Archive for the ‘tools’ Category

LibraryThing

Saturday, January 26th, 2008

A cool site/tool I was recently made aware of… LibraryThing.

I like that it uses an open standard for managing my book collection: Z39.50.

I also like that I can export my data.

You can see a more extensive listing of my library here.

Wisdom is proactive

Friday, January 11th, 2008

Confucian wisdom via A Ku indeed!

don’t treat yourself like a tool (a ku!). Take your life seriously. Do something that excites you. Something that you wake up wanting to do.

Wiki works better than email for group coordination: Explanations In Plain English

Thursday, November 8th, 2007

Short video linked here is well worth a few minutes, if you would like to explain wiki to those who cling to email:

http://www.commoncraft.com/video-wikis-plain-english

Here’s a longer related article: Wiki and the Perfect Camping Trip | Common Craft – Explanations In Plain English

conference on neighborhood leadership

Wednesday, June 13th, 2007

     
    You are invited to co-create the 4th Annual Chicago Conference for Good. PLEASE join us, bring friends and add spirit! Share this invitation with neighbors and colleagues, people you’d like to connect or reconnect with this July!

“…cuz people
who do stuff
need to know
more people
who do stuff.”

– ted ernst

   
 

Localizing

Global

Change:

 

Issues

and

Opportunities

   

 

July 19-22

in the Little Village neighborhood of

Chicago, IL USA

     
   

Discussion


What kind of stuff
have we been doing?

  • hosting and attending green dinners,
  • community gardening,
  • blogging,
  • digital excellence… inclusion,
  • chicago conservation corps training,
  • growing food,
  • organizing block clubs and parties,
  • depaving your yard and inviting neighbors,
  • restoring a riverbank,
  • planting native prairie in your local park
  • organizing your neighbors to work with the alderman or CAPS to get a camera,
  • or get one taken out,
  • recruiting volunteers,
  • organizing safe routes to school,
  • buying organic foods,
  • experimenting with new tech ways to connect people,
  • and living with less tech
  • driving less,
  • recycling more,
  • ensuring all differently brained people are seen as human beings,
  • seeing to it that the ADA laws are followed,
  • making social activists are supported and nurtured,
  • urban chicken egg farming
  • block clubs
  • traffic calming
  • peace parks
  • “doing.”… ,

  The momentum of community is rising. Please join us! …for More and More. More and more people. More and more resources. More and more easy. More and more connected. More and more green. More and more power to do good things, in more and more local neighborhoods and organizations.Three years ago, some of us convened a small but national conference on the future of philanthropy, technology and community action. Two years ago, more of us joined in to create a second and international conference which was also the first-ever omidyar.net members conference. Last year we did it again, and along the way these conversations have sparked half a dozen more conferences and action on at least four continents.All the while, you’ve been busy doing all the things you do to try make the world a better place, and you’ve been noticing that more and more people are getting together for global community good. This year’s global gathering in Chicago is going to focus on “doing”. All good work. All kinds of local action. We welcome good people from everywhere to join with people we are actively inviting who are “doing” in Chicago neighborhoods. Bring your own local doing to share. We want to do more and more in all localities, and to do it more together.This year’s conference will follow the same simple and active format as all the previous conferences. We’ll gather for one big opening, create a working agenda that includes all of our most important issues and questions, meet with friends and colleagues to actively address everything on the agenda, document and publish our notes online, and head back out into all the things we are doing with more energy, more clarity and more connections.

The momentum of community is rising. Please join us!
…for more and more global good on the ground where you live.

WHEN? July 19-22, 2007 …music and barbecue on Thursday night, conference all day Friday and Saturday, finishing by noon on Sunday, with airport drop-offs or excursions for out-of-towners on Sunday afternoon.

WHERE? General Robert E. Wood Boys & Girls Club, 2950 W. 25th Street, Chicago IL 60623

WHO SHOULD COME? Anyone who wants to get more and more into community, technology, environment, and other social justice kinds of work and practice. Anyone who wants to make more and more connections between all these sorts of things. And anyone who wants to have more and more fun and friends in the process of community leadership.

WHAT TO BRING? Food to eat/share, materials to show/share, ideas and questions, issues and projects that you care about and want to inform and be informed by others AND a total of $40 (scholarships may be available) to pay for basic costs of site and materials for all three days of meetings.

NOW WHAT? Send an email to register@globalchicago.net (or any other address we like), make a payment at paypal (details forthcoming), forward this invitation to friends and colleagues, people you work with — and people you want to work with. we’ll send you details about places and times and be glad to answer any other questions. Stay tuned to www.GlobalChicago.net for more information.

CO-CONVENERS? Ted Ernst, Christina Jordan, Michael Maranda, Hermilo Hinojosa, Kachina Katrina Zavalney, Pierre Clark, Julie Peterson, Jean Russell, Dave Chakrabarti, and You…

wiki in high places

Wednesday, May 16th, 2007

Andy writes that wiki may be used in a policy writing experiment on Ed Tech.

What’s critical here? Openness, yes, and sincere attention of Legislative staff or Legislators themselves.

Sourcetree Commons

Sunday, May 13th, 2007

We’re still re-learning how to work according to our values. 

This is as it should be.

Following is the project description for Sourcetree Commons, as posted at the Net2 challenge 2007.

Sourcetree Commons: Geeking our way to a better world

To develop better social software, we must use these very tools in the communities that are building them. We leverage social software to amplify the creative power of geeks and provide increased resources, efficiency, feedback and support.

Project Vision Statement & Potential Social Impact:

Our goal is to leverage social software to amplify the creative power of geeks.

Geeks are a force to be reckoned with. They are creating the tools to strengthen communities, share ideas and shape information flow in an information age. Yet we still struggle with old ways of competing, collaborating and decision making. If we are to develop better social software, we must incorporate the very principles of collaboration and collective intelligence into the communities that are building them.

(more…)

Grassroots.org bites

Thursday, April 19th, 2007

Grassroots, and .org! Two of my favorite things. And GR is led by one of my favorite people… blah, blah, blah – I have lots of favorites. Don’t even ask about colors. I’m all about spectrum!

I’m very happy that the Grassroots.org Toolkit was selected along with 20 other projects in the recent NetSquared community vote. Here’s the Grassroots.org pitch for the Toolkit:

The Grassroots.org Toolbox will empower nonprofit organizations by granting free access to a suite of fully configured & hosted online tools, including content management, online event registration software, and CRM.

The whole GR team is great – I know several of them very well, including my former CTC Vista, Dave Chakrabarti. In fact that seems part of the management secret – hire alumni of the CTC Vista Project!

The Toolkit project is still in beta, and I am following on closely as a “Toolkit Advisor”…

They have some other developments in the works that are really cool (at least to me)… but we’ll have to wait a bit before exploring those.

Tonight (Thursday April 19) they’re hosting Malaria Bites – a fundraiser, in Columbus, Ohio.

Reggae, bednets and all.