Community Mobilization

Open Social - the Commons of Social Spaces

I just read an article talking about the collaborative efforts of Google and Yahoo to push forward the Open Social information standard. This will essentially create information portability amongst various social networks. In general I think it is a good thing provided that the public uses the technology. The real question becomes what is the differentiator amongst the sites? If the space allows information portability (think ell phone numbers) what is the reason to go to one network or the other and stay? Friends, Service, Layout, usability, features. Time will tell what is the real valuable piece of the social networks.

Sharing Hope . TV Interview

If you followed the story of the Frozen Pea Fund from the beginning, you know that just before Susan Reynolds was diagnosed with invasive breast cancer, David Neff of the American Cancer Society had Connie Reese to do some pro bono work for the Society on a new project, SharingHope.tv, which recently launched.

 

David Neff is the director of Web and interactive strategy for ACS, and is featured in this video talking about the origins of the idea for SharingHope.tv, and why ACS decided to build it with Ruby on Rails and enable OpenID.

Fitness on your Cellphone

Computational power continues to shrink and the eventual reality is that  our computing devices will follow suit. To a point we will be able to cram a movie theater, a home stereo a camera and a telephone into one ... But even more important is when we begin to include our health monitoring devices into the cellphone / smart phone package. The Micoach is a all in one device in conjunction with Adidas that incorporates fitness training programs into a fully loaded cell phone. The brains of the system is a Samsung phone that gets linked to a pair of shoes through rfid or blue tooth for tracking exercise. Available only in Europe at this point, look for Micoach and other integrated devices to help keep us healthier longer.

Vote for ACS in the Mashup Challenge

The American Cancer Society is a finalist in the NetSquared Mashup challenge. We would really appreciate your vote. It is a bit of a process to vote but I can assure you that it is worth it 100%! Thank you for your support.
1. You must register with NetSquared's site to vote. NetSquared is cool so it's a good idea anyway.

2. Once you've logged in go to the bottom of the page where you'll see the PROJECTS tab. Click on the N2Y3 Mashups Challenge Project Gallery Link.

3. You'll end up at the project gallery which has a big tag cloud in the section "Explore Project Ideas By Cause Area." Click on Health in the tag cloud.

4. You'll end up on the Health section. Go down the bottom of the page and click "page 2."

5. Scroll down about 3/4 of the page. We're "US Cancer Data and Care Disparities Map." (Right below the SexINFO project proposal. Ya can't miss it.)

6. In the light green field at the top of the proposal space click "Add to my ballot." That gives you a chance to vote for it at the end.

7. You must vote for 4 more. It won't let you confirm your ballot if there is less than five projects on it. Just go to others and follow the same process to get them on your ballot.

8. In the upper right-hand column you'll see the your list of ballot items growing. When you've got 5 or more you can check the "vote" link at the bottom of your list.

9. The ballot list comes up with check-boxes to the left of each project name. Click the check boxes and click "submit" at the bottom.

10. You're done. Next time you log in you won't be able to generate a ballot. But do read some of the other proposals. There are some pretty interesting ones.

A Life Transparent

I was thinking back to the SXSW panel today on the personal identity management and how one needs to be perpetually aware of what they put up on the internet, and what is put up about them. It was an interesting topic so I went back into a unch of my very old blog posts, and Flickr images, and my old Frienster account I do not access anymore and just looked. I tried to find something over the top, or embarrassing but to no avail. Am I that boring or is it a mild sense of awareness and maturity.

I did not begin to digitally create a self until  I was well into my 20's and already had a sense of the fact that once something is on the internet it is always on the internet. For better or for worse. Trouble is that there are enough people who are looking for internet attention even if it is negative attention. Digital brand is something hard to attain and even harder to maintain and for some it is a full time job. I have run out of time in life to really manage my digital brand - I have too much work to do. I am going to try a bit harder and clean up a few of my web properties and see how folks like the new look.

Of Flus, Tornadoes, and Airtravel

Following an exceptional trip to SXSW this year I returned home with a mighty bad flu. Running upwards of 102 F I was sidelined in bed for three days and  had cooled off to a respectable 98.6 (still warm for me) by the time I got back on an airplane and headed to Atlanta. Straight into the tornadoes that tore up Downtown. Coincidently we had a wedding downtown and aside from the falling glass during the rehearsal dinner all went as planned on schedule. Of all this - the most stressful and aggravating part of the entire week was the air travel. Something is a miss when air travel beats out tornadoes and the flu as the worst part of your week.

Pimp My Nonprofit

The panel was comprised of a number of recognizable names in the non profit technology arena. Beth Kanter, Rachel Weidinger, Erin Denny, Ed Schipul and Michaela Hackner. The panel gave some very interesting examples of programs that they themselves created, or they have been working on. art of the challenges tha they face is that working within the confines of small non profit agencies it quite difficult due to resource constraints. Using online technology to create a world wide community can be accomplished with energy and time. Relicable projects are important to maintain continuity.

Beth kanter is just tearing it up with how involved she is in. More importantly she showed how she was able to maintain a high level of engagement from lots of disparate communities at the same time. The multi mode communication overlapped all of her different communities. She is very involved in a number of communities and she was able to get involved with so many of them at the same time, encouraging others to take up the cause for her.

Social Network and Your Brand

Steve Ganz, Sushi and Robots Boagworld, Ordered List,

Part of the challenge is social networks is perception and how your avatar is perceived. There is value in having a persistent avatar – but make sure it is the correct avatar picture. Commenting can positively impact your personal brand. Volume and content are key in others perception of you. Commit over the long term. Be honest, consistent and represent yourself as you are and maintain attitude across the board. Take inventory of what is out there on the web about you. Making comments on the internet is open, public, and permanent.

The development of social relationships and damage control is all part of existing in fast moving arena of online media and space. Relationships move quickly and missteps are amplified. Retaliations and flame wars are counterproductive and reflect poorly on you for engaging in the behavior. Take disagreements offline and treat the other person publicly with respect.

Human Rights, and Virtual Poperty Rights

The panelists consist of professionals from GoPets, Live gamer, and Charles River Ventures. One of the questions that often comes up is are game designers responsible of devaluation of valuable goods in world? The panelist seem to agree that part of game play is treating player fairly but game owners can not be held accountable for market forces.Marketing side is more important than the legal side. Treat the customers well in protecting their content (not necessarily guaranteeing value). EULAs help to determine publisher responsibilities, but again vthe questions are all centered on the challenges of the legal vs. the ethical.
Part of the limiting factors of WOW is the lack of human and property rights within the game. One amazing questions becomes inheritance and willing of objects. Monetary value that is assigned to avatars and to activity is difficult to assign since there is not always a definitive dollar value to an object or a skill set.

Mobile Active

Mobile active.org There is a complicated ecosystem of many stake holders including carriers, customers, and content generators. Spam is a major concern of carriers as well as customers to avoid sms spam. SMS is the king in countries outside of the

US

because of cost of voice. SMS is cheap and voice is expensive and unreliable. Lots of mobile innovation is based by the capabilities of the audience. Short code vs. 800 number. ‘Say Now’ Campaigns are looking the use of voice on the mobile – asterisk as an open source PBX. It is being used with mobile to help route people to critical information in specific languages. SMS was the major mode of communication in the Thai demonstration not only because it is inexpensive but also because it is fast and viral.

Part of the appeal of mobile is it is inexpensive but the challenge is balancing the intrusion of the SMS and the call with he privacy rights and desires of the customer.