Ushahidi is a web-based platform that allows anyone to gather distributed data via SMS, email or web and visualize it on a map or timeline. The goal is to create a way of aggregating information from the public for use in crisis response. In 2008, Ushahidi was awarded $25,000 after winning the NetSquared N2Y3 Mashup Challenge.

First for the fun: a new machinima and live mixed video by Drax that features the TechSoup Community team behind the scenes working on the Nonprofit Commons in Second Life! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwAZ1-BstjE

And for the how and why of what we're doing in this community:
The people of TechSoup have been deeply saddened by the recent devastation in Haiti. We have been so inspired and impressed with the many ways folks are using mobile and other technologies to help with disaster relief. Together we have blogged about some of these relief efforts from the great folks at Ushahidi and the Extraordinaries as well as those of our donor partners.

The team at Ushahidi have adapted their mobile platform for crisit reporting and mapping for use in the situation following the devastating earthquake in Haiti:

http://haiti.ushahidi.com/

We encourage you to spread the word about this tool: Anyone in or outside of Haiti can use this tool via the web or on a mobile phone to make reports with voice, text or video; the reports will then be mapped and sources verified.  Ushahidi are hoping this adapted version of the tool, that's been used successfully in the recent Kenyan election crisis and the DRC war crisis, to help shepard people donation to relief efforts and mapping services to people urgently in need. 

Ushahidi is one of 11 "Information Technologies and New Media" enterprises that have been named by the WEF to their Technology Pioneers awards for Embracing Disruption. They share this award with Amiando, Amobee, CollabNet, Dilithium Networks, Innovid, Obopay, Playfish, RingCentral, StreamBase, and Twitter.

Ushahidi won first place winner at N2Y3 (May 2008). http://www.ushahidi.com/

http://www.weforum.org/en/Communities/Technology%20Pioneers/TechnologyPi...

Today, TED announced their 2010 Senior Fellows - and to our surprise and delight two representatives from N2Y3 winner Ushahidi are on the list. Congratulations to Erik Hersman and Juliana Rotich (and the entire Ushahidi team) on this honor. Below are links to the places where you'll find Ushahidi on the N2 site:

-Ushahidi's original Project Gallery entry
-N2Y3 coverage
-Posts tagged "Ushahidi"

We can't wait to see your "TED Talks" Juliana and Erik!

It’s no coincidence that 2012 (the latest in a long line of disaster movies from director Roland Emmerich)  is timed to release during one of the worst weather months North Americans experience. Yep, November is storm season, bringing with it power outages, floods, snow, wind – and that’s only on the west coast. We’ve written a bit about crowd-sourcing disaster information before, but now seems like the perfect time to get back into disaster preparedness. (More...)

In the past couple of days, I have had the great pleasure of having post-N2Y4 conversations with John Zoltner (a project representative from DatAgro) and Emily Jacobi (a project representative from Digital Democracy's Handheld Human Rights).

HopePhones, a new campaign, launched today that enables anyone to provide health services to those in the developing world – by donating your old cell phones!

N2Y3 was what got Ushahidi started financially.  Up until that time, we had no money at all. Zero.  We were all just volunteering our time to a project that we all believed in.  The $25,000 we won last year changed all that.  Here are some of the lessons that we learned and which just might help you too.

NetSquared recently followed up with the N2Y3 Featured Projects to develop these short case studies, with the goal to expand the knowledgebase of best practices for applying social media in the nonprofit context. We interviewed participants from the N2Y3 Featured Project teams to gain a better understanding of the way they used social media to increase their reach and carry out their missions. We are very happy to bring you their stories!

Today's spotlight: Ushahidi!