MobiChange will be an open-source, multi-lingual mobile social networking platform, accessible by voice and SMS, designed to support local communities and enable social change.

The MobiChange project will have three parts --

1. An open source code base for a multilingual mobile social network designed on the basis of extensive ethnographic research, to be accessed almost exclusively by voice and SMS (MobiChange).

2. A Drupal-based community website to discuss how such a platform may help non-profits engage local communities and mobilize social change (www.mobichange.org).

3. A hosted ad-supported consumer version of the mobile social network, built on the MobiChange platform, designed for mass market adoption ( www.mobitalk.org).

www.mobitalk.org will be our main source of revenue.

MobiChange will work closely with grassroots non-profits working with disadvantaged local communities to build a code base and user interface that is flexible enough to be customized for development-oriented applications in the areas of education, activism, advocacy and micro-enterprise.

It will be the first social networking experience for millions of mobile phone users who have limited ease with English and use a $50 mobile phone as their only computing device. It will allow them to do some of the things we take for granted on social networks — meeting new people with common interests, benefiting from new opportunities for learning and earning, even sharing their own knowledge and skills with others.

A desired outcome will be the effective use of the Mobichange platform at a grassroots level to self-organize, coordinate and mobilize activities relevant to the community.

MobiChange will subsequently release its open source code base and train non-profits in emerging Asia and Africa to use it as a powerful development tool.