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Net Tuesday, September 1: Portal Pilsner

Please join us on September 1 at Buffalo Billiards (118 Chestnut Street), beginning at 6:00 PM. This will be the third and last of our “Summer Ale Series”, Portal Pilsner.

For more information, please join us on our new website!

All future information will be posted there — with the easy-to-remember web address PhillyNetSquared.org. Past posts from this blog have also been moved over, and we’ll be rolling out even more community features there in the near future. Join us!

Homebrewed Rumination: Your website and the social web

Join us for our next Net Tuesday event on August 4. This will be the second of our Summer Ale Series, “Homebrewed Rumination”.

We’ll have an interactive discussion about what to consider when integrating social elements into a website. We’ll be looking at such themes as how a website can:

• Help people connect to one another
• Aggregate information
• Foster collaboration
• Encourage self-expression
• Reach out to the rest of the world

We’ll explore each of these themes in general, and then focus on applying them specifically to: a) Philly NetSquared’s own new, Drupal-based site (PhillyNetSquared.org); and b) other sites represented or suggested by those who show up and participate.In this way, we hope to accomplish two things… Let’s think together about how the new Philly NetSquared website might foster our individual and collective ideas and ambitions about “using the social web for social change”. And, at the same time, let’s talk about these principles in general, and how they might enhance your own site or cause.

So, bring your own perspective, creativity and open mind. RSVP’s are desired, but not required.

Looking ahead to September: Portal Pilsner! Network For Good, Causes and change.org, oh my! These days there are so many portals to use for raising money and engaging members in action on behalf of your cause. How do you choose which one(s) to be on? Does maintaining them take away from your other online efforts (e-news, blog, etc.)? Which ones have you been successful on? These questions and others will be discussed at our Portal Pilsner session, the last of our Summer Ale Series, on September 1. Have a story about a non-profit portal you want to share? E-mail Judah at jferst@buzzing4change.org.

Net Tuesday, August 4: Adding social elements to our/your website

Join us for our next Net Tuesday event on August 4. This will be the second of our Summer Ale Series, “Homebrewed Rumination”.

We’ll have an interactive discussion about what to consider when integrating social elements into a website. We’ll be looking at such themes as how a website can:

• Help people connect to one another
• Aggregate information
• Foster collaboration
• Encourage self-expression
• Reach out to the rest of the world

We’ll explore each of these themes in general, and then focus on applying them specifically to: a) Philly NetSquared’s own new, drupal-based site, phillynetsquared.org; and b) other sites represented or suggested by those who show up and participate.

In this way, we hope to accomplish two things… Let’s think together about how the new Philly NetSquared website might foster our individual and collective ideas and ambitions about “using the social web for social change”. And, at the same time, let’s talk about these principles in general, and how they might enhance your own site or cause.

So, bring your own perspective, creativity and open mind. RSVP’s are desired, but not required.

Looking ahead to September… Network For Good, Causes and change.org, oh my! These days there are so many portals to use for raising money and engaging members in action on behalf of your cause. How do you choose which one(s) to be on? Does maintaining them take away from your other online efforts (e-news, blog, etc.)? Which ones have you been successful on? These questions and others will be discussed at our Portal Pilsner session, the last of our Summer Ale Series, on September 1. Have a story about a non-profit portal you want to share? E-mail Judah at jferst@buzzing4change.org.

Net Tuesday July 7: Activist Communities in the Midst of Social Media

As warm weather settles in, nothing’s more refreshing than a flight of Net Tuesday Summer Ales.

First up, on Tuesday, July 7 starting at 6 PM at Buffalo Billiards, 118 Chestnut Street: Communi-Lager! Chris Bartlett will present Activist Communities in the Midst of Social Media. He’ll share how he has used the tools of the trade — social networks Twitter, Facebook, Stickam, and Ning — to create a series of communities that support his community organizing. He’ll engage Net Tuesday participants in an inquiry about how we can use these tools to build community, strengthen social networks, and bring about powerful change in our communities. Key ideas for the night:

•  The importance of connecting others — and not only yourself to others — as a strategy for social network organizing.
• The timeline for face-to-face — how to bring about in-person connections that strengthen online ones.
• Pitfalls of online organizing– fitting your strategies into your overall plan for getting things done.
  Most importantly, Bartlett will facilitate a conversation among participants to hear what is working for all of us. If Twitter (and other social media tools) are in fact transformative, we’ll hope to hear some stories of those transformations.

Chris Bartlett is a gay men’s health community organizer from Philadelphia. He directed the SafeGuards Gay Men’s Health Project in Philadelphia for ten years, and has acted as lead consultant to the LGBT Community Assessment in Philadelphia, a project that gathers data about LGBT communities in order to make recommendations regarding community organizing, health, housing, and economic development. He co-facilitates the Gay Men’s Health Leadership Academy, a national meeting of leaders in the field of gay men’s health and wellness, and has helped to convene the Gay Men’s Health and LGBTI Summits. Most recently, he has received support from the Arcus Foundation to develop a strategic plan for LGBT leadership development in the United States. Community organizing through social media is his greatest current passion and commitment.

RSVP’s are optional via the Meetup page. Or, just c’mon down, and bring a friend.

 

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Looking forward to what’s on tap for the rest of the Net Tuesday Summer Ale Series…

August 4: Homebrewed Rumination. We’ll be using a modified version of our Extreme Makeover: Web Strategy Edition format with Philly NetSquared’s own website: phillynetsquared.org. Together, we’ll identify specific steps we can take to enable the growing Philly NetSquared community to use our website as a place to connect with, learn from and inspire one another to realize each person’s dreams and each organization’s objectives.

September 1: Portal Pilsner. Change.org. Network for Good. Razoo. And many other sites are out there, committed to using social tools help nonprofits achieve their mission. How do you sort through the clutter and use these sites to advance your own cause?
Join us at our Net Tuesday Summer Ales, where we’ll sit back, relax and explore ways social technology can help organizations and individuals advance social change in Philadelphia.

UPDATED info on Net Tuesday, June 2: Mobile Technology for Social Change

You are probably already aware that our next Net Tuesday (June 2, starting at 6:00 PM at Buffalo Billiards, 118 Chestnut Street) is going to be about Mobile Technology and Social Change. This was the theme of the fourth annual NetSquared conference (N2Y4) that Ivan and Seth just attended in San Jose. The centerpiece of the conference was a “challenge”, in which 14 new, innovative projects competed for prize money up to $25,000.

We were blown away by some of the projects we saw, and want to share on Tuesday evening. Some highlights:

• First prize winner FrontlineSMS:Medic is saving lives in Africa with cell phones that rural health workers can use to access medical records and expertise, and (this is amazing) re-purposing the cell phone’s camera to perform breakthrough in-field diagnoses for malaria and other diseases. We’re planning to have the Clinical Programs Director participate in our meeting via videoconference to discuss it.
• Second prize winners, the Extraordinaries, are developing a way for people to use their cell phones during “spare minutes” (like, on the bus) for a growing array of “micro-volunteer” projects, like tagging photos for the Library of Congress or translating subtitles for short videos.
• Third place winner VoxMob – Mobile Voices / Voces Moviles is testing its project with immigrant workers in L.A. It empowers these people to express themselves in words, sounds and pictures to tell their stories and document abuses.
• SeeClickFix is working on a project to enable regular people to take and upload a picture of a non-emergency problem they see (e.g., a pothole or drug deal), and then automatically map it and generate notices to pressure local agencies, politicians and others to address the problem. The mapping aspect of SeeClickFix is being prototyped on Philly.com.
• The Mobile Giving Foundation enables non-profits to set up campaigns in which people can contribute small donations (e.g., $5 or $10) via their cell phones and charged on their phone bills (in which 100% of the contribution is passed through to the non-profit).

We also want to hear about your experiences or ideas about mobile tech and social change. In addition to illustrating these various initiatives, we’ll have a chance for folks to delve into the technology and/or how we can apply these capabilities to our causes here in Philly.

We’re at the very early stages of what promises to be a profoundly powerful movement to use these small and ubiquitous devices to advance social causes. Come discover and discuss what’s happening now, and get a glimpse into the future.

We’ll start gathering at 6:00 PM and begin the program at 6:30 (and we have the room until as late as 9:00). RSVP’s via the Meetup page are appreciated, but not necessary. Feel free to come and bring a friend.

Net Tuesday June 2: Mobile Technology for Social Change

Mobile technology is one of the fastest growing areas of digital technology. And developing applications for social change is following apace.

Our next Net Tuesday on June 2 will be about mobile applications for social change. Again, we’ll be meeting at Buffalo Billiards, 118 Chestnut Street. We’ll start gathering at 6:00 PM, and the program itself will begin between 6:30 and 6:45. RSVP on Meetup.

What does mobile technology for social change mean?

Ivan and Seth will discover part of the answer attending the 4th annual NetSquared Conference (N2Y4) in San Jose May 25–26, which is featuring a number of mobile projects, competing for $50,000 in prize money to further their development. (This page provides ways to follow along with the conference.) Ivan and Seth will report back on what we thought were the most interesting projects.

And, we also want to hear your thoughts and experiences (and hopes) about using mobile technology for social change. If you know of any local projects in this arena, please let us know. If you think it’s interesting, please come and share your perspectives.

The featured projects at N2Y4 include:

• Agricultural Market Information Service (AMIS) Project
• DatAgro: Increasing the Yield of Latin American Farming Cooperatives
• Digital Democracy’s Handheld Human Rights
• Equobility
• FrontlineSMS + Cell Alert = FrontlineSMS Alerts
• FrontlineSMS:Medic – SMS for Medical Records and Mobile Lab Diagnostics
• IJCentral: A Movement to Support Global Rule of Law
• IPeace
• Local SMS Community Newsletter for Promotion of Self-Employment
• PublicStuff–The Craigslist for Local Government Interaction!
• SeeClickFix: Report Non-emergency Local Problems and Collaborate to Solve Them
• Slave-Free
• The Extraordinaries — On-demand crowdsourcing volunteerism via smartphones
• VozMob: Mobile Voices/Voces Moviles

So come, bring your mobile device, and discover and talk about how these little machines are starting to play their part in improving the world.