Squarepeg - change is social

Challenges Entered:

If you have an opportunity you want people to know about, let Squarepeg know about it first. We'll send it across the web to wherever you have supporters (Facebook, Myspace and other social networks, blogs, websites, email). If your supporters act on that opportunity, their friends will be notified via the communication channels your supporter chose (e.g. if your supporter uses Facebook, their friends are notified via the mini-feed). If you are looking for opportunities, you get to choose the tool (Facebook, Myspace and other social networks, blogs, websites, email) you use to receive updates from Squarepeg. You can choose to follow updates from any specific organization (like, Amnesty International), or individual (like, me!). Based on the interests you express when you follow people and take action, we'll also recommend opportunities in your area that you are most likely to be interested in. The recommender system is a great way for organizations to reach new individuals, without bothering those that are unlikely to be interested.  Whether you are an organizer or a would be volunteer, you will also be able to browse through groups of people and organizations that have common interests, similar to how you can browse groups of similar books on Amazon.com. We hope this will foster collaboration by helping people and groups understand their common causes, likely partners, and opportunities for collective action.

What else have you done in this area of work?

We're active organizers, but we're all pretty young and feisty. This is definitely the first social sector web startup any of us have been involved with.

Project Details

Project url:

http://www.squarepegged.org

Project video:

Project RSS:

http://blog.squarepegged.org/

Project Assessment

Financial support:

Project has financial support

Project goals:

Update: Based on all the wonderful feedback we got at the Netsquared conference, we've made some significant changes about how to implement our core ideas. We hope you'll read about that below, and also check out the assessment section. We'd really love to have you get involved!  We are building a social communication tool that uses a recommender system (similar to netflix.com or amazon.com) to help individuals and organizations understand which opportunities they are most likely to find interesting. Communicating and collaborating online is no longer as simple as connecting with more people; the Internet is far too large and information overload can be as uninspiring as silence. Our solution is targeted information. When social change organizations use Squarepeg to build relationships, our recommender system will help them focus on individuals that are most likely to be inspired by their work. Individuals who use Squarepeg to find opportunities and organize people will have a more enjoyable user experience because we will mashup recommender data and social data, and filter out information that individuals are unlikely to act upon. We believe that the social sector stands to benefit from recommender technology similar to how the private sector has - less wasted time for individuals and more action for organizers.  

Identified Obstacles:

We're psyched about the current Squarepeg team, but we are still looking to add a few more fingers to our keyboard. If you are a developer with Ruby experience, (Rails experience is particularly helpful), or a CompSci type, mathematician, or psychologist with experience with recommender systems, we would absolutely love to hear from you. We'd also like to meet an accountant or tax specialist, and talking strategy with veteran entrepreneurs would be nice. Of course, if you are a talented techie, organizer, or consultant of any type, with an enthusiasm for our cause, we'd love to see what you can do. Email is a great way to let us know who you are a why you might like to get involved. Please check out our Get Involved page for more detailed descriptions of the help we're looking for.Â

Location

Portland, OR

United States

See map: Google Maps

Submitted by iholeman on March 5, 2008 - 12:12pm

Notes from a small desk

Submitted by Daniel Bachhuber (not verified) on May 26, 2008 - 9:00am.

I think a recommendation engine which provides solid, intelligent connections to people like me working on similar projects could potentially be a giant step forward in acheiving social change through online tools.

For instance, pretend I were a dedicated, motivated student who was passionate enough to do international development work, but didn't have the resources or connections of, say, UNAID or UNDP. If I could be introduced to people with a similar desire to do a water filtration project, it's possible that we could connect over the net and plan digitally. Furthermore, if I had already started a project in Peru, and there were other people on Squarepeg who were working in a similar location, it might be that I could "become aware" of the other projects without having to search them out. Is that too much to ask for?

Additionally, if it were possible, how will you make the barrier to entry (i.e. number of forms I have to fill in as a user) as small as possible? I already have a wealth of information on the music/podcasts I enjoy listening to; and the books I like to read; on Last.fm and Good Reads. If I've already done write-ups on the project I'm doing on a project website, I really won't want to copy and paste that information over again and again.

Most importantly, how do you prove to me that you can bring this great concept to reality?

Changing times

Submitted by Michael Emile on March 13, 2008 - 6:21pm.

It's been interesting to see how much the internet has changed political campaigning. Looks like it can do the same thing for social movements. Is this site going to be set up more for individuals and small organizations, or for larger organizations already in existence, too?

better tools for individuals working with small and large groups

Submitted by Isaac Holeman (not verified) on March 13, 2008 - 9:55pm.

Many large, well established organizations already have websites that allow people to create profiles, organize events, etc., so these organizations will be less likely to use Squarepeg in the immediate future. This isn't because their existing site does the same things that Squarepeg will, but because many CEOs at nonprofits think that they are using an equilivant tool. In practice, even relatively large organizations tend to lag when it comes to implementing engaging networking tools.

Squarepeg also offers some benefits for users that a Nonprofit cannot offer if they host their own tools. For example, it is annoying and inneficient to create a new profile and password for each organization you volunteer with, it makes it less likely that a user will join any one nonprofit's networking tool. There are also privacy issues e.g. I want to network on the save darfur site, but I will be more stingy with my profile information and some kinds of networking if I know the organization is able to access every bit of my profile data the next time they want to decide how to ask me for money. When organizations host their own networking tools , they also must bring each user onto their site, rather than letting users find them via the networking tool (one of the highest potential areas of online networking for social change organizations).

So, initially we will work the most with a few small to mid sized organizations organizations and campaigns who are ambitious about growing but may not have the resources to build excellent networking tools on their own. We think we have a lot to offer much larger campaigns as well, and will be better prepared to market to these organizations once we have proven ourselves with slightly smaller groups.

Opening double doors wide

Submitted by hopefulist on March 13, 2008 - 7:20pm.

This project seems like a way to open a big, gorgeous set of double doors WIDE. I grew up wanting to make a difference but the scale was small: local soup kitchen, litter clean-up day, reading at a nursing home. This project could be what I'm looking for to really blast those doors open and go from thinking limited and local to networking with others on a grand scale. And if my local ideas have merit, maybe they'd work in a 1000 other localities.

Good luck and happy trails!

Hopefulist

PS I'm wondering if there will be a system for forwarding your site information to others, like an "email this page" function. I'm involved in several local groups including Habitat for Humanity and AFS student exchanges and the volunteers tend to be middle aged and older. In general we're less internet savvy than our kids' generation; it would be good to have an easy way to get others in the loop.

This is a great idea, and

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on March 11, 2008 - 11:29am.

This is a great idea, and could be a great part of much-needed R&D on the social dynamics of the web. I think yall might want to think more about how the messaging system would go (ie would people be able to recommend organizations easily, or just activities?). But this is a great way to proactively respond to technological change already going on right now with a call for social change.

Thanks for your comment, we are working on that

Submitted by iholeman on March 12, 2008 - 2:00pm.

Hi,

Thanks for your comment. I agree the messaging system is central to how people will interact with each other, and how they will interact with organizations on the site. The key is making sure that the nature of the communication on the site doesn't just make people feel good about themselves, it actually needs to encourage people to get out and do good things - offline and online. Translating the online social dynamic into offline activity is one of the holy grails of this project.

cheers