Women Who Tech: a TeleSummit for Women in Technology

Women Who Tech ( http://womenwhotech.com/ ) , in partnership with the WIN Technology Network, present Women Who Tech: a TeleSummit for Women in Technology in the non-profit and political world March 31, 2008.  

This free, live event will bring together the most talented and renowned women breaking new ground in technology. The telesummit aims to create a supportive network for the vibrant and thriving community of women in technology professions by giving them an open platform to share their talents, experiences and insights via virtual workshops and panel discussions. 

Current workshops include: 

Women and Social Capital 

Networking, schmetworking…why is it that women are statistically more’social’ than men, but have statistically less powerful business networksthan men? This panel will explore how the women who have entered boys clubsand built powerful Social Capital have done it and give ideas to women onhow to build their networks. 

Panelists: Joan Blades, Moveon.org and MomsRising, Arianna Huffington,Huffington Post 

Moderator: Tara Hunt, Citizen Agency   

Open Source For Women 

This panel will explore how to get women more involved in developingtechnology and contributing to Open Source and Open Standards. What are thecurrent barriers? What can we do to break these barriers? 

Panelists: Michelle Murrain, NOSI, Leslie Hawthorn, Google 

Moderator: Kaliya Hamlin, She’s Geeky   

Open Source Technology for .Orgs

Join the Technology Network of the Women’s Information Network for:

Open Source Technology for .Orgs

Saturday, February 23rd
1 pm – 3:30 pm
Cleveland Park Library
3310 Connecticut Avenue, NW
1st Auditorium

To register for this event please contact: Sibyl Edwards at technetwork@winonline.org

 

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Have you heard of Ubuntu, Kubuntu, and Linux? Or maybe you have heard of Firefox, WordPress or Drupal?

What do these things have in common? They are all Open Source Technology!

Open Source Technology is technology created by developers that is non-proprietary and can be modified and upgraded
by a community of other developers.

Open Source Technology is generally free and accessible to anyone who wants to download it.

Open Source Technology is being used in businesses, organizations and schools across the country.

Come and learn more about how the Open Source community is making technology bigger, better and more accessible for
all from our panel of Open Source enthusiasts and experts.

The panel is being led by Kevin Cole and Mackenzie Morgan.

Kevin Cole is a research applications programmer for the Gallaudet Research Institute at Gallaudet University. He is an advocate of using shared open technology to teach and learn. He is also the reluctant leader of the Ubuntu DC LoCo (Local
Community) team, where he is known to volunteer at local libraries teaching locals Ubuntu.

Mackenzie Morgan is a Computer Science major at George Washington University. Specializing in Linux, she works with the Linux community both online and offline helping new users.

To register for this event please contact: Sibyl Edwards at technetwork@winonline.org

DC + Social Betterment + Facebook + ?

I recently joined Facebook to stay connected with one of my friends and to shamelessly promote my book (The Creative Activism Guide) and discovered three pretty cool things.

1. Among the many groups you could elect to join as a Facebook member is one called DC Treehugger Happy Hour.

2. There are a bunch of other groups built around certain social or environmental causes.

3. You can participate in online brainstorming sessions.  Look for a group called Jenni. You can sign up, look some of the creative challenges (and ideas) that have been posted, and post your own challenge. Sadly, the posting feature wasn’t working on 11/02.

The Verizon Warning

When Verizon Wireless censored political speech on one of its mobile services, alarm bells should ring on the need for laws on digital communications.

Late last month, Verizon Wireless denied an application from Naral Pro-Choice America, a reproductive rights group, for a “short code,” a few numbers that a mobile phone user can use to subscribe to a particular source of text messages. Verizon said its policy was to refuse “issue oriented” text-messaging programs from any group that “seeks to promote an agenda or distribute content that, in its discretion, may be seen as controversial or unsavory to any of our users.” The policy also said political candidates may be granted short codes if the content is, “in VZW’s sole discretion, not issue-oriented or controversial in nature.”

Leave aside for the moment the sorry spectacle of a major American company aiming to make campaigns even more substance-free than they already are. The Verizon policy was textbook censorship. Any government that tried it would be rightly labeled authoritarian. The First Amendment prohibits the United States government from anything approaching that sort of restriction.

If Verizon had attempted it on normal phone lines, it would have been violating common carrier laws that bar interference with voice transmissions. Unfortunately, those laws do not apply to text messaging.

read more | digg story

Past Coverage
Verizon Blocks Messages of Abortion Rights Group (September 27, 2007)

Free Handheld Camcorders for Non-Profits!!

Here is a press release from Pure Digital who will be giving free handheld 
camcorders to non-profits across the world starting in December. 

–Sibyl


_________________________________________________________



Pure Digital Kicks Off Massive Camcorder Giveaway 



Starting today, Pure Digital Technologies 
 will be launching a 
one million Flip Video Camcorder 
giveaway to benefit nonprofits worldwide. The Flip Video Spotlight program 
came about when former President Bill Clinton approached Pure Digital, 
requesting that video be used to shed light on world issues that need to be 
addressed.

With a million pocket-sized camcorders 
 that have built-in software 
for direct uploading to YouTube , the 
possibilities are endless for what can be achieved with this initiative, “We believe video can help change the world,”

wireless AMBER alerts

Statistics show the first three hours after a child’s abduction are most critical to recovery efforts. Recognizing that wireless technology can help galvanize communities to assist law enforcement in the search for and return of the child, the membership of CTIA-The Wireless Association®, The Wireless Foundation, the United States Department of Justice and the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children are honored to offer the Wireless AMBER Alerts Initiative.

By combining the efforts of the wireless industry with NCMEC and law enforcement agencies, the Wireless AMBER Alerts Initiative will be a catalyst for the more than 200 million wireless subscribers to aid in the return of an abducted child.

To sign up for wireless AMBER alerts, click here.

New Category – Social + Tech

 

Howdy Idealists!

Because of my love of social/issue advocay and technology, I have decided to create a category on the blog that discusses the use and imapct of technology for grassroot/netroots and activism. Instead of merely posting the latest news on the latest technology I will discuss how Web 2.0 technologies can utilized to advocate for social change. I will post weekly, so please visit the blog often! (–Sibyl)

Tags and Meta-tags: Simple Online Attention-Getters for Activists

Finally, we can post a reply to an issue that came up in our first Civics & Coffee event: What’s the difference between a tag and a metatag?

 Tags and metatags are pretty easy to understand really – both are just labels you put on different types of web content. In both cases you want to have labels that describe what you wrote about. You do this for a blog by tagging the post with key words and phrases that describe the subject of that post. The point here is to help people who are searching for posts on whatever your subject happens to be, or else on subjects that are clearly related.

(Using misleading and irrelevant tags to attract attention won’t do any good unless your goal is to annoy people.)

Metatags are words and phrases that describe the content of each Web page, not the entire site. This task is usually reserved for those experienced in HTML, ie., a webmaster. For everyone else that is not an expert at Web programming, you too can create metatags if you use some Web site creation tools.

For example, I’ve created sites in Tripod.com and used their very simple tool for adding metatags to each page. I added some words and phrases that related to the content of the page and that was all.

Three Tips for Tags and Metatags: 

1. You  should not waste space on different forms of most words. Use “activist” and a search engine will return that page in a list of results for “activists.”

2. If some of the words are likely to be misspelled you could include the most likely variations.

3. Don’t forget common variations on words. “Eco-city” and “ecocity” could both be listed if relevant to your post or page.

Five Myths and Mysteries About Black Web Surfing

Myths about using black background

read more | digg story