NetSquared, an initiative of TechSoupGlobal.org blogs

A Look Down the Rabbit Hole of Interest-Based Discovery

Bari — Fri, 25 May 2012 16:34:38 +0000

I confess I do spend a lot of time on the Internet, often tumbling around aimlessly. In my defense there are some amazing discoveries made during these online travels that make it all seem worthwhile.

One of my favorite analogies is that our meanderings on the Internet are like fascinating journeys down a rabbit hole of discovery, starting at one place — and arriving somewhere we never quite imagined we would be. Well, at least that analogy makes all the hours I spend online seem more whimsical and literary and all.

At the same time discovering something of value and interest online has become increasingly challenging. We are being bombarded with copious amounts of content. But there also are shifts happening in how we are creating, discovering, and consuming content that might indicate a light at the end of the rabbit hole. Shifts that are worthy of a closer look.

Socially Curated Content

While preparing the most recent issue of Net2’s new monthly publication,Digital Bites, I came across (discovered) a great blog post on the need for a Curators Code, to honor the process of discovery through a codified system of attribution. Really good stuff, as one would expect from the folks over at Brain Pickings.

Such a curator’s code would be timely given the rapid growth of socially curated content -- which is essentially re-sharing your own or someone else’s content in an organized way via sites like Pinterest, Storify and now Quora. In fact, socially curated content combined with compelling images, and one-click interactions (e.g., re-tweeting or re-blogging on Tumblr) have effectively taken the hard work out of coming up with something interesting enough to share with the world.

Elad Gils’ post about the evolution and bright future of social curation and its poster-child Pinterest is both informative and insightful. He gives a clear history of the social curation phenomena. It is, Gil says, “structured sets or collections of curated content” and is at the heart of social sites like Pinterest, which is modeled on sharing based on interests (boards) in a visually compelling and easy way:

“Pinterest allowed users to collect content from across the web, as well as from other users on the site. In some sense it took what a site like Tumblr had been doing but transformed blog-like streams into structured, curated collections users could share. Importantly, it was easy for new users to consume these sets of content visually as structured sets, and to share these sets with others.”

Given all this sharing of other people’s stuff, Pinterest’s model makes a strong case for a curator’s code, and even brings up some legal issues.

Getting Selective

Importantly, social curation via structured sets signals a shift in our online social behavior by addressing that fundamental tension: that we are simply overwhelmed with content online. The tension is driving us to be selective. And that is a good thing.

We are starting to both create and consume content that actually interests us. Go figure. We are choosing insights derived from meaningful content instead of a perpetual feed of more or less random updates (e.g. “Oh! Look at the Scrapple I had for breakfast” accompanied by a vintage Instagram image of a slice of pork scraps formed into a loaf) from the large lists of Facebook friends we have built.

This need for context and relevancy is evidenced by the rising popularity of socially curated content at sites like Pinterest and marks a notable refinement of our journeys of discovery on the Internet. It seems we may finally be ready to acknowledge that we are already too bloated to gorge on what the Internet can and will feed us non-stop if we let it.

Like my two-year old son, I am forced to accept that I will have to get some structure and discipline in my life (online). And like my son, I may at first resist that structure, in my case due to some vague but deep-seated notions of freedom, liberty, democracy and whatnot. But at the end of the day, I know it’s good for me.

The Upshot

Might I actually like the structured rabbit hole with some guiding lights on its walls? It does give me some sense of control and direction about where I am going. And with structured content curation there do still remain plenty of opportunities to be surprised, delighted, shocked and inspired, right?

Elad Gil predicts that 2012 will be the year of curated sets across the web at more sites like Pinterest. Why? Essentially because producing, consuming and sharing content is easy and requires very little effort. My own research for this post revealed so many sites with so much content (see below) based on the curated set model — that I got a little overwhelmed. In fact, I felt a little like I was tumbling aimlessly. Hold on! Wait a minute!

Interest-based discovery via structured sets of socially curated content is definitely something to keep an eye on in 2012 and beyond. As usual, I’ll just need to remind myself to be a little disciplined and selective, that’s all.

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Sites of Interest: Pinterest, Storify, Quora Boards, Gimme Bar, Snip.it, Fancy, Paper.li, Pearltrees, ColourDNA, Image Spark, Evernote, Springpad … and more.

Image attribution: Arthur Rackham [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

TechSoup Webinar: Backup and Disaster Recovery in the Cloud

Alicja Peszkowska — Fri, 25 May 2012 15:33:05 +0000

Cloud storage can be a perfect solution for protecting your organization's data. Join our webinar Disaster Recovery in the Cloud on May 31 at 11 a.m. Pacific time to learn about disaster recovery solutions and products.

According to npCloud (The Nonprofit Cloud), "For many nonprofit organizations, 'the cloud' can take the place of everything in their server closet." During this webinar, we will hear from Sam Chenkin, Product Manager for npCloud. Sam will discuss cloud computing and disaster recovery basics, and will outline the different types of cloud storage and products designed to help you achieve your disaster recovery goals.

Sam will then focus specifically on what makes npCloud different, outlining the benefits of choosing their npVault product.

You can read more about npCloud, TechSoup, and the Network of Nonprofit Technology Solution Providers (NNTSP) in this online press release.

Details:

Date: Thursday, May 31
Time: 11 a.m. Pacific (2 p.m. Eastern)
Topic: Backup and Disaster Recovery in the Cloud
Register: https://cc.readytalk.com/r/2iobxirxzg1i

Net2 Digital Bites - May Issue Just Published

laneytest — Thu, 24 May 2012 00:30:33 +0000

Last month we embarked on an experiment called Net2 Digital Bites, a neo-newsletter monthly publication that packages and highlights visuals that tell the NetSquared story of social good. Digital Bites is all about capturing what we do, and why -- so we can share the story.

For the May edition, we set out to work the Bee Gees, the Titanic, and a felt microchip heart all into one publication that's still about NetSquared and social good. It wasn’t easy, but we think you’ll like this issue of Digital Bites.

Check it out -- and let us know what you think via comments here on the blog, or @netsquared.

Don’t want to be left out from the next edition?

We're looking for compelling images and videos to feature, especially those showing technology at work for social good. If they tell a good NetSquared story, even better. If you’ve got photos and video to share, drop us a line at net2@techsoup.org and we'll get you set-up to submit.

WORLD TELECOMMUNICATION AND INFORMATION SOCIETY DAY 2012 in CAMEROON

Excel — Tue, 22 May 2012 14:53:07 +0000

I-Vission International in partnership with COFEPRE, FEBAS, Netsquared Cameroon, GIC CECMMC, ARSF,TALENTEDGE, YMIE, Un MondeAvenir and Partnership Cameroon brought together 73 participants especially women from various civil society organizations; government, politics, business and religion to articulate on the theme provided for this year by the ITU: “Women and Girls in ICT”

The event was designed around the following activities:

Debate on policy issues, capacity building, success stories, workshops, TV talk and networking.

Scheduled for the 10th to the 11th of May 2012, the event was postponed to the 16th and 18th of May 2012 due to some logistic difficulties. The venue of the event was Regional Delegation of the Ministry of Advancement of Women and the Family known by its French acronym “MINPROFF”

On the 16th of May, a seminar/workshop was organized in prelude of the celebration of the World Telecommunication and Information Society Day 2012. On the second day (18th of May) we had a TV debate on the theme: Women and girls in the ICTs” on DBS TV Cameroon.

The Objectives of the event were to:

· Educate and sensitize women and girls on the role the ICTS play in socio cultural development in Cameroon and how they can take advantage of these tools to improve the output of their activities make their voice heard,

· Advocate for government to take into consideration gender issues in policies related to the Information and communication Technology,

· Put in place a Working Group on Women and Girls in ICT in Cameroon (WGinICT)

Methodology

· PowerPoint presentations of the various subjects

· Open session debate

· Workshops on specific issues to strategize and make recommendations

Expected out comes

· Women are aware of their role in the nation building process and how the ICTs can help them reach their various goals

· Women are organized in a network/working group to discuss and promote their services through the ICTs

More pictures @ http://www.meetup.com/ivission/photos/8452112/

San Francisco NetSquared Designs a Better World with IDEO.org

thisisnotapril — Tue, 22 May 2012 00:45:14 +0000

This month San Francisco NetSquared was delighted to have IDEO.org come out and speak to our group - and what a turnout we had! There are a lot of folks interested in the IDEO.org mission to spread human-centered design in the social/non-profit world. We wanted to share the message of IDEO.org's work with the global NetSquared community, and Regina (awesome SF Net2 co-organizer) thought the best way to do that was to have our speaker, Sean Hewens, wrap up the night himself. Thank you again, Sean, for speaking to our group!

Sean would also love to hear from other NetSquared organizers and community members who are interested in the IDEO.org mission - get in touch at www.ideo.org! Sean's recap follows below, and you can also view his presentation on Slideshare - Designing a Better World with IDEO.org

On Tuesday evening I spoke to a great SF Net Squared meetup event at Tech Soup in San Francisco. I was there to talk briefly about IDEO.org — the nonprofit organization created by the design and innovation firm IDEO — and also get brainstorming help from attendees at the event for ways to expand the newest IDEO.org offering, an online platform called HCD Connect which aims to spread human-centered design throughout the social sector.

HCD Connect is an online platform where human-centered designers working on challenges in low- income communities can share their experiences, ask questions, and connect with others working in similar geographic areas or on similarly focused projects. So whether you’re a small farmer in West Bengal, a teacher in rural Alabama, or an NGO employee in Ethiopia, HCD Connect can help you share stories about specific challenges you face everyday, find inspiration in “human-centered” solutions that meet the needs of the poor, and learn from others’ insights and experiences.

At the end of this month, we’ll be launching a microgrant program on HCD Connect. Users posting human-centered design projects on the HCD Connect platform related to agriculture are eligible for HCD Connect microgrants ranging from $1,000 - $10,000. One of my goals at the Net Squared event was to solicit suggestions from the audience for ways that we might circulate news about the microgrants to as wide an audience as possible. I received some great suggestions from the audience, many of which encouraged us not to rely just on our on-line platform, but to also focus on more traditional network mapping to understand who we know at IDEO.org who might know someone who might be the perfect microgrant recipient! This was great advice and not what I might have expected to hear from a room full of technology people. Very cool!

I also received some great ideas from the audience about effective ways to manage the HCD Connect community given IDEO.org’s limited resources as a nonprofit. One suggestion was to identify community volunteers who could specialize in certain subject areas or locations in the world. That way, if someone who was only interested in health & sanitation joined HCD Connect, they could be immediately introduced to the resources available to them (perhaps via an email from the volunteer community manager) and also quickly feel like a part of the community. Another suggestion was to incentivize the submission of quality content to HCD Connect by aligning with a major media outlet (suggestions included GOOD or Fast Company) who might promote winning stories submitted to HCD Connect. This would also be awesome for furthering IDEO.org’s mission of spreading human-centered design throughout the social sector.

It was a great evening presenting to SF Net Squared. I loved how quickly the audience understood what we were trying to accomplish with HCD Connect and was able to offer really helpful and actionable suggestions. I’m very much hoping that we’ll be able to spread news about IDEO.org and HCD Connect to the other Net Squared chapters around the world.

Need some infrastructure before you jump to innovation? TechSoup can help you and your organization out!

Alicja Peszkowska — Mon, 21 May 2012 16:33:01 +0000

You know what NetSquared is about. It all is about bringing together people like you, who believe that technology can make a positive social impact in the world. But now: did you ever notice a little TechSoup blurb at the bottom of the Net2 site? NetSquared is also one of the initiatives of TechSoup Global. And one of the most important things TechSoup does is connects nonprofits, NGOs, public libraries, and foundations in the United States and 37 other countries with donated and discounted technology products.

Even if you’re not at a social-benefit organization yourself, you may know someone who is. Once registered and qualified for a TechSoup Global donation program, organizations can access 400+ donated and discounted products and services, including high-quality hardware and software from partners like Microsoft, Adobe, Cisco, Intuit, and Symantec.

TechSoup Global also helps organizations make informed tech decisions through learning resources developed just for social-benefit organizations. Free resources, including articles, blogs, webinars, and forums led by expert hosts, are available to all users. We are not enforcing any particular option -- we are just trying to bring all of the possibilities to the shared table.

If you have any questions about the donations program -- wherever in the world you are, let us know!

TechSoup Webinar: Creating Better Presentations with Microsoft PowerPoint

Alicja Peszkowska — Fri, 18 May 2012 15:05:48 +0000

Want to make your presentations more visually engaging and collaborative? Learn how during the first webinar in our Microsoft Tips and Tricks series, Creating Better Presentations with Microsoft PowerPoint on Thursday, May 24 at 11 a.m. Pacific time.

During this free webinar, we will hear from TechSoup's Elliot Harmon and Microsoft’s Doug Thomas on ways to enhance the effectiveness of your presentations. First, we will talk about improving the visual aspects of your presentation through tools such as SmartArt. We will then discuss PowerPoint's broadcast function, which allows you to virtually share your presentation with clients or colleagues throughout the world.

Also included in this webinar will be a discussion of Microsoft Web Apps, PowerPoint resources, and information on the TechSoup Microsoft Software Donation Program.

This webinar is appropriate for nonprofits or libraries interested in creating enhanced PowerPoint presentations.

Stay tuned for announcements of other webinars in our Microsoft Tips and Tricks series!

Details:

Date: Thursday, May 24
Time: 11 a.m. Pacific (2 p.m. Eastern)
Topic: Creating Better Presentations with Microsoft PowerPoint
Register: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/823195113

Going Virtual: Tech & Social Change Baltimore Learns How to Build Community in Virtual Worlds

kbladow — Fri, 18 May 2012 04:43:38 +0000

At Tech & Social Change Baltimore's May meeting, virtual world and Nonprofit Commons evangelist Sally Cherry explained what virtual worlds are, discussed the differences between several virtual worlds, and then took the room on a tour of Second Life and introduced us to a few of her colleagues. You can read the notes from the session in the Tech & Social Change meetup group.

Our next meeting will be June 7 at 6:30 pm, and Ben Kutil, a local designer, will explain the theory behind design and talk about a few of the rules designers follow. Interested in attending? You can RSVP online.

Welcome Elijah van der Giessen to the NetSquared Team

Marc Manashil — Tue, 15 May 2012 18:37:36 +0000

It is with great pleasure that I introduce Elijah van der Giessen who is starting this week as a contractor on the NetSquared community team!

Eli will be working with Anna Kuliberda and I over the next 90 days to assist with a variety of NetSquared community engagement activities. As part of this work, he will be providing day-to-day support to NetSquared Local groups formerly covered by Claire Sale in Africa, Asia and the Americas. Anna Kuliberda will remain the point of contact for all NetSquared Local groups in Europe.

Eli is an event and volunteer organizer extraordinaire who brings terrific online engagement skills. He has been a NetSquared Local organizer in Vancover, BC, Canada for the past three years and is a star member of our Global Leadership Council.

Before starting this gig with NetSquared, Eli served as Creative Services Lead at the David Suzuki Foundation where he led the online acquisition and outreach work that has helped the foundation build an online constituency.

If you’d like to learn more about Eli and the amazing work he’s done, a great place to start is the Vancover NetSquared page.

I’m incredibly excited that Eli is working with us, so I hope you will join me in welcoming him to his new assignment at NetSquared.

Houston NetSquared Learns the Big Secret to Using Social Media for Successful Events!

sarahmworthy — Mon, 14 May 2012 18:56:43 +0000

According to a recent survey by Constant Contact, 77% of event marketers from small businesses and nonprofit organizations use social media as a complement to their event marketing. The survey cited the top 2 reasons for using social media in conjunction with events were to attract new attendees and to reach past attendees with the overall goal being to increase awareness and attendance at events.

At the May Houston NetSquared meet-up, Wesley Faulkner shared ideas and actionable takeaways for integrating social media with your event marketing strategy. If you are like most nonprofits or small to mid-sized organizations, you may just want to keep reading how to increase awareness and registrations at your upcoming events...

The Big Secret

Wesley saved his Big Secret for event marketing success for the end of the evening's meeting last Tuesday - so I won't make you wait any longer to learn it in case you missed the meet-up:

"No event is ever really a failure unless you think it was."

As event marketers, we all want to say our event sold out, our attendees had the best time ever and we exceeded our Fundraising goal from sponsors and donors. Let's call it a Perfect Event when an event accomplishes all 3 of these objectives:

Sold Out
Amazing Attendee Experience
Exceeded Fundraising Goals

Perfect Events are extremely rare for nonprofit organizations. When you are a nonprofit planning an event with little to no budget, a small staff, and limited resources - chances are you are more worried about whether anyone will even show up than if you manage to pull off a Perfect Event.

What if No One Shows Up?

Hopefully, none of you have had to ask that question before an event - and I'm guessing there are more of you reading this that have had than anyone would guess. Generally, events work out and Perfect Events are rare but successful events are not rare when you put a little effort and planning into the details.

Wesley gave great advice for those events when "no one shows up" - I put that in quotes because I don't think most of us have had a true zero attendance for an event. If you've had an experience like that - leave a comment and share why you think it happened so we can learn from it. If you end up with one of those events with few attendees, the key is to remain flexible and use the lower than expected attendance numbers as an opportunity to give those attendees the best experience ever.

"Not all events are a success; that's the one thing you can’t control."

If you throw a party and only 4 people show up, take photos, create an atmosphere online and more importantly, offline for those 4 people. You have far more resources per person to give them a great time than you would if 100 people were there so make use of it to give those people the best event experience ever.

Social media gives you the chance to show how awesome your event was, regardless of how many people were there by providing you so many different channels and ways to send your stories: LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, etc. Use social media and this advice to implement Wesley's Big Secret so that none of your events will ever be failures.

Now that I've shared Wesley's big secret from Houston Netsquared, let's talk about the real guts of his presentation and how you can increase your event marketing to get closer to having more Perfect Events by using social media.

Different Strategies for Different Types of Events

Wesley recommends identifying which category your event falls into to first determine the best social media marketing strategy to use from three event types:

Traditional Events
Social Media Based Events
MultiFaceted Events

Each of these different event types will have different end goals for determining if they are a success. You'll also typically find the events have very different implementation strategies, budgets, and audience sizes.

Traditional Events

Traditional events include events that have been around for a while and are usually an annual fundraising activity. Wesley shared ways he's helped traditional events integrate social media into their events to make it easy and build awareness of the organization's cause in addition to helping attract new participants. Wesley states that "Events give people the opportunity to experience the struggle that you are going through to get to the finish line."

Find ways your attendees can share their accomplishments at each milestone during the event to enhance your social media marketing and event marketing campaigns. Wesley uses the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure as an example of how to include social media with the teams during the race itself to give the team opportunities to share their experience on social media channels. His team was taking photos at each mile marker and sharing with their online communities as they went through the race.

Another option you can try is to create Foursquare locations at each mile marker. Then encourage your attendees to "Check-In" on Foursquare. Then, use Wesley's suggestion to offer messages at each mile with words of encouragement or a funny message on Foursquare so when they check-in, they receive a boost. Nonprofit organizations use these special events to raise money and the key is to get your donors personally involved when you plan your next event.

Think of ways to give people an experience and then, add the social media element by thinking of ways to make that experience share-able online.

Social Media Based Events

Social Media platforms like Facebook and Twitter have inspired fundraising and cause awareness events for nonprofits like Twestivals and Foursquare Day. These events are very different in that they typically aren't planned in advance by a nonprofit organization. Instead, people who are active in their local communities and on social media sites online come together and organize the event.

Nonprofit event organizers should try and see the perspective that the people participating in social media based events are using their money as a "ballot" they give by attending events they've learned about on their social networks. Unlike traditional events where you are trying to make your event share-able online, social media based events begin online and the key to success is to take the online excitement and buzz offline and in a format where people will come out and "vote" for your cause.

This requires your organization to first be online and simple to communicate with. Wesley suggests you regularly look at who is following you on twitter and Facebook that are truly passionate about your cause and engaging online with you. Reach out to these "Superhero Volunteers" online and ask them to help organize and promote your next social media based event.

Multifaceted Events

These events are harder to describe because they take on so many forms. In fact the branding and purpose can differ dramatically depending on who you ask at the event. Large conferences like SXSW and Love Austin Week span multiple days and locations, and managing these requires an ability to reach a point and then just let them run. Some of these events will take on multiple themes and some events, like Movember, will span multiple cities and countries.

To make the best use of social media to promote multifaceted events, Wesley says "Go Nuts!" and find ways to get everyone involved and having fun online and offline. The best way to get people involved is to find ways to personalize the experience each attendee has at the event. For example, one event Wesley helped organize hired an artist who did charicatures of attendees for their t-shirts.

Here are a few more ideas that can help you personalize your event:

Personalize cupcakes, cookies, and other sweets for each participant
Come up with a signature cocktail for the event
Create a website just for your event
Offer customizable swag bags that your attendees can select items for before the event
Include Online Participants by sharing their tweets and offering event videos and photos on your website
Rent a photo booth or hire a photographer and send attendees home with a photograph in a frame highlighting your event

Succeeding in the Social Economy

I want to conclude my wrap-up with Wesley's words of wisdom to keep in mind when you are venturing out into social media.

1) The social economy doesn't use the same exchange that we do at a merchant level... Give before you ask and be mindful of your social withdrawals.

2) You have to sometimes have a team member or partner who helps you get to the next step - Don't feel like you have to go it alone and you'll go further when you combine resources. This is particularly true when you are combining social media channels to promote your event.

3) Be like-able and make it easy for people to find you and talk to you! I want to thank Wesley for a great presentation that gave tons of helpful ways to make your events more successful with social media marketing.

You can find Wesley's slides from his presentation here - Social Media and Events: An Evolution.

We want to give a huge thank you to our sponsor Tendenci, the open source CMS for NonProfit Websites for the food, drinks and photos from our meetup: Tendenci Photos Album.

Connect with Wesley Faulkner online:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/#!/wesley83

Blog: http://wesleyfaulkner.com/

LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/wesley83

Join Houston NetSquared in June

Find out the details for future meet-ups on the Houston NetSquared Meet-up page and RSVP for our next meeting. Please "Like" Houston NetSquared on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Net2Houston and share the meetup with your Tech and NonProfit Friends!