Citizen Command Center Humanitarian Relief Database for Action

02 Infectious Disease, 03 Environmental Degradation, Civil Society, Earth Intelligence, Geospatial, Gift Intelligence, International Aid, Non-Governmental, Peace Intelligence
quickstart link

http://www.citizencommandcenter.org/quick/start
The purpose of this site is to provide a central location to find resource status information for disaster zones and to help regions prepare for disaster.

  • Disaster Response
  • Disaster Preparedness
  • On-going Human Services

We aim to enter command & control information for regions IN ADVANCE of a disaster, AND immediately following, so as to help relief groups hit the ground running, and to help survivors immediately locate services and supplies in the event of a disaster in their region. This command & control information might be as simple as entering the name and cell phone for groups that are prepared to be first responders in a region. Or if a region's disaster community chooses, it can mean entering a list of disaster response units and/or facilities that are on “standby” for disaster response activity. There are many disaster response “command and control” systems in use by VOADs and EMA organizations. We hope to compliment what these established systems offer and we hope to offer unaffiliated groups a method for tracking their own needs and resources.

Journal: Twitter Money To Open Money

11 Society, Budgets & Funding, Civil Society, Cultural Intelligence, Gift Intelligence, Mobile, Real Time
Jon Lebkowsky Home

HelpAttack!

by jonl on November 16, 2010

My friend Sarah Vela launched a new company called Help Attack! in August, and it’s proving to be a cool way for nonprofits to raise money, and a clever way for donors to commit money by pledging to give some amount of money for every tweet they post in a month. Sez Sarah, Sez Sarah, “This new way to donate is easy, fun and offers a layer of social responsibility to online activities. We invite all nonprofit organizations seeking new ways to collect funding through year-end campaigns to visit the site, add themselves if they’re not already listed, and share this new way of giving with their supporters.” In addition to the money they’re raising, the nonprofits get more social media visibility via the Twitter connection. Callie Langford, Communications Manager of CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates), says HelpAttack! raised awareness of her organization and provided “a no-fuss way for us to receive additional donations, engage with new and old donors, and share details about our upcoming events.” [Link to HelpAttack!]

Help Attack Home

Phi Beta Iota: This is interesting in part because it shows the further development of bottom-up fund-raising at a micro-level; and in part because once the platform is well-established, the way is open to adopt Open Money and cut the banks out entirely.  Facebook is also on its way to becoming a financial exchange without the built-in legalized organized crime.

Journal: Three Days of Attention for Homeless Vets

11 Society, Civil Society, Cultural Intelligence, Gift Intelligence, Military, Officers Call

Written lead & video button

WATCH: Can Three Days Make A Difference For Homeless Veterans?

On Sunday, 60 Minutes reported on a visit to San Diego, where a yearly “Stand Down” event for homeless veterans is designed to change lives in just three days.

A skeptical Scott Pelley found that while the event's clean, safe and empathetic environment can't fix the problems homeless veterans face, the event serves as a “ceasefire” to show vets that they aren't alone.

Phi Beta Iota: There are two threads here, the first being that attention is healing and nurturing, whether it is new-borne babies or hardened vets.  The second is that this is a complete break from treating homeless vets or homeless anyone as “the other” that is not “noticed” as if they did not exist.  San Diego has done a good thing with this annual event, it ought to take place all across America.

Journal: Exoskeletons for Disabled People

07 Health, Academia, Gift Intelligence, YouTube

Short Video

Berkeley Bionics: Introducing eLEGS

About eLEGS

Phi Beta Iota: This is an inspiring story in the context of unlimited wealth and no attention to the needs of the five billion poor–another example of multi-million dollar innovation for the one billion rich when the five billion poor need a two dollar fridge or a single shirt that can shed rain.  This is also a hugely impressive example of how good Berkeley is getting at propaganda–this is one of the slickest academic shorts we have ever seen.  The beneficiaries are rightfully estactic but the question must be asked: what could this investment of talent and money have done for millions who would then create infinite wealth to allow for a hundred of these advanced projects to flourish?

Journal: Social Capital–Doing Good AND Making Money

03 Economy, 11 Society, Civil Society, Commerce, Commercial Intelligence, Cultural Intelligence, Gift Intelligence, Methods & Process, Non-Governmental
DuckDuckGo on Social Capital

UpTake Institute October 11, 2010

There are some problems that neither pure capitalism nor charity can solve. Social capital is a new way of looking at solving those problems. This month, people from all over the world came to SOCAP10 in San Francisco to talk about social capital, and put their money where their mouths are.

Over the next several days we’ll be posting stories about companies that have what is called a “triple bottom line” — where they measure results not just in profit, but also in the business impact on people and the planet.

Our first video focuses on just what the social capital movement is about. We talk with people who run social capital companies such as Firefox maker Mozilla, people who are seeking funding for their businesses, and journalists who are covering the social capital movement.

Link to story and video

Tip of the Hat to  Leif Utne at LinkedIn.

See Also:

Review: Building Social Business–The New Kind of Capitalism that Serves Humanity’s Most Pressing Needs

Review (Guest): Cognitive Surplus–Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age

Review: Nonzero–The Logic of Human Destiny

Review: The Hidden Wealth of Nations

Review: The Monk and the Riddle–The Art of Creating a Life While Making a Living

Journal: The Activist Power of the Internet

Civil Society, Collective Intelligence, Gift Intelligence, IO Mapping, IO Multinational, IO Sense-Making, Peace Intelligence

Sarah Kessler About 3 hours ago Sarah Kessler 9

Why Social Media Is Reinventing Activism

The argument that social media fosters feel-good clicking rather than actual change, began long before Malcolm Gladwell brought it up in the New Yorker — long enough to generate its own derogatory term. “Slacktivism,” as defined by Urban Dictionary, is “the act of participating in obviously pointless activities as an expedient alternative to actually expending effort to fix a problem.”

If you only measure donations, social media is no champion. The national chapter of the Red Cross, for instance, has 208,500 “likes” on Facebook, more than 200,000 followers on Twitter, and a thriving blog. But according to the Chronicle of Philanthropy, online donations accounted for just 3.6% of private donations made to the organization in 2009.

But social good is a movement still in its infancy. Facebook launched in 2004, YouTube in 2005 and Twitter in 2006. Let’s give the tools a little while to grow up before we start judging them.

All of that virtual liking, following, joining, signing, forwarding, and, yes, clicking, has a lot of potential to grow into big change. Here’s why:

Read the entire piece.

Phi Beta Iota: Complementary observations are made by Steven Denning in his featured post, Reference: The Revolution IS Being Tweeted.

See Also:

Continue reading “Journal: The Activist Power of the Internet”