Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

What does Social Capital have to do with Digital Inclusion?

A Really Simple Guide to Digital Inclusion

View more presentations from clarewhite.

There's an interesting conversation happening in the UK at a seminar on May 20, 2009 to explore digital inclusion for social capital, building on a paper written by Will Davies on The Social Value of Digital Networks in Deprived Communities. (More information here)

A couple of definitions:

• Digital inclusion is the use of technology to improve the lives and life chances of disadvantaged people and the places in which they live.
• Social capital is a way of understanding the (positive and negative) impact of social networks and norms on people’s lives.

Some questions to be discussed during the seminar:

• What engagement approaches are being successfully used to overcome barriers (such as confidence, content, access) to digital inclusion, for example among young people not in work or education?

• How can we make sure we are not exacerbating existing inequalities by only serving the people already connected? What are successful examples of outreach?

The paper points out the distinction in social capital between ‘bonding’ social capital – strong connections with people similar to us, such as friends and family; and ‘bridging’ social capital – weaker connections with people further removed from us, such as contacts, and acquaintances. 

Tim Davies will be reporting from the Seminar and Amy Sample Ward will be participating in the discussion and live blogging it now doubt.  You can track the discussion happening online with this dashboard or join the conversation on the digital engagement network site  or blog.

AppAfrica: International Technology Conference

AppAfrica is series of international technology conferences and forums for software developers, entrepreneurs, ngo’s and others interested in discussing how web technologies can benefit developing nations. Whether this be strengthening economies by participating in the world marketplace or innovating operations as they currently exist. The first event will be held July 31 at Makerere University. Visit the live wiki for more.

 

Video Blogging in Rural Cambodian Province

Photo by MeanLux

Last August, I was invited organizers of the Cambodian Bloggers Summit to give a keynote and teach Web2.0 and video blogging workshops in Cambodia.   I launched a personal fundraising campaign so I could help be a sponsor for the conference and get over there with video cameras, shwag (t-shirts and stickers donated by nonprofits and tech companies) and teaching resources.   Folks from the video blogging community - like Jay Dedman, Ryanne Hodson and Coffee With Doug came up with the idea of video blogging kits and donated some cameras.

Mean Lux emailed to let me know that they had taken the cameras up to a Youth Festival and Training in a remote corner of Cambodia called Pursat!   Viirak (the guy behind the stickered laptop) and Be Chantra were there to help.  Mean Lux wrote a blog post, but it is in Khmer can't translate fully.  May Mean Lux will drop a comment in english?

Videos to come shortly!  Meanwhile, enjoy these photos.   I am thinking now that Flickr 90 second video would be awesome, although I'm sure the Internet access in that remote province is definitely cell and slow ..

The Digital Generational Divide: BabyBoomers Are Not Old!

That's a screen capture I grabbed from the Morgan Stanley March presentation and analysis flagged by Tech Crunch the other day.   The idea that "email is for old people" is nothing new - I've written about this several times here.   What is most relevant for nonprofits is how this will manifest itself in the workplace - this was the whole topic of discussion at the Minnesota Nonprofits Conference.

I am a proud member of the baby boomers generation (2nd cohort).  I was introducing a colleague who is of my generation to social networking and showed him LinkedIn - and it was really appealing.  Sailed over any objections.  But I tweeted a comment like "Linked In is a great way to introduce older baby boomers to social networking."   A follower politely told me that calling baby boomers old was offensive.   I don't think that's what I mean - because I'm one too!

I guess I refuse to think of myself as "old"

Anyway, I happened to come across this awesome list of Learning Games to Change the World and clicked through to the Karma Tycoon described as

Karma Tycoon rocks the gaming world by offering you a thrilling ride through the world of social entrepreneurship as you earn Karma in virtual communities across the US.

I strongly resisted the urge to set up an account because I have to finish planning out my trip to Austrailia, so I clicked over to the curriculum page. The tag line is:

this is the site for old people who want to help young people do something

Hmm .. there's that word again.

All this to remind you that I'm giving away a copy of the book Mobilizing Generation 2.0 and you have less than 24 hours to leave a comment in that post if you want chance to win.

Christian Kreutz, Web 2.0 for Development Blogger, is in Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam Now ... Cambodian Education System Changes To OpenSource Software!

I've been following Christian Kreutz's blog, CrissCrossed Blog, which explores social changes through communication and focuses on the impact, potential and challenges of using Web2.0 tools in different cultures around the world.  He is also interested in approaches network learning and highlights knowledge management for development.  (He did some terrific reporting from the Web2.0 Development Conference in Rome last September)

Through following his twitter stream, I discovered he's on the ground now in Southeast Asia and is coming to Cambodia.  So, I'm posting this here on my blog to alert my Cambodian blogger colleagues (whose email I don't have) that Christian is coming to your country.   Ping him over at his blog.

Christian also sent me some links that answer an earlier question I've had, "How Can We Use Cell Phones to Bring Web 2.0 to places without high speed Internet access like Cambodia?"   

I have heard of interesting examples using mobile phones getting RSS feeds from blogs. One example to publish comes from Africa - here and here. There was also a more technical guide but I cannot find it right now.

On another note, I got an email from Javier Solas (interviewed the Linux Chix on his staff last fall) from Open Institute who has been leading the Khmer OS project and building the educational technology plan for Cambodia letting me know of major project milestone: The Cambodian Education System Changes to Open Source Software and KhmerOS

At a massive ceremony that took place on 22 January 2008, the Cambodian Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport presented its new Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Textbook for all schools that have computers, all universities and all teacher training facilities.

The new textbook teaches the use of Khmer language Free and Open Source applications, such as OpenOffice, Mekhala (Firefox) and Moyura (Thunderbird), which have been fully translated to Khmer language (Cambodian). It follows eight months of intensive training during which all new upper secondary school ICT teachers, all ICT teachers at upper secondary schools that have computers, and all ICT Master Trainers from teacher training facilities have been trained to teach this type of software, as well as to maintain their computer facilities. The books are distributed together with a letter from the Ministry indicating that from now on this should be the materials to be taught

 

Government 2.0 and Citizen Superheros - from Tara Hunt

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Really enjoyed this slideshow from Tara Hunt. Superheros seems to be a nonprofit fundraising meme these days.

Closing the Digital Divide Among the Elderly

That's my Dad who is 86 and who calls me on Skype.  In fact, a few weeks ago, I forgot to turn off my skype connection during a workshop and my laptop was being projected on a screen.  It was about the time that several participants in the session who were close to retirement age started to complain that they were too old to participate in social media.   I swear I didn't secretly twitter on my cell phone to my dad to call in! The last time I visited with my Dad at home, I showed him youtube, videoblogging, and how to set up a blog.  He was interested and enjoyed his few minutes of fame on YouTube.

Last weekend, I visited, and showed him how to set up a Facebook profile.   He was curious about Facebook and poked around, but declared it "cognitive overload."

Now, my Dad has been a computer user since the early 1980s (as long as I have), so he  is probably more geeky than your average octogenarian, but there are many elderly who are not.  That's why programs like the Oasis program recently reported by NTEN are important to watch.

Give One, Get One Laptop Kicks Off

The Give One, Get One campaign launched yesterday.

Between November 12 and November 26, OLPC is offering a Give One Get One program in the United States and Canada. During this time, you can donate the revolutionary XO laptop to a child in a developing nation, and also receive one for the child in your life in recognition of your contribution.

I wrote about some of the challenges about using these laptops in Cambodia (primarily - can't load KhmerOS on them because the screen is too small) and you can' t designate the recipient or the country even.

Nonetheless, I decided to make a donation to the project.  The OLPC that arrives in this house will most likely stay here in the US for my children for a few months before making its way to the English class at the Sharing Foundation's computer school in Cambodia. 

Is Social Media Just for Young Folks?

Source: Karl Kapp presentation

Do you think that people on social networking and media are just teens and college students?

There is the well-known YouTube user, Geriatic 1927 who creates videos as a memoir of his WW2 days and has over 45,000 subscribers and 2 million views.  And there are a number of bloggers in their 80's, but perhaps the best and most well-known is Millie Garfield.   And, if they aren't blogging, they're reading, take for example the AARP Pet Pals Blog and the others identified in the comments here.

Saga, a social networking site for over 50 crowd launched last month according to this Guardian Article.

The site, which has been running in trial mode for four months, has more than 13,000 users so far - and the company hopes this will increase dramatically now it is officially open. "Older people aren't shy of using the internet - they have a verve for life that applies online as well as offline," said Paul Green, a Saga spokesman. "Thirteen thousand is just a drop in the ocean - in theory the membership is practically limitless. Social networking isn't going to be for everyone, but the feedback so far has knocked our socks off." 

One wonders if this site will catch on or go the way of Eons which is struggling.

Yes, the social networking site demographics are aging, but maybe as fast as pace as other segments.

Christian Kreutz's Reflections on Web2.0forDev

Christian Kreutz has written up his reflections on the recent Web2.0fordev conference. He points to a question that many nonprofits are struggling with:

Another key lesson was the big question of ‘how to best combine all these web2.0 tools to obtain better results.’ Everybody is still experimenting –this might be what web2.0 is all about. Nevertheless, I understood the importance of taking a holistic approach ... How do I offer all these channels for collaboration and still filter what is important to me? This has to be overcome to prove the benefit and not just use the technology for the sake of it.

He also make a few other points worth noting:

I had the feeling everybody shared an enthusiasm for the potential that development can have, but I also only saw a few clear structured projects. A complete contrast to that was Damir Simunic, who talked about Collaboration on the Edge of Network. He basically argued that web2.0 is still too far away from broad usage by presenting a tool relying solely on emails, which has enough capabilities. Even though I find email is often an information overload application, Damir gave an interesting example: at the WHO, a 20.000 people network manages over easy mailing lists and easy features, proving traditional ways can be successful, especially in developing countries.

Also, pointed to some threads about filtering:

The question of relevance of all this user generated content was rarely discussed. Ethan ZuckermannHow to filter the information or voices to a meaningful size to find all that that is important to me. Aggregators can help, and so do social bookmarking sites, which show evaluated ranked webistes. More important are however, people, who sort, comment and translate content and make sense and relevance in the growing sea of information. emphasized in his presentation how important filters in this regard are.

Web2 for Dev: I so wanted to go ...

Flickr Photo Tadenoe

Oh, I so wanted to go.  Here's the before I give a talk post and news update from Tobias from Kabissa.  Now, where can I find the reflections from the event .. please leave a comment and url to this post.

Give One, Get One: One Laptop Per Child ....

 

DC Metblogger Flickr Photo

Almost exactly two years ago,  the One Laptop Per Child launched.  I blogged it and was initially very excited!  But when I realized it would take a long time before a small NGO working in a country, like say, Cambodia, might be able to purchase a small number of them (less than 100) to outfit a school,  I was disappointed. 

Tharum was disappointed too.

So, the Sharing Foundation has continued to use our method of getting donated laptops in the US, refurbishing them, and getting them to Cambodia.  (And,  we can even load them up with KhmerOS!)

So, I was hopeful when I heard about The One Laptop Per Child - XO Giving  on NPR yesterday morning and it also reported in the New York Times and ABC news.  I was really happy because I immediately thought this would be terrific personal fundraising campaign to get a couple of laptops for the Sharing Foundation college students (like Leng Sopharath) and for the computer school.   Even better, the green laptops would match the video blogging kits that Ryanne Hodson and Jay Dedman brought over the month before I brought the same kits to the Cambodian Bloggers Summit.

The press release  does not mention whether it is going to be possible to designate the recipient!  So, it makes very difficult to get motivated to do a fundraising campaign for some unknown recipient.  Good fundraisers also know that fundraising campaigns are more effective when you can put a face to the cause, according to recent research. 

You can sign up on the page to get an email notification for more details when the campaign launches in November.  So, maybe they will make it easier for people who want to support specific schools and children.

Virginia Debolt who covers the technology beat at BlogHer has a great roundup of the reactions.  TechSoup Blog also reports.

Update

Some other opinions
Ethan Zukerman
Amy Gahran

KM4DEV Journal: Stewarding technologies for collaboration, community building and knowledge sharing in development

The KM4D Journal is produced by the KM4Dev-community and I was honored to participate on the editorial team for the the recently published issued on "Stewarding technologies for collaboration, community building and knowledge sharing in development."  Nancy White and Lucie Lamoureux lead a team editors which include myself,  Partha Sarker, Oreoluwa Somolu, Beverly Trayner, and Brenda Zulu.   The issues contains articles, case studies, interviews, and community notes. 

While the focus is on organizations and contexts in development work, anyone who works for a nonprofit, and needs to learn about how to integrate web2.0 in terms of adoption issues, knowlege management, and online community building should read this.   The articles are all good, so I can't pick out a favorite.

I enjoyed, along with Nancy White, interviewing  ethnographer and blogger Dina Mehta, about the role of technology steward in the context of voluntary online disaster relief work.  We covered the choice and deployment of software, volunteer organization, mutual support and distributed leadership.

Dancing in the Space Between Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants

Lynetter Flickr

This flickr photo made me hit the pause button because of the date, not the content.  That quote comes from a speech that Murdoch gave over two years ago.   And, the terms "digital native" and "digital immigrants" comes from an essay by Marc Prensky dated 2001, over six years ago!

The quote helped me weave together some cross-disciplinary themes that have been bubbling up through my networks in the last couple of weeks -- a synthesis of my recent Facebook explorations, some quotes overhead during the Games for Change Conference by Clive Thompson who writes about video games for the NY Times and Wired Magazine, something that Barry Joseph of Global Kids said in a plenary discussion during that same conference that has been haunting me for weeks, and noticing more slide shows being tagged as  "Enterprise 2.0" and analyzing the evolving thinking about technology adoption issues.   

These patterns point to some larger trends about generational shifts, digital divides, and dancing in the space in between.  (Imagine Bob Dylan song in the background, "the times they are a changin ..."

I'm thinking about Clive Thompson's session at the Games for Change Conference.  It was a late afternoon session and I was brain dead.  But a few points he made really stuck me.  I didn't capture his quote on the video, but he was talking about writing a book about games.  He said he didn't want to do that for another 15 years.  He talked about the difference between his Wired readers and NY Times (wildly paraphrasing here).  He went into a bunch of game jargon and explained in an excited tone of  -

"I don't have to explain those terms to my wired readers.  On the other hand, for an article in the NY Times I have to and (he did a brilliant step-by-step of context setting) ending with "I'd have to explain electricity."  And he ended with, "It's better to wait 15 years until they are dead."

Someone said in a slide show that "Email was for old people."  (And perhaps I should "like me," after all I'm on the dividing line between baby boomer first and second cohort).   Anyway, I stumbled upon a group on Facebook called "Email Bankrupcy"

Most of my emails now are notifications that someone has posted, either something to do with facebook, or a comment on my blog, or a reply to a forum message I'd left, or something along those lines. Given how bad email is as a tool for actually tracking histories of communication, and how much better other services are, why not declare email bankrupcy today?   Tell people you are no longer reading emails, and that the best way to get hold of you is to post a message somewhere you WILL read.

I thought to myself, wow I'd love to do that, but I can't because so much of my work is dependent on people use still use email.   And think about it, email has been around for a really long time but the web, Internet, the amount of information, and how people use it has changed dramatically!   Is that quote the future?

I'm thinking back to what Barry Joseph of Global Kids had to say in a large group discussion at the Games for Change Conference. While I don't think he used the term digital natives and I'm wild paraphrasing:

"We've been working on a job description for a new staff person and have been talking about what software skills we should identify in the job description.  I think this is less important than having the skill to learn new software.  My father is very comfortable using a particular email client and that if he had learn a new one, he probably couldn't.  Playing games as a kid gave me an important skill set: the ability to figure out software.  And that today's youth have those skills."

 

Someone else in the conference mentioned the Berkman's Digital Native wiki that is looking at the difference between people who grew up with the Internet and those who didn't - and what that all means.

One of my favorite Web2.0 addictions these days is slide share.   I recently noticed a number of new slide shows about "Enterprise 2.0" which talk about integrating web2.0 technology tools, strategies, and practices into the workplace.  While most of these shows are focused on the for-profit sectors, there are certainly lessons and food for thought for nonprofits.   I've been interested in the issues around ngo organizational adoption of web2.0 stuff, inspired by my colleagues Nancy White, John Smith, and Etienne Wenger and their exploration of technology stewardship for communities of practice.

A point that Jeremiah Owyang made about enterprise 2.0, although talking about in the context of for-profit sector really resonated:

6) Embracing the Cultural shifts
It’s difficult for traditional folks to understand that the next generation of workers is has already networking online in college, and will bring those networks to the workplace. These new workers will already be connected to employees, prospects, and competitors, and there’s nothing a corporation can do about it. Communication in general is shifting, as my kid sister told me she only uses email to talk to old people like me.  The biggest challenge?  understanding that these communication tools shift power to the lower ranks and file of the company.

So, as someone who is eligible for ARP, with aging parents, and with digital natives for children,  I sense that generational shift really strongly. I'm also one of the odd ball baby boomers who experienced the Internet in the 1980s and have a perspective.  So, I feel like I'm dancing in the spaces in between and doing a lot of translation.   

There's actually a word for people dance in the spaces it called "network weavers."   Nancy White has written about Network Weavers and Evonne Heyning.   And in a post over at TechPresident, Patrick Ruffini, gives us some examples of it in practice and refers to the tools as "Technology Hybrids."

So, I end with more questions than answers, only because I really should be working on finishing my presentation for next week's Bridge Conference about fundraising2.0.  But some questions linger:

• As we enter this 15 year period of generational shifts in the workplace, how do organizations manage it?  How do we provide a bridge for "elder generations" to understand the new tools?" 
• Do old people (like me) have to change or retire?  Is there a role or need for a new breed of translators?
• What does this mean for nonprofits -- both from a workplace perspective but how they do fundraising, communication, and programs?

Global s Seeks Micro Grant Proposals

That's David Sasaki from Global s.  We had the pleasure of meeting in London at the Global s Summit in 2005.  I ran into him again at the NetSquared Conference this week and learned about Rising s:

Rising s, the outreach arm of Global s, is now accepting project proposals for the first round of microgrant funding of up to $5,000 for new media outreach projects. Ideal applicants will present innovative and detailed proposals to teach citizen media techniques to communities that are poorly positioned to discover and take advantage of tools like blogging, video-blogging, and podcasting on their own.

The complete information is here.  Grant deadline is June 15th.

Mary Joyce: Global Social Change Blogher - Her Latest: Free Monem Campaign

Mary Joyce in front of her campaign posts during a recent trip to Lagos to set up computer equipment for the OpenNet Initiative in April, 2007  (Photo from her Flickr stream)

My colleague Mary Joyce who writes a blog called "ZapBoom: The Sound That Change Makes" that focuses on the question, "Under what conditions does citizen activism occur and how can it be supported and encouraged?" 

She has is supporting a campaign to Free Monem, a blogger arrested by Egyptians security forces on April 15th.  He was charged with several crimes, including "belonging to an illegal organization" and "organizing secret meetings with the aim of disturbing public order."    According to Mary, his real crime was challenging the dictatorial regime of Hosni Mubarak by telling the truth about the torture he underwent and condemning the country's unjust military tribunals.

In an email, Mary suggests taking these actions:

As the world celebrates World Press Freedom Day an Egyptian blogger,  Abdel Monem  Mahmoud, sits in jail, his only crime his desire for a more open Egyptian  society.  We cannot let the regime succeed in silencing him.  We have to show  the Egyptian regime that when you imprison a blogger, you don't silence his  , you AMPLIFY it!  How?  By taking action!  Here's what you can do: 

1.  Watch the protest video.  Share it with your friends.

Global s Advocacy  Director Sami Ben Gharbia has created a video which powerfully explains the  reasons for the detention of Monem and demands his freedom.  View it. Share it.  Post it on your blog: http://www.YouTube.com/watch?v  =-017xCZEXFU&eurl=

2. Add the Free Monem quote randomizer badge to your  blog's sidebar.

Yeah, we think it's  pretty cool.  Activist tech guru Astrubal has created a sidebar badge which  cycles through a stream of Monem's blog quotes (à la Amnesty's Irrepressible campaign).   Fortunately for us, Monem is an eloquent writer.  Here's a taste: 

"We [Egyptians] claimed freedom for others and forget our own  freedom"

"If I taught a woman to wear a veil, I should teach her to claim  her right to enter the university wearing the veil."

"Freedom is now an  obligation and should be implemented before Sharia'a"

 

Yeah, we think he's pretty inspiring too.  The symbol of a brighter future  for the Middle East, in fact.  So let's make sure he  gets his freedom, not just by posting his words on World Press Freedom Day, but  by broadcasting his words every day.  You can get the badge here on our  "banner and badges" page or you can just insert the following embed code into  your blog:

<iframe name="monem" src="  http://freemonem.cybversion.org/monemphrases/monem_phrase.php"  frameborder="0"  marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" height="200"  width="150"></iframe>

Eventually, quotes from other imprisoned bloggers will  also be added to the quote feed.  Just sit back and let the free speech  flow. 

3.  Re-publish Monem's posts on your own blog. 

For the last few days a crack team of volunteers  from around the world has been translating Monem's posts so millions of new  readers can read his censored speech.  Let's show Mubarak that his attempt to  silence this blogger has been completely counterproductive.  Instead of reducing  the number of people who read Monem's words, let's make sure that the number of  readers increases... exponentially!

It's easy to take part!  Just pick a post by Monem from the list below and copy and paste the whole thing  (or an excerpt) into your own blog.  It would also be great if you could tag  your post (using Technorati or deli.cio.us) with the words  "FreeMonem" to help us keep track of how many people take part in this action.   

----MONEM'S POSTS... for you to republish on your  blog----

Free the Brothers...Free Abdel Kareem... Free Egypt 3/7/07  (one of our favorites - Monem calls for jailed blogger Kareem's release and  points out how secularists and Islamists face the same oppression by the  Mubarak's regime)

The Fourth Anniversary of the Torture of Detainee #25 4/14/07  (essential reading - moving account of torture by Egyptian security forces  during his imprisonment in 2003 )

Alexandria University Detour 11/1/06 (frustration with the  Muslim Brotherhood at his university and a call for Egyptians to demand their  freedom... excerpt)

Birds' s 2/12/07 (how blogging is changing the Muslim  Brotherhood... excerpt)

NpTech in China? Can you help?

A few weeks ago I received an email from Jerry Hu introducing me to the Fuping Development Institute in Beijing, China.  The organization works on poverty alleviation and sustainable development through activities in five main fields of work: establishment of civil society, corporate social responsibility and social investments, environment and sustainable development, education and employment, and integrated community development.

He writes:

The development level of NPOs in China is far behind with foreign countries, but we can keep up in IT area and Internet usage, Web2.0, blog, podcast are also popular words here.  So what I concerned is how technology can help NPOs and individual to make a difference in China.  I wanted to study the current situation in foreign countries and how can we start to follow.  I am looking for reports or articles about how technology help NPO to make social change. our non-profit world.  We need to  focus on some fundamental use of technology in NPOs.  Can you help?

What studies, reports, or articles would you recommend that Jerry read?

Update from Jayne Cravens

from Jayne Craven's Flickr Photos from Kabul

A few months back,  colleague Jayne Cravens was off to Afghanistan, to serve as Communication and Reporting Advisor for the United Nation's National Area-Based Development Programme (NABDP), part of UNDP.    I wrote a bon voyage post here.

Jayne recently dropped me an email pointing to her photos from Kabul.  You can keep current with Jayne's adventures on her blog.

Vikas Nath talking about gender and ICTs in good governance

Click To Play

Vikas Nath explains his idea that empowerment of women in governance using ICTS should pass via livelihoods

My colleague, Joitske Hulsebosch, who is based in the Netherlands and most recently working in Ghana, developed a 12-step vlogging process to help a network in Ghana (GINKS) produce an ICT4D stories blog.  She writes:

They were amazed that it is so easy to do, easier than maintaining a website for instance. We did two videos in the office together for fun, then did two video interviews jointly. The last two videos were published on their own. You can see them all on the GINKS blog.

The 12-Step vlogging process is an excellent primer for beginner "Social Reporters," or for anyone who wants to do video blog interviews at conferences.

Joitske also points to another good resource on video blogging:

There is an IBM podcast too on how to get started with online video. In it, they also make the point that it is very easy to get started with video editing software which is already may be on your computer (like windows moviemaker) which is of reasonably good quality. In combination with the easiness of uploading it to various site, and the possibility of tagging and blogging these video productions, it is a powerful way of bringing people closer together.

Thank you Joitske for an excellent video blogging training curriculum that can not only be useful to ngos in developing countries, but generally for nonprofits who want to start video blogging.

 

UN Field Notes Blog

Clay Aiken in Afghanistan with Unicef, Photo from Flickr

I've been following Unicef's Field Notes Blog.  The posts are from people working in different countries on child survival work.   The blog tagline says it all, "Blogging gives us the ability to quickly report from the field, alert you to media coverage of interest, and share the success of UNICEF's lifesaving work around the globe."

The most recent set of posts are from Clay Aiken's field work in Afghanistan and also includes flickr photos. Along with the reports, there is a fundraising campaign.   What is most interesting about this blog is the active conversation taking place in the comments section.

KM4DEV Journal Guest Editor

Nancy White pinged me the other day asking if I was interested in joining the Guest Editor Crew she is leading for the next edition of the KM4Dev journal. The theme is going to be on something like "Technology for knowledge sharing in development."  I said yes because  I have always found collaborative online activities with Nancy extremely rewarding, it is an opportunity to connect with others beyond the US borders, and discover new research/researchers.

In the few minutes or maybe hours since I said yes, I've already been exposed to some fascinating research -- Net2.0 Unplugged Research -- Here's the description:

Net2:Unplugged is an action research project which will explore the question: how do we make make 'web 2.0' socially and technically accessible in emerging knowledge societies? The project will provide direct support to three telecentre networks who want to use these new approaches to organize their members online. We will learn about what works and what doesn't alongside these networks.

The Pros/Cons of Social Web for NGOs from Kabissa

Kabissa, an organization that supports African civil society organizations so they can put information and communication technologies to work for the benefit of the people they serve, has recently published a terrific overview of the promises and and pitfalls of Web2.0 for African Civil Society.

I think some of the points are universal, others not.  Take for example this pitfall to watch out for:

What to do when you’re away from the Internet?

People that spend alot of time online begin to take it for granted - this was already the case before Web 2.0, but now new Web 2.0 services are encouraging you to do more online than ever. What do you do when you’re not near your Yahoo mailbox, your blog, your flickr account? Please be very strategic and don’t fall into the trap of being in a life threatening situation without critical information that is only available on Yahoo and you are 200 miles from the nearest cybercafe.

Those of us large metro areas in the US are never far away from a coffee shop with wi-fi or high speed Internet access.  But that isn't the case for an ngo working a developing country or extremely rural area.  I remember this from my time in Cambodia where I was an hour's drive from the nearest Internet cafe while teaching ESL in the Roteang Village School english program.  I usually left my laptop back in the hotel and packed all my paper resources.  But, when I go on an assignment here in the US, I can always pull down what I've forgotten from the Web.

Anyway, this brief summary is well worth a read if you're thinking about Web2.0, Social Media, and Nonprofits.

CTCNet's Connections for All - Funding for Accessibility

Via an email from the CTCNet team:

CTCNet's new Connections for All (C4All) program offers a variety of opportunities for you to enhance your CTC's capacity to serve people with a broad range of abilities.

 AllianceThe centerpiece of the C4All program is the Accessibility Grant. Following a competitive grant application process in early spring 2007, CTCNet will award 14 organizations with $20,000 Accessibility Grants. Funding can be used to address issues in the areas of assistive technology, staff training and development, community outreach, program enhancement, and facilities improvements. Also included is 30 hours of technical assistance from thefor Technology Access (ATA).

The AccessNow Award is another way that C4All can help your CTC expand access. These $1000 awards allow CTCs to quickly implement simple and cost-effective measures to make programs more inviting and accessible to people with a broad range of abilities.

To be eligible for these funding opportunities, you must attend a C4All Accessibility Institute. Offered in 10 cities in 7 different states, these trainings are a valuable way to learn how to assess, plan for, and implement strategies to make your CTC more accessible, and they are an important step in preparing for the grant application process.

Visit www.ctcnet.org for more information about funding eligibility, as well as Institute locations and schedule.

 

Alison Lowndes: Helping to care for children in Kenya

I "met" Ali while lurking on the UK Riders list, a peer group of ICT circuit riders.  She caught my attention because she founded an organization that works with orphaned and disabled children in Kenya.  She also asked some really good questions about blogging for ngos on the listserv.      

Ali is the Founder of AVIF (ABLe Volunteers International Fund). In  2002, she established a 65-teacher international summer school in NE Asia.  She lived in China for 8 months with her 2 young children.  On returning to the UK in 2003 she spent some time working in internet security before deciding to go back to school.  She was studying Astrophysics but unfortunately, as a single parent, she found it difficult to continue with the financial burden.  Having friends in Kenya, she came up with the idea to provide summer schools in Kenya.  In March 2006 AVIF was born, the first volunteer placement ran over a 5 week period this summer.  (She chronicles the program's start up on her personal blog)

She shares why she started her NGO, "The economic situation is far worse in Kenya than China so volunteer teachers were the only option.   I decided to make AVIF a charity rather than a company as people are always more willing to offer time to a non-profit organisation. That said we are hoping to launch a trading company allowing all the orphanages and communities we reach in Kenya to sell their hand-made local crafts; bags, sandals, pumice, soapstone, plates, jewellery etc, to further their own futures. Trade not Aid !"

AVIF is a virtual organization that uses free and low-cost Internet technologies like VOIP to manage its programs and development work from the UK.  Notes Ali, "It is me in my living room and a friend named Sharn Argwings-Kodhek networking in Nairobi.  We access all orphanages via the internet. We have a substantial network of people we speak to by SKPE or SMS.  Kenya has a poor bandwidth at best and this limits internet access to email only in most areas, except large corporations in large towns. Mobile communications are extremely accessible however, with very few dead zones."

The organization works directly with local ngos and volunteers matching them by interest, need, and skills.   Organizations in Kenya are carefully vetted.  Notes Ali, "Unfortunately there is a lot of corruption and greed in Kenya.  Assigning volunteers to work with vetted organisations allows us to fully verify the organization's commitment to the children. "

AVIF plans to open an online shop to sell items to raise money for its program.  "We have a large number of really beautifully-made items, hand made by the communities the volunteers lived with this summer. They have sent me photographs, weights and full descriptions of all the items. These items will be listed and hopefully sold on our online shop and the items packaged by the Kenyans and dropped with DHL for global delivery."

AVIF uses the Internet to recruit volunteers.  Notes Ali, "We advertise for free on the very many ESL /TEFL websites for teachers and also recruit many primary education student-teachers in 2/3rd year of university degrees via the UK government's Teaching Development Agency (TDA). We also advertise the Volunteer Centres in the UK web sites."

The organization has just started to use a blog to engage volunteers and others interested in their work in a conversation.  Volunteers are able to post about their experience in country.   Notes Ali, "Blogs also allow much more "real" info as well as progress reports.  It is so much more alive than a static web site.  We've just begun blogging and thankfully I've been helped by my peers on the UK riders group."

Photo from Ali Lowndes on flickr
 

E-Tuk Tuk Project: Other Building Peace through ICT projects

photo from the E-Tuk Tuk project

I just had to blog it.  Would love to see something like this in Cambodia and perhaps is a step towards comprehensive connectivity?

The eTUKTUK is a community building initiative that aims to converge the technological benefits of digital communications and new media with community radio. The eTUKTUK is a self-contained mobile telecentre and radio broadcasting unit housed within a three wheeled motorcycle.

One of the golden rules of blogging is to acknowledge your sources - something I've always practiced.  Now, Alan Levine has come up with a term for it, LinkTrition (Hmm .. a meta linktrition?)
I learned about this project via a well-written and researched blog post called "Building Peace through ICT - Ideas for practical ICT4Peace Projects."   This is a great list of practical, down to earth ICT projects.