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So far, it was always a top down way of
dealing with world issues.
Now, people like my friend Alejandro Pisante,
which is here, or Raul Echeveria.
We can feel that we are really part of the world,
that we can really maintain a peer to peer
relationship with the rest of the world,
not only one of a top down,
but really a peer to peer relationship.
And this has been feasible because of the internet.
Before that, nothing was like that.
Nothing had this kind of impact in our society.
That is why, in the name of all the people
who have contributed to the activities of the,
from the La FundaciĆ³n Escuela Latinoamericana de Redes,
EsLaRed, Latin America school,
which is an organization of
men and women, from all over the world,
but mainly from Latin America,
that try to be the voice of the Third World,
try to be heard,
try to be established,
and to make a difference,
try to assert our position in the world.
We are very proud of having received this award,
because this is something that is not very common.
To be able to have our voices heard.
And all the people of our organization are
very grateful to the Internet Society,
not only for receiving this award,
but also for having supported our activity for
the last ten years,
in a very important way,
they have been feasible to undertake our activities,
not only in the teaching and in the fostering of
internet activity in general,
but also, in the providing access in countries of the
Third world.
Because, we have found that the most efficient way
to provide access in our countries is by means of
the wireless technology.
Wireless, no doubt, is the way to go
to provide internet access, in developing countries.
You can see that in the undisputed statistics,
that wireless access, mobile wireless access,
is by far very much,
the penetration of wireless access is very much
higher than the land line communication all over the world.
And especially in Third World countries.
So, we have dedicated ourselves to the task of
using wireless technology, adopting them,
to empowering the organizations in Third World countries,
to provide internet access, to provide access to the
means of communication,
to have a voice to the whole world.
And we have tried, along all these years,
to modify very humble wifi widespread consumer devices,
modify them,
fit them with high gain antenna,
to provide long distance communications,
to provide backbones into the developing countries,
to provide technologies to give access to the people,
to information,
to help knowledge, to help productivity,
enhancement techniques,
to provide people in the Third World
to the knowledge,
to make their plight known to the rest of the world,
to make them heard,
to make them an equal partner in development.
And for all of this, I am really grateful to
the support of all you people in this room,
and I hope to continue to have the support to,
together, make a better world.
[Applause.]
There are certainly no better words
or no better way to end the evening.
So again, congratulations, Ermano, and thank you
for everything you're doing in EsLaRed.
And thank you all so much for coming this evening.
It's been a great pleasure to see some of you again,
I haven't seen some of you for a few years.
And thank very much.
That closes the program.
[Applause.]
I think the wine stays on the table, however,
and there's probably more coffee available as well.
No, no, you need -- that just, no.
This is just me saying, I'm done emceeing.
[Applause.]
[Laughter.]
[Background crowd noises.]