GIVEAWAY: @HTC and @nakateproject go #MobileEmpowered for #Internationalwomensday
March 8, 2013 § 21 Comments
HTC had been after me for two weeks when I dropped my iPhone in December.
Hot off the dance floor – 2:08 AM, in fur and flats and running to catch a cab.
Slip. Slam. I heard a crack.
I stopped. I covered my eyes. I waited for D to pick it up.
“Just tell me what it looks like,” I said. “I can’t. I can’t even look.”
“Awwww, girl,” I heard him say. “Just hang on. Hang tight.”
I felt him beside me, bending over.
“Well. It’s working…
(pause)
Only kind of shattered.”
He was trying to sound cheerful.
Monday night’s happy hour consensus said I should go to one of “those little shops” on 6th.
“They fix that for $29.99, you know. Gotta know where to go.”
“Where?”
“Just gotta know. Gotta get the right vibe. Know it’s a good place.”
I insisted I was fine. Then I dropped it again. This time, on it’s face.
I gave in the next morning, after I pulled the tiniest glass shard out of my cheek after a 5 AM Skype with Uganda – a baby of a glass shard I pulled out in the mirror, and stared, while I watch a trickle of blood collect.
It was time.
HTC sent me a phone to try on January 14th, the day before my 24th birthday. I shut down my iPhone, opened my HTC EVO 4G LTE. And, I cried.
To be clear, that was the pathetic I’m-a-control-freak-and-can’t-handle-a-new-phone-I-don’t-understand-yet kind of crying. As in, harder than my last breakup.
See, if you give girls like me the right phone, we can work anywhere, any time. That’s how we live – putting in ten minutes here, five minutes there. We’re running multiple social media accounts and turning in pieces on deadline, we’re going, going, going at our part time jobs managing interns while we bootstrap. We’re starting companies in our twenties, and, under the intense pressure of budgets and deadlines and meetings and contracts, we want a phone that can. Fill in the blank. Whatever it is, I want it on my phone.
I thought that’s what my iPhone was – a can do phone.
And then I switched to HTC.
It started a week after the crying fest.
“My phone doesn’t do that,” a founder friend said over my shoulder.
“What?”
“Open up spreadsheets like that.”
I shrugged. “I thought I just didn’t know how to do it on my iPhone.”
“No,” she said. “I don’t think it does that. It definitely doesn’t do that.”
A week later, a recruiter I was gchatting with told me to, “keep going” while he ran into a meeting.
“I’ll go mobile,” he said.
Already mobile, I sent him a three paragraph schpeel from my EVO (yes, a schpeel is a thing) that he never got.
My phone buzzed a half an hour later.
“Testing. I don’t think it’s working. I’ll get it back at my laptop.”
The next time I saw him, he slipped my phone in his pocked, and smiled.
“Yeah, that fits,” he said.
I raised an eyebrow.
“We’ve all been brainwashed by Apple,” he said. “Right? You like this, don’t you?”
He handed it back.
“I’ve been watching you work with it. I like it. I want one.”
I smiled – half for myself, and half for a community manager that knew just, exactly, what she was doing, sending a phone to a girl like me.
I thought back to an interview on African women in tech that I had last fall with Anne, a gender and trade specialist at DAI, an employee-owned, international development firm.
“Women are natural innovators,” Anne had said to me.
According to Ann, it was all about getting the right mobile phones in the hands of the right girls – improving access to markets and information, providing them with the ability to work from wherever they are, with up to date information and technology.
The more I discovered I could do on my EVO, the more I felt like she had to be right.
At Nakate, my LA based stylist and I partner with female artisans on the ground in East Africa to bring their work to high fashion and lifestyle markets across the world. We have stockists in Australia and in Canada, Ireland and the UK, not to mention contacts in South Africa, West Africa, and a manger on the ground eight hours ahead of EST that I need to be in almost constant communication with. Someone that we’re working with is always awake – and we’re still a very small operation.
- Switching to HTC has improved my access to google applications, and spreadsheets, which I can share, edit and interface with on the go.
- It’s increased my communication with my manager on the ground in Uganda, and contacts across Africa through easy access to gchat and google talk and hangouts.
- I didn’t have to pay $2.99 for tweetbot like I did on my iPhone, because the twitter app that comes with my HTC phone already blind tweets, and switches between accounts seamlessly.
- My phone immediately integrated to dropbox, where I share not only photos with dozens of shop owners, but editors, and go over shoots with stylist in LA in seconds.
- I’ve also found that applications like Paypal, Freshbooks and Square are easier to interface with – saving me time when I’m doing sales on the go.
- Thanks to HTC, I’ve close accounts while I’m walking up 6th, grabbing the J train and billed in a manner of quick minutes from my part time job. We’ve enjoyed better quality mobile cameras and the ability to edit and upload straight from our phones.
This International Women’s Day, HTC has partnered with my social enterprise Nakate Project to celebrate the mobile evolution of female entrepreneurs across the world through giving away one of the following phones:
· HTC One X+ (on AT&T or for global winners)
· EVO 4G LTE (Sprint)
· HTC One S (T-Mobile)
· DROID DNA (Verizon)
I’m the founder, see. I’m the CEO. That means I approve and reject, approve and reject, approve and reject – photos, deals, samples, accounts. If I can log on and approve and reject in thirty seconds while I pee during a restaurant meeting in midtown, projects move forward. If I don’t, they don’t.
That’s my bottom line.
1. Comment on this post to let us know how mobile has changed the way you work.
Then,
2. Follow @nakateproject and @HTC. You must follow both accounts to qualify.
3. Tell us how you’re working on the go with the hashtag #MobileEmpowered. To qualify, format your tweet in the following manner:
I’m #MobileEmpowered because _________.
Tell us how you how you have been #MobileEmpowered in your work, mentioning BOTH @nakateproject and @HTC, and include a link to this post. Only 3 entries per day. No purchase necessary to enter. Contest ends and winner will be chosen at random on Friday, March 15th at 12 PM.
(Some examples: I’m #MobileEmpowered because _________ http://bit.ly/15BGTOu (@nakateproject @HTC), or I’m #MobileEmpowered with @nakateproject and @HTC because ________ http://bit.ly/15BGTOu).
How mobile has changed my life –
it gives soo much flexibility!!!
Love how I keep updated on the go! eMail, Twitter, Facebook…
Plus, It helps me promote my knitting the second am done with it! i just snap a picture and send it to my Facebook and get orders!!
How cool is that!!
Hello, Am running a food delivery business at a student hostel in Kampala, Uganda. This business requires me to constantly communicate and receive orders from students. Being a student as well, I require to balance my schedule between my two lives. My mobile device has been the major enabler to help me accomplish this. I receive orders and payments by mobile money. I feel I have been truly mobile empowered!
i love Mobile!! How Mobile has chaned the way I work:
It gives me flexibility!!
I get to promote my work the instant I am done! I instagram a picture of my knitting, send it to my Facebook and start receiving orders!!
How cool is that?!
Photography is my first hobby. Photography is my second hobby. Photography is my third hobby.
And as a professional, photographer, the key to documenting powerful everyday life stories is to be apart of that life. I own some of the most powerful cameras in the market and still have not achieved pictures half as powerful, raw and non-distractive as those I have recorded with my phone.
Side by side, I have consistently used my phone alongside my professional camera to record some of the most powerful events in Uganda, my home country. For example, the celebration of Uganda’s 50 years of independence. And with the evolving technologies in mobile phone cameras, quality output is gradually becoming history. More and more mobile phone manufacturing companies are putting out state of art camera phones, some going head to head with Digital cameras.
The weight of your camera gear as a professional photographer is very important for consideration when out in the field. Most of my gear is heavy and so, a lightweight camera phone has always come in handy, not just preserving my energy but also ensuring, I am flexible enough.
I also use Mobile phone cameras to mentor amateur photographers. Many times, people think, carrying a full professional camera gear guarantees powerful photography. I have consistently disapproved that and went a head to do practical teaching on my/their mobile phones. And am glad to report, the mentality is changing. People are using whatever camera’s they have to freeze some of the most important events in their lives and in our country.
You can also check a mobile phone blog post that earned me a “freshly pressed” appearance on wordpress.
http://echwaluphotography.wordpress.com/2012/12/07/2012-on-my-mobile-phone/
For me a mobile phone, has been as important as a credit card or hard cash in my every day life.
Mobile allows me to use my time wisely (like waiting in line at the post office), stay in touch with business clients with just in time strategic advice, and see pictures of my new goddaughter moments after she’s born.
Mobile helps me use my time effectively (like waiting in line at the post office) and respond to business clients with just in time strategic advice. But my all time favorite is getting pictures of my new goddaughter moments after she’s born.
Great story and nice to hear you are enjoying your HTC! Good luck with the contest and keep up the amazing work.
How has mobile changed my life?
It IS my life.
As a Communications person I need to be connected to the world for up to date information on the latest news, recent events and sharing experiences from a country most people have never heard of. Twitter in particular has been a godsend in reaching out to other like-minded individuals interested in talking/learning/discussing international affairs & development, current events, Africa and political governance around the world.
I couldn’t interact with so many people on some many different topics without the global platform that my phone represents. I’m on the go constantly – in the office, at the cafe, in the market, on the road, at the airport. Having the world at my fingers – email, social media, old school calling – through my phone is key.
@terahedun
Working in finance you wouldn’t think I’d be so mobile, but I have found that being mobile is a huge part of my business success. Being mobile keeps me in constant contact with my clients and able to supply them with any financial information they need in minutes. With my phone I am able to update spreadsheets, download and forward files to clients in minutes. My phone also keeps me paperless and organized.
On a personal level being mobile I have access to up to date information on financial news and special events. I lovee being able to share information and experiences with people from all over the world. I enjoy the global platform that being mobile provides.
I use my phone to email, calendar & appointment organization. I perform multiple accounting task and share files. I also do a lot of old fashion calling and tons of texting.
I’m a virtual assistant and I’m able to connect with clients where ever I am in the world. I enjoy travelling and I can still conduct business while I’m visiting the Louvre (okay, while I’m sitting in a cafe near the Louvre) or having lunch in Dushanbe.
What I really love is how mobile technology has truly allowed my business to be a global one. Even when I’m not abroad, I’m not limited to clients from North America or Western Europe. I can connect with people from the Caribbean to Africa and Central Asia.
Mobile keeps me connected to customers and makes available when needs arise
I Follow @nakateproject and @HTC
@tweetyscute
[...] our twitter account until Friday, March 1/15. I would love if you would consider sharing our giveaway with your network. We’re tweeting with the hashtag #MobileEmpowered. (An example of what [...]
As Social Entrepreneur and photography student, you are dealing with new and rugged terrain where you set new trends and defy convention. In this case, you need tools that make that terrain a little bit easier to navigate. Its like going upcountry to an unfamiliar destination and taking a jeep wrangler… That is the best way to describe how mobile has changed the way I work
As a social Entrepreneur, the first thing you need is to be able to access information and communication on the go since this helps you make decisions faster. So you need as many efficient ways to communicate as possible. From chatting with my Boss who is thousands of kilometers away in a different time Zone on whats app and Gtalk to getting and replying emails in real time, editing documents collaboratively with Google Drive, Scheduling events and managing my task list or going social with twitter YouTube and Facebook, sending my clients pictures of sample produce in good resolutions to finding my way in a new territory with Google maps
Mobility has changed the rules of productivity and efficiency cutting through a lot of huddles to make the almost impossible easily possible
I don’t need a desk I need a phone. I cant imagine a day without my mobile phone. That is how mobile has changed the way i work
[...] Find out more and enter for the giveaway here. [...]
Mobile has given the opportunity to work wherever I am. I don’t have to be stuck in an office, it can be anywhere, so long as I’m connected!
I’m a recovered substance abuse addict, so the internet and my Mobile Device in many ways have been at my aid to recovery. I too started a blog and used this platform as a source of freedom to express myself and overcome my addiction. The Mobile Web is now my safe place to hide from all the negativity you may face in reality and have really made me a strong person. I am today a proud SA blogger of 2010 a World Economic Forum global shaper and a community developer on the cape flats. It all started with a simple email and a blog.