Inspiration
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Using Twitter to Scale Caring
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Obama Education Speech: Innovation, Problem Solving, and Twitter
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Web 3.0 and the Emergence of Creative Community Hubs
The Problem of Politics: Gordon Brown Calls For A New Ethic at TEDGlobal
Published July 26, 2009 @ 10:48AM PT
Perhaps the most talked about talk from the recently concluded TEDGlobal in Oxford, UK is Prime Minister Gordon Brown's speech "Wiring a web for global good." In it, Brown calls for a new sentiment that recognizes the connection between people across borders of nationality and class, and suggests that new global institutions are needed to realize that vision.
There is a lot interesting about the speech. The fact that it happened demonstrates that TED is increasingly reaching a tipping point of global recognition. There are not very many conferences that could put together a suprise visit from an active head of state.
Second, it's one of the first talks I've seen where there are many members of the TED online community feel like the speech (or at least the person giving the speech) betrays the spirit of the event, and are arguing vociferously in the comments to have it removed. This as well demonstrates a certain maturation of the community around the event.
Third, from a completely technological perspective, this is the first time that I've used TED's "Interactive Transcript" tool, where you can click on a line of text from the speech and the video automatically forwards to that portion. This is extremely cool and very useful.
Fourth, the speech is definitely that of a politician. As in, it says a lot of things that we can all agree with without a lot of commitment to doing it or a vision for how it gets done. That's not to say that speeches aren't important, but this is not exactly treading new ground.
Fifth, I love the reference points in history, but there are some interesting asymetries in the analysis. The one that stood out to me was Brown's assertion that the first British Abolitionist movement took 24 years to change public sentiment, and his question about how might it have been different had the organizers had the tools of modern engagement - particularly the ability to convey images as testimony.
Historians such as "Bury the Chains" author Adam Hochschild would probably take a different view, suggesting that British sentiment chained dramatically faster than British policy. Indeed, the abolitionist movement was impeded for years not by a lack of public support, but by the tumultuous global political system and the way the French Revolution made the British power elite nervous about responding to the demands of the proletariate and the way the Napoleonic wars sapped resources and attention.
What's more, those same historians would likely recognize the vital importance that demonstration images - even if they were not the dramatic and constant images we have from modern injustices - had on the movement. One of the most effective instruments for changing sentiment were diagrams of the slave ships that showed how slaves were cramped like sardines into spaces not possibly big enough.
So while Brown's not wrong to say that the tools of modern organizing might have shifted how fast sentiment was changed, I think that it might be even more accurate to recognize that modern tools might have provided a better platform for organizing that collective shift in political pressure that could not be denied for two decades by politicians who wished to focus elsewhere.
TED is an incredibly important institution. There are far too few spaces that place intellect, creativity, and smarts of all stripes at the center of the public conversation. Regardless of how one feels about Brown's speech, it's hard not to be excited about how far TED has come and how much potential there is for the hundreds of millions of people who've watched the TEDTalks to take their inspiration to new realms.
Here's the speech:
TEDGlobal2009 and the Substance of Things Unseen
Published July 21, 2009 @ 02:23PM PT
TED is maybe the best known gathering of creatives in the world. Each year, tens of millions of people watch TEDTalks for free online, but only a few lucky thousand get to attend one of their few events.
TEDGlobal is an annual conference held at Oxford University in the United Kingdom each year, and is meant as a gateway into a world of big ideas and passionate people. The event is just beginning and even from thousands of miles away, I can begin to feel the excitement creeping into blogs, tweets, and the social-intellectual ether. I've got some major, major envy.
I absolutely love this year's theme, "The Substance of Things Unseen." This purposefully open theme is quintessential TED; subtle enough to allow for an incredible variety of conversations, but with a common thread that plays on the imagination.
I have been thinking about "The Substance of Things Unseen" with even more regularity than normal lately. Immersed in the exhilarating chaos of leaving one life to start anew two-thirds of a country away is exactly the type of experience that breeds an incredible reflection and introspection about meaning, purpose, and what's next.
My favorite blog post to come out of the event so far is "The Books of Oxford," a reflection by a frogdesigner about seeing the Magna Carta, a Gutenburg Bible, and some of the other treasures of Oxford's Bodleian library. The post asks what it is about seeing those incredible works in the flesh - despite the fact that almost no one can read them any more and that perfectly good modern translations of the words exist.
For my part, I think it's because history - particularly history of that order and magnitude have a way of making us feel small. Not small in the sense of meaningless, but small in the sense that we are part of something much bigger. That feeling is at once overwhelming and reassuring that we cannot possibly understand or control everything.
TED is ever more active in translating the power of their big ideas to the social realm. This is particularly embodied in their TEDGlobal Fellows, which gives incredible folks like Appfrica's Jonathan Gosier the chance to participate in TED events.
What's more an event so fluid with the ideas of the day cannot help but deal with the enormous magnitude of global problems. In the first day of the event today, surprise speaker Prime Minister Gordon Brown (yes, you read that right) talked about the need for new institutions to combat the challenges we face. His assertion is that pictures, words, and other media have immense power to change the way we think about the world and it's our obligation to harness the full capacity of modern media to make good on that potential.
And that's why I love next year's TEDGlobal theme, announced yesterday. "And Now The Good News" will be all about sharing those stories that paint a very different picture of the promise and potential of the future that we just tend not to hear as much these days.
For now though, enjoy the incredible outputs from what promises to be an inspiring week.
The Real Value Renaissance and Opportunities for Good Startups
Published July 16, 2009 @ 10:14AM PT
One of the themes I've tried to push with this blog is that even in a down economy, there are incredible entrepreneurial opportunities for those willing to seek and find them out. Having just left one job to start a new company, there is perhaps a bit of self-fulfilling prophecy here.
But it's hard not to look across the spectrum of ideas that people are pouring into new companies and organizations and see that we could be on the verge of a real value renaissance, where people are not only founding companies, but finding ways to really meet specific needs and generate wealth with positive social and environmental impact.
Entrepreneur magazine posted yesterday about some of the industries best suited currently for startups. There are a lot of interesting ideas. I think that affordable meals are a clear opportunity to combine financial gain with social impact, and the example of Revolution Foods is a pretty awesome demonstration on how you can solve an old problem (crappy, unhealthy school lunches) in a new way.
Another one of their examples, Flat World, demonstrates I think how much opportunity there is to democratize access to textbook quality information and reduce the absurdly high cost of text books that become a major financial obstacle for many students. Using the internet to lower the cost of education seems to me to be one of the single best opportunities for socially-minded entrepreneurs out there.
Finally, the article points out the wide variety of opportunities around providing products and opportunities for the retiring baby boomer generation. Better educated and with more experience than just about any generation before it, there are huge opportunities to channel knowledge and expertise, as well as providing better services.
The point of course is simply to remember that even in a down economy, the entrepreneurial spark does not go away. If anything, for social entrepreneurs it gives us a new excuse to pitch a version of the future where social is the natural word in front of enterprise.
Loving Every Minute
Published June 11, 2009 @ 09:52AM PT
(photo via talkingheadtv.com)
"There are way too many people in this room right now that are doing stuff they hate. Please stop doing that. There is no reason in 2008 to do sh-t you hate. None. Promise me you won't. Because you can lose just as much money being happy as hell."
That's how Wine Library Tv founder, social media guru, and web personality Gary Vaynerchuk began his truly awesome keynote at the Web2.0 Expo 2008. Gary is one of the leaders of a new breed of entrepeneurs that get in their guts how much better life is if you approach it with passion and joy. It's hard to imagine this guy saying something that didn't require an exclamation point.
Thursday is always the drag day for me where I have to regroup, remember all the excitement, and kick it back into gear. Gary's one of the most inspiring people out there for helping with that process.
Muslim Social Entrepreneurs and Obama's New Era
Published June 04, 2009 @ 11:37AM PT
Photo credit: Stephen Crowley/New York Times
This morning's speech in Cairo signaled a new US approach to the Muslim world; an approach that like the rest of Obama's young presidency seems to be characterized by pragmatism, common sense, and a deep-seeded belief that all people, communities, and cultures have something to contribute to a sustainable, thriving, peaceful global world, and that at the end of the day, we're only as strong as we are together. There were also, as we've seen elsewhere, indications that economic prosperity relied on a combination of actors including social entrepreneurs.
The speech is a particularly significant moment for me personally. Cairo is a place whose story has become interwoven in complex ways with my own. I wrote earlier this year:
In 2004, I found myself in Cairo, Egypt for a semester abroad. It was after 9/11, a year into the Iraq war, and I was skeptical of the dogmatic us, them, clash of civilizations mindset that seemed to be in style. I wanted to see it for myself.
Egypt was not a random location. My parents had visited Jordan, Israel, and Egypt when I was only three, and just after the start of the first intifada. Their stories introduced me not only to the majesty of history, but of our power to destroy - and often to destroy in the name of the good. I would find an Egypt just as confusing.
Almost from the moment I arrived, I loved Egypt. I loved the layers of history embedded in the very buildings themselves; I loved the passion of constant conversation. I loved the cab drivers who consoled me and my American friends the day after George Bush was re-elected.
But at the same time, my Egypt was not just about Pyramids and politics. In 2004, the violence in Darfur had just flared up and I began volunteering with refugees from the horn of Africa as a way to "do my part." It quickly became the most important part of my week. I spent as much time as I could tutoring English at St. Andrews, a small sanctuary from the cacophony of the outside world.
While I was captivated, I was also appalled. There is no place where I've felt the injustice of opportunity denied quite as oppressively as among the refugees of Cairo. Brilliant, talented, compassionate people are left to languish, denied the basic rights of employment and education. An entire generation of Sudanese youth have grown up outside of any systemic support. And if the Egyptian government's treatment of refugees isn't deplorable enough, the rest of the world treats Cairo like a convenient dumping ground, progressively reducing the number of refugees we allow to cross our borders.
It was the first moment that I felt the seemingly immense gap between my desire to do good, and my ability to actually impact global problems.
I included in that piece just how powerless I felt that fall sitting in a hotel room in Cairo surrounded by other idealistic young friends watching George Bush be re-elected as president. To see then, today, our new president forcefully reject the politics of fear and division and project a new vision of an era of US-Muslim cooperation is thrilling.
In the section of the speech dedicated to what happens next, President Obama asserted that "education and innovation will be the currency of the 21st century," and that success would take cross-sector collaboration:
On education, we will expand exchange programs, and increase scholarships, like the one that brought my father to America, while encouraging more Americans to study in Muslim communities. And we will match promising Muslim students with internships in America; invest in on-line learning for teachers and children around the world; and create a new online network, so a teenager in Kansas can communicate instantly with a teenager in Cairo.
On economic development, we will create a new corps of business volunteers to partner with counterparts in Muslim-majority countries. And I will host a Summit on Entrepreneurship this year to identify how we can deepen ties between business leaders, foundations and social entrepreneurs in the United States and Muslim communities around the world.
In response to that gap I felt in 2004 between my desire and ability to do good, I've tried to answer by investing in the social entrepreneurship sector. It's incredible to see our president refer to Muslim social entrepreneurs because of the immense potential for positive energy they're creating around the Muslim world. Referring specifically to Arab social entrepreneurs, Ashoka Arab World wrote this week:
...the very movements that have the most potential to realize these promises of change, are receiving the least press coverage. They are those movements for social change that are taking place in the Arab region right now. They consist of civil society leaders, activists, organizations and associations that are committed to tackle systemic issues that their societies face using home-grown and innovative ways. Regardless of which of the twenty-two Arab states you look at, there are movements underway to address pressing social issue.
In Egypt, for example, Ehaab Abdou is mobilizing disaffected young professionals to positively contribute to their country. Ehaab established ‘Nahdet el Mahrousa’ to engage young social entrepreneurs in Egypt and abroad and to push them to be responsible for creating the change they themselves hope for. Hisham el Rouby is another example of a committed leader that is giving youth a strong taste of civic engagement and social responsibility. Through his Youth Association for Development, Hisham is popularizing the concept of volunteer-service, an idea that has already led to the establishment of youth volunteer centers in Yemen, Egypt, Syria, the United Arab Emirates and Tunisia since 2003. In Lebanon, Selim Mawad is creating a cadre of “agents of change” by providing young people with the skills and knowledge necessary to teach their communities about the need for transparency and accountability in government. His country-fellow, Wael Hamdian, is inspiring youth to become engaged in realizing social change by identifying and promoting ‘local heroes’. In the occupied Palestinian territories, Abdelfattah Abusrour is introducing Palestinian children in refugee camps to a non-violent form of channeling their frustration and anger by promoting a ‘Beautiful Resistance’ that uses arts and theatre.
These are the Ashoka fellows, but after even just five years of traveling to the Middle East and inviting young Middle Eastern leaders like Hany Amin and his brother Ramy Sami, leaders of Better World NGO dedicated to using technology to unleash youth potential in Egypt, I can say that the excitement and passion for social entrepreneurship increasingly characterizing American youth leaders does not stop at our borders.
An Egyptian man applauds as he watches this morning's speech (Getty)
TED Announces Fellows for TEDGlobal 2009
Published May 26, 2009 @ 08:09AM PT
TEDGlobal 2009: The Substance of Things Not Seen
For the uninitiated, TED is one of the greatest modern gatherings of thinkers, doers, and general polymaths. Their 20-minute TED talks, framed to presenters as the "speech of their lives" have produced some of the most brilliant nuggets of wit and inspiration this side of YouTube. The TED Fellows program gives creative innovators from around the world the chance to attend, cost free, one of the world-reknown TED conferences.
Today, TED announced its first class of TEDGlobal fellows, each of whom will join speakers like The Second World author Parag Khanna, musician Imogen Heap, and child-soldier-turned-rapper Emmanual Jal at the TEDGlobal program in Oxford in July. I was thrilled to see a few familiar names on the list:
"Jonathan Gosier (US/Uganda) — Founder, Appfrica, an organization nurturing and investing in East African software startups...
Peter Haas (US/Haiti/Guatemala) — Founder, Appropriate Infrastructure Development Group, bringing appropriate technology to the developing world; tinkerer...
William Kamkwamba (Malawi/South Africa) — Inventor; student, African Leadership Academy"
As regular readers know, I think Jon's model of African entrepreneurship incubation is a little glimpse of the future and the smart money should be betting on him. Peter Haas' model of supporting community driven appropriate technology has been an inspiration for young changemakers since he founded the Appropriate Infrastructure Development Group a few years ago. He served as one of the earliest keynotes of the Global Engagement Summit that got me started in this crazy world. William I haven't yet met, but along with so many others, I've been inspired and touched by his story of ingenuity and inspiration.
Playing for Change: Music, Transcendence and the Human Spirit
Published May 02, 2009 @ 02:43PM PT
Mermans Kenkosenki, from Playing for Change
In the summer of 2005, I traveled from Serbia to Rwanda, spending as much time as I could with the nonprofits, volunteers, social entrepreneurs, and communities who were working to create a better future. The trip, which largely took place in post or current conflict zone, forced me into ugly confrontation with the question that lurks behind economic development: "development" to what ends?
Perhaps this will seem obvious, but stories I heard and the passions that drove the people I found were not focused on economies of consumption, they were about the ability to be more; to have the freedom and mobility to pursue passions; to provide happier and more comfortable lives for their family, and to experience the joy of being alive in it's full richness without the threat of brutal, stupid, and undeserved war or famine or poverty.
It may just be me, but I often need to remind myself that the reason I work to create change is to unleash the full potential of the human spirit. If the global market is a vehicle for that, I'll seize it with gusto, but that is means, not end.
There is little that does so much to remind me of the beauty and potential of our creativity as music. When I hear the first few notes of the chorus I/II of Bach's "St. Matthews Passion," the way the hair stands up on the back of my neck is the same as when I'm grabbed by the sardonic groove of Fela Kuti's "Shuffering and Smiling" is the same as when I feel the staccato pulse of Arcade Fire's "Rebellion (Lies)" is the same as when I hear Esau Mwamwaya triumphantly holler "Malawi!" over Sri Lankan-via-London M.I.A.'s anthem "Boyz."
Music makes me feel connected to a human experience that is more than the sum of its problems.
That's why I love the Playing for Change project, a multi-year journey that brought a mobile recording studio around the world to have dozens of musicians collaborate virtually to render some of the most powerful, moving, and beautiful songs of all time. The project has ambitious goals:
...to inspire, connect, and bring peace to the world through music. The idea for this project arose from a common belief that music has the power to break down boundaries and overcome distances between people. No matter whether people come from different geographic, political, economic, spiritual or ideological backgrounds, music has the universal power to transcend and unite us as one human race.
But no matter how big that seems, it's something that resonates deep, deep in my guts. It reminds me just how lucky we are to live in a moment where someone can actually convene this wonderful collaboration. Watch this video of "One Love," listen to the steel guitar hang on those very first notes and just try to feel alone. Then look at the comments.
To learn more about Playing for Change, including the work of their foundation which is building schools and supporting music programs around the world, visit their website.
