IT diffusion in small and medium-sized enterprises: elements for policy definition
Information Technology for Development
Wireless world: social and interactional aspects of the mobile age
Wireless world: social and interactional aspects of the mobile age
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Perpetual contact: mobile communication, private talk, public performance
Perpetual contact: mobile communication, private talk, public performance
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Perpetual contact
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Perpetual contact
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Perpetual contact
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Proceedings of the 2007 annual research conference of the South African institute of computer scientists and information technologists on IT research in developing countries
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Information Technologies and International Development
Research Approaches to Mobile Use in the Developing World: A Review of the Literature
The Information Society
The impact of mobile telephony on developing country micro-enterprise: A nigerian case study
Information Technologies and International Development
Mobile phone usage of young adults: the impact of motivational factors
Proceedings of the 20th Australasian Conference on Computer-Human Interaction: Designing for Habitus and Habitat
A review of the research on mobile use by micro and small enterprises (MSEs)
ICTD'09 Proceedings of the 3rd international conference on Information and communication technologies and development
Uses of mobile phones in post-conflict Liberia
ICTD'09 Proceedings of the 3rd international conference on Information and communication technologies and development
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ICMI '11 Proceedings of the 13th international conference on multimodal interfaces
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Proceedings of the 4th ACM/IEEE International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies and Development
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Despite a worldwide boom in mobile phone ownership, studies of the social and economic implications of mobile telephone use in the developing world are rare. Approaching mobile phone usage from the individual level, the study uses Q methodology to ask 31 owners of urban micro and small enterprises (MSEs) in Kigali, Rwanda to articulate what using the mobile means to them. The exercise identified four distinct perspectives on mobile use among the participants. One perspective sees it as a device for the pursuit of instrumental business goals. A second perspective uses mobiles to satisfy emotional or intrinsic needs. Two other perspectives mix instrumental and intrinsic elements, seeing mobiles as productivity enhancers, or as simply indispensable. Taken together, these distinct perspectives illustrate a range of intended uses and gratifications among MSE owners, and suggest numerous paths for future research. Q methodology is discussed in some detail so that researchers can consider its utility as a way to understand users of information and communication technologies.