smart city and the applications[END_REF].

Smart communities can exist in the virtual space, such as in SecondLife [START_REF] Basu | Learning from experience: Novice and serial immigrant entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley[END_REF] or a hybrid of physical and virtual space, such as, Silicon Valley [32]. On the SecondLife platform, people leverage the Internet to perform business transactions, lecture presentations and even social gatherings. In both domains members of the community build relationships with each other for specific purposes such as collaborative learning, information and resource sharing [START_REF] Basu | Learning from experience: Novice and serial immigrant entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley[END_REF]. Simply providing IT capability to a community does not make it a smart community. The individuals and organisations within the community must be educated and trained to make the applications more accessible and useful to them. It is only when the members of the community can use IT capabilities to produce new values that improve their lives, can it be classified as a smart community [START_REF] Baskin | Towards a smart community: Rethinking the strategic use of ICTs in teaching and learning[END_REF].

The availability of technology in a smart community is also as important as it is in a smart city. The infrastructure acts as a platform where community members interact. The networking infrastructure of the smart community can be made up of different technologies that need to interact with each other. Like most networking projects, the interoperability of different technologies is a challenge. This is because different technologies use different protocols and standards [START_REF] Baskin | Towards a smart community: Rethinking the strategic use of ICTs in teaching and learning[END_REF].

Smart communities have the potential of speeding up the processes of innovation and getting a product or service to the market. This is because members of the community work in partnership to realise specific goals. The digital divide can also pose as a threat in smart communities. Partnerships such as these can help in closing this divide [START_REF] Kaplan | The fairyland of Second Life: Virtual social worlds and how to use them[END_REF]. By pulling resources together, members of the community can buy and maintain IT capability that would not have been attainable individually. Some members of the community may not have enough knowledge of the technology to be able to leverage it. Lack of knowledge and understanding of potential benefit for the members may lead to slow or no 'buy in' by the community [START_REF] Phahlamohlaka | Community-driven projects: reflections on a success story: a case study of science education and information technology in South Africa[END_REF]. This threat can be mitigated through continuous training and support to all the members of the community that need it. Community members must be consulted for input throughout the development and implementation in order to increase their desire to be a part of the smart community.

The literature of the ICT enabled entrepreneurial drives, all of which are linked to SEIDET community centre; and having looked at the literature on Smart Cities and Smart Communities; the following section presents the proposed Smart Community Centre model.

The Proposed Model of a Smart Community Centre

This section presents the proposed smart community centre model in the SEIDET community centre context. Some of the components of the model are derived from the above literature. The model aims to overcome the challenges of decentralised services and resources which results in limited sharing, redundancy of service delivery, and difficult access of services. The following subsections present the proposed model in details as well as an example of how it could be applied in the SEIDET context.

Smart Community Centre Model

As defined in the introduction and background Section 1, some of the challenges that the community of Siyabuswa is facing are; having disjointed developments in place which often result in poor administration, miscommunication and limited sharing of facilities and resources. These challenges are also experienced at the SEIDET community centre.

The proposed model, depicted in Figure 3, is a smart community centre model which aims to resolve some of these challenges. These include distributed resources, lack of governance, collaboration and sharing. This is achieved by employing smart city concepts to the existing SEIDET ICT architecture.

Users

Smart

Smart Community Centre Services

The proposed model is based on a service oriented approach. From the definition of smart city, it was identified that the value is provided by the services that are delivered by the components (people, technology and governance); hence, the service oriented approach. It focuses on services required to achieve the goal of the smart com-munity centre. These services are; smart users, smart infrastructure and ICT, smart applications and smart governance.

The services are discussed in detail below.

 Smart Users: These services are skills and knowledge based provided by the smart community centre such as education and training. These services empower the users with the skills to participate, and share resources. Examples of smart users within a smart community centre context include: training of users to able to efficiently utilize both smart applications and smart infrastructure to their benefits and the benefits of their businesses. This further improves quality of life and improved the economy, which can be summed as "smart living and smart economy". This will develop further participation in public life, flexibility, creativity/ innovativeness, social and cultural plurality and affinity to lifelong learning.  Smart Infrastructure and ICT: These services are network and ICT based and provide two functions. The first function is to create an information flow path.

For an example, implementation of networks, such as the mesh (BB4All), allow information to flow. The second function is to provide access to the network through smart devices. For an example using tablets, servers, etc. Other examples of these services include; information systems (applications and data architecture), technological infrastructure, business architecture and communication protocol.  Smart Applications: These are services that are provided by interactive software packages. These includes web portal in the remote servers, applications in the users' devices. For an example, in resource management, they enable visualisation of the resources and registration.  Smart Governance: These are services that are provided by the stakeholders; public, private sector in a form of policies, rules and regulations for participation. These services aim to promote a system with predictable behaviour as participants are obliged to follow them. These rules, regulations, policies are formulated through active reviews, and inputs from all stakeholders. The main role for the smart governance is to promote participation and decision making in the smart community centre.

Smart Community Centre Implementation Layers

There are three layers in the smart community centre model and are shown in Figure 3. These layers are components which provide different services at different levels in a resource management process. These layers are described in detail below:  Access Layer: This is the user layer responsible for access to the system. It consists of the users and devices (as data resources providers and consumers) of the traditional community centre. The main role of this layer is to enhance sharing amongst the user and also supply information about resources and available services between the users and the routing layer.  Routing Layer: This layer is responsible for the routing of requests between the entities (users and CMS) in the system. All data shared by users is interconnect-ed, structured, sorted, processed and routed to and from both the access and management layer.  Management Layer: This layer is responsible for central managing of the resources. It is the layer where all the data (shared services, application, software, etc.) is stored and managed for efficient utilisation intelligent decision making, better service monitoring and easy access of services.

An Example of the Proposed Model Application within SEIDET Community Centre

In subsection 2.1, the challenges that are faced by the Siyabuswa community, such as decentralisation of resource management, limited sharing and collaboration, and lack of governance of ICT resources were outlined. The smart community centre model is proposed to address these challenges. This subsection illustrates how the proposed model could be used in addressing some of these challenges through ICT.

The entrepreneurs in Siyabuswa operate in isolation and as a result there is limited or no collaboration. Resources such as printers and fax machines are shared in a traditional manner, that is, if different entrepreneurs share a building, they will know the available resources by talking to each other. This model attempts to address such problems using modern means through ICT. This implies that exposing resources to participants in the smart community model system.

Possible Smart Community Centre Services at SEIDET

 Smart User: The smart user services could be all the human capital development services that are already provided at SEIDET community centre, such eentrepreneurship and eSkills programme and cybersecurity awareness training.  Smart Infrastructure: The smart infrastructure and ICT services could be the network services that are already provided by the current BB4All network infrastructure which is available to SEIDET community centre.  Smart Application: Currently, SEIDET does not have elements that can provide smart applications services.  Smart Governance: The SEIDET stakeholders can provide the smart governance services after they have acquired the appropriate training.

Registration Process

The first process in the system is the registration process. In this process, users register with the central management system. The central management system keeps records of all VOs, resources and users. The smart governance services provide rules and qualification criteria to determine the fitness of the user. This includes the skills the user needs to actively participate in the system, in which such service are provide by the smart user services of the model. Upon successful registration, the user is given terms and conditions regarding participation, also provided by the smart governance.

Resource Sharing

Once the user has been registered in the system, they can start sharing and requesting resources. This process is divided into three layers: access, routing, management.

Figure 3 shows an architectural implementation of the model for Siyabuswa.  Access Layer: In the case of the Siyabuswa, a user uses a smart device (smart infrastructure and ICT), PC to log on with their credentials. Upon successful logon, a request is sent to the local VO, i.e. VO responsible for the area where the user is in. A user is any entity or participant that is capable of exposing and sharing resources. In the context of the SEIDET community centre, these could include the entrepreneurs, users, stakeholders, communication devices or sensors.  Routing Layer: VOs play a pivotal role in this layer. VOs service an exclusive area. For example, assume that one entrepreneur attended an overseas training and would like to share business marketing ideas he learnt from that training in a form of a document. He will have to registers with the VO leader, the local VO keeps records of all shared resources from that area and has the responsibility make the resources available to all the community by uploading them to the central management system. VOs accept the requests from, and forward responses to the access layer. They keep track of the local resources. If a requested resource is not available locally, they route the request to the CMS. In the SEIDET context, an entrepreneur who needs a specific service submits their request and has it dealt with by the area specific VO. That VO responds to the inquiry. If the requested services are not available locally, the VO asks other VOs through a central management layer.  Management Layer: All VOs and resources are registered with the CMS. The CMS accepts request from the VOs, query its database for the requested resource and responds to the VO.

This example illustrates how the proposed model could be adapted for the current SEIDET community centre towards making it a smart community centre. It goes through each of the services of the model and recommends the available SEIDET components that can fulfil the services of the model.

Concluding Discussion

SEIDET has made a big impact during the past decades of its existence, not only in terms of its contribution to human capital development through education, but also on how ICT could be accessed and used by communities in support of socio-economic development. The new thinking and drive by its board to morph it towards a Smart Community Centre within what they envision as the SEIDET smart community centre makes perfect sense. It could draw on a wide range of its previous collaborators, the CSIR included, to make this happen.

The Smart Community Centre model proposed in this paper follows a conceptual analysis of its ongoing open characteristics highlighted in the introduction. The ICT enabled initiatives discussed in section 2.1 are classic demonstrations of this facilitative and open nature of SEIDET. The proposed model encapsulates and borrows the concept of a Village Operator, developed by the CSIR as part of its BB4All project and identifies the currently available ICT enabled initiatives as the examples of the smart community centre services.

The central management system in the proposed model could be the anchor point of the envisaged SEIDET smart community centre, where members of the smart community, including the entrepreneurs, users and other organisations could be linked. Linked to the smart community centre could therefore be physical, virtual as well as communities of interest, such as researchers at the CSIR. For instance, several entities within the CSIR are already collaborating to look at a smart city model that could be fitting to the South African context. As part of this study, it could link up into the proposed smart community centre to experiment with some of the initial ideas. The smart community centre model proposed in this study could thus assist in attaching local meaning to the smart city model that the international community is interested in pursuing.

Fig. 1 :

 1 Fig. 1: Smart Community Centre Model Plan

Fig. 3 :

 3 Fig. 3: Proposed Smart Community Centre Model