From pirate supplies to Bat Cave: homework help a winner
If you have broadband it’s absolutely worth keeping an eye on the TED Talks, maybe even subscribing to the feed in iTunes.
TED stands for Technology, Entertainment and Design.
The annual conference now brings together the world’s most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes).
The talks available through iTunes are almost always interesting, thought-provoking, engaging. The theme is generally about how to make the world a better place.
Speakers have included not only many people I hadn’t heard of before, but famous people such as Stephen Hawking, Jane Goodall, Billy Graham or Al Gore.
Dave Eggers spent 25 minutes (an 85Mb file) showing and explaining in a very entertaining way how and why he set up an after school homework programme offering one-on-one tutoring to local kids. He explains how they got off to a bad start — no kids attended the programme for weeks — and then how it became not only successful, but such a success the programme spread to other cities, other countries and broader concepts.
With spellbinding eagerness, he talks about how his 826 Valencia tutoring center inspired others around the world
Visit : Dave Eggers makes his TED Prize wish: Once Upon a School | Video on TED.com.
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The medium and the message
There are people who live online and on their phones, and there are folks who stick to the newspaper. You need to look not only at the age of your audiences, but also where and how they live so you know the best way to reach them. Fancy marketers call this ethnographic research.
[Via Katya's Non-Profit Marketing Blog: Must read: the changing US consumer.]
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Identities in the offline world
Karaitiana Taiuru makes a point about how we contact people in a world where populations are in a constant state of change: we change jobs, houses, cities and even countries with great frequency. Is it still appropriate to ask people for their phone number? Perhaps an Internet address would make more sense?
I wonder if it is time we stopped using our phone numbers on personal ID and forms, or that we are at least given the option to use a phone number and a web address such as a personal domain or social networking site address.
Read the whole post at Karaitiana Taiuru - Blog: Identities in the offline world.
Add in schemes such as OpenID and i-names, which allow people to establish a definitive identity:
…your OpenID can stay with you, no matter which Provider you move to. And best of all, the OpenID technology is not proprietary and is completely free.
While OpenID is more about logging in to password protected areas, i-names are more about claiming a single identity to represent you on the Internet.
Just as a url is an address for a website, an i-name is an Internet address for YOU! It is a simple, secure way to authenticate your identity and to share personal data, with the assurance that it will remain private and up-to-date. Further, your identity cannot be “harvested” by spammers or other marketers without your express permission.
There are two types of i-names: individual i-names and organization i-names:
- An individual i-name begins with an “=” sign (i.e., =victor.grey)
- An organization i-name begins with an “@” sign (i.e., @2idi)
This post was written by Miraz Jordan, i-name=Miraz.
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Xero Case Study - New Zealand Drug Foundation
We’ve mentioned Xero before now as an accounting system community organisations should look into. One feature it does not share with other accounts packages is that it’s an online system, meaning the accounts are available to any authorised user at any time from anywhere.
On the Xero website there’s: Xero | Case Study | New Zealand Drug Foundation —
Ross Bell is executive director of the New Zealand Drug Foundation, a charitable trust committed to reducing the harmful effects of drugs and alcohol.
… “We were using MYOB and it was too difficult for me to use. It was on our finance manager’s computer, so I never really had access to it. The finance manager would print off reports for me that were already out of date when I got them and they were quite hard to follow,” says Ross.
… “With Xero, it’s easy to login and see everything all at once. It’s fantastic for me to do that whenever and wherever I need,” says Ross.
“Because Xero is online it gives us greater transparency. Our trustees have really come to depend on access to Xero. The reporting makes everything so clear, which has given the board greater confidence in what we’re doing.”
One enormous benefit of the Internet is that it allows members of organisations to share information more easily. Having the accounts ‘locked away’ on a single computer can be a real drawback.
Has you organisation looked into Xero? Are you using it? Have you rejected it? What do you think? Please share your thoughts through the comments below.
[Via : Xero | Case Study | New Zealand Drug Foundation.]
Disclaimer: After doing some work for Rod Drury earlier this year I receive a discounted rate for a Xero subscription for my business.
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One way to raise funds online
The latest issue of New Dialogue carries an article about a New Zealand website that can help community organisations with online fundraising:
Fundraising for the sector has long been typified by cake stalls, begging for money and donations, filling out forms, collecting, handling and processing cash — and dealing with the fact that cash goes ‘missing’ sometimes. But now the audience perspective has changed.
FundraiseOnline provides the sector a new channel to supplement donation streams. It’s an easy to use, functionally-rich and low cost web capability for any sized charity.
… Visit FundraiseOnline to check out some examples of mindblowing fundraising success stories, particularly: www.fundraiseonline.co.nz/kayak4cancer/ showing how every day events can be changed into life changing experiences; www.fundraiseonline.co.nz/digdeep/ where communities of very special and local interest can do amazing things. The two organisations concerned together benefited to the tune of $30,000 from online donations.
Also visit: www.socialactions.com/new-benchmarks-for-group-fundraising.
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