I think so often when dealing with world issues like famine, poverty, illiteracy – the problems is not being able to comprehend the scale of the situation. What does 1.2 billion people without clean drinking water actually mean? And the more intangible the issue, the less one feels able to do something about it. These infographics all use the idea of ‘If the world was a village of 100 people..’ to scale down the numbers and make the problems tangible. Great use of design to explain a problem. Next step: Simple tangible steps towards removing the problem.
Another nice play on GPS writing, from this runner who will be taking part in the London Flora Marathon, and is trying to raise awareness of her cash-raising in this nice little youtube:
Our Child’s i Foundation first meetup will be held at the Old Bank of England on Feb 4th. The main plan of action (so far) is to discuss our current todo lists, and hopefully peddle off tasks to people who are keen to give some time and effort to the cause. We’ll be posting more about what we’re able to divvy out on the main blog in due course, but if you’re interested in giving some time, please RSVP, and come along.
Kirsty, Lucy and Julia were at the sicamp last night, collecting business cards and speaking to a whole range of lovely developer and just interesting types, many of who are keen to help out, across quite a wide range of technologies. It provides an interesting challenge, in that we’re eager to receive help regardless of what platforms things are built on. We already have interest from Drupal, Rails and PHP people. Our current site is built on Wordpress and will soon enough be moved to its own box so we’re a bit more able to hack the code – but if we have lots of activity using different platforms, it will be a great opportunity to show how open standards and interoperability technology such as webservices can be used to great a coherant whole. Increasingly, I think the main site will become a portal to aggregate the network activity – which quite neatly reflects our meatspace activity.
Through my work at Yarned, I’m involved in a new charity – Child’s i Foundation, which is building a babies’ home in Uganda on the outskirts of Kampala for 50 infants, from newborn babies to five years-olds. The home will have medical facilities to help with premature and sick babies and children with special needs.
This is happening in two ways:
1. To build a “transitional orphanage” with full medical and educational facilities that provides a safe haven for babies and young children.
2. To place these children into secure and happy families, giving them something we believe every child has a right to – a loving home.
Child’s i Foundation will connect supporters to our work in Uganda in real time. Through emails, blogs and videos, people will be able to see exactly where their money is going, and we will have the opportunity to appeal directly for additional help should we need it.
Members of the community can be involved on many levels, from community fundraising, making donations and suggestions to actively volunteering at the Home in Uganda.
Interaction and mass collaboration are the keys to building the charity and achieving our goals.
We are creating a Web 2.0 version of a letter from a sponsored child and creating a new way of giving.
I’ll write more about the approach we’re taking from a technical perspective over the next weeks, but in the meantime, please go and visit the website:
My wife is running two (count them, two!) Race for Life 5K runs this year in aid of Cancer Research, something which has affected, and is affecting both of us. Give her a little cash to help her towards her £10 target. Who said she has low ambitions?
