Bridgital Nation (Solving Technology's People Problem)

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Technology is driving change around us at a terrific pace. The transformation to a digital world has had and will continue to have a profound impact on the way we live, work and learn. However, this global transformation is not always smooth and predictable, as it may not adequately allow for social factors or recognize the importance of a human interface.

Bridgital Nation addresses these issues in the context of India and emphasizes the need to build human bridges which recognize the diversity of the human interface with its varied educational base, skill sets and access to infrastructure. In the book, the authors demonstrate, through anecdotal examples, how such bridges can improve digital transformation by extending technology-aided capabilities and goals.

During the first days of India's smart city initiative in 2015, MyGov.in, a government website, asked Indians to imagine what a smart city transformation would look like. The response was enthusiastic. There were hundreds of suggestions to use technology in ingenious ways, of course. Still, scrolling down the pages, it was clear that a much larger number were interested in getting what they already had to work properly. They suggested that smart cities should have running water, uninterrupted power, and trucks that picked up garbage twice a day. A truly smart city, they said, would have streetlights that worked at night.

The city they described—the city of their imagination—was nothing more than a functional city.

Picture, for a moment, the same survey on a larger scale: If citizens had to imagine not a smart city but a smart nation, the range of their concerns would significantly expand.

**Contents and Sample Pages**