Digital Democracy

I’m in Port-au-Prince, Haiti for the next week to follow-up on the great trip Abby Goldberg and I took this spring. I began my trip distributing cameras for the Life In A Day project – the first user-generated feature film. I’ve also been distributing photos from our workshop in April and I ferried some films [...]

This week the U.S. Senate votes on a $60 billion supplemental aid bill for Haiti. Our work with Haiti helped bring together a coalition of twelve U.S. Senators to take up the issue of sexual and gender based violence in Haiti and ask that funding be earmarked for the protection of [...]

Abby and I just returned from an inspiring and full week in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. We couldn’t have done it without your support, and we’re thrilled to announce that, thanks to a donation we received this week, we have met our fundraising goal of $7,500 for the trip! Thanks to all the donations, we were able [...]

Tomorrow morning Abby and I travel to Port-au-Prince to focus on the needs of Haitian women. On our trip we have two objectives, and we need your help to meet them.

Investigating how technology can be leveraged to protect women and girls from gender-based violence.
Conducting media trainings with women and leaving them with equipment to [...]

In Haiti, a second humanitarian crisis is unfolding: Haiti’s women are under siege from increasing insecurity, which has grown steadily since the earthquake devastated the country in January. Facing violence and rape, Haiti’s women operate within discriminatory legal structures which prevent them from accessing aid and taking an active role in their country’s redevelopment process.

This [...]

For the amazing work that has been done by the Ushahidi volunteers at SIPA, Tufts and elsewhere, our advisory board member Patrick Meier received an award this past weekend from Bill Clinton at the Clinton Global University Initiative. Well done Patrick!
Humble as he is, he dedicated the Clinton prize to all Ushahidi volunteers. Congrats again [...]

The power of new technologies has made a lot of headlines recently, but behind these new tools is a deeper story – the power of the people who wield them. When it comes to open-source and particularly crowd-sourcing tools, those people are so often volunteers, and they are the true heroes [...]

On January 12th, a devastating earthquake shook Haiti. We had a team of people on the ground working with young Haitians. Thankfully they all survived, but what was life like before and what can it be like after? Today we’re proudly publishing our report from the research they were conducting, looking at the economic livelihoods of  young [...]

In early January 2010 we partnered with Tufts University’s Center for Emerging Market Enterprises (CEME) to conduct research and a photography training with young adults in Haiti. Researchers Chrissy Martin and Joshua Haynes, using the Project Einstein curriculum, worked with young adults ages 18-24 to explore – through the use of digital photography – how [...]

One of the things that drives us is being able to highlight exciting ways people are using technology to make the world a better place. Today, we’re excited to highlight the Extraordinairies – a social enterprise using technology to help people micro-volunteer their time. Through their iPhone app or website, people can volunteer just minutes [...]