Are you interested in technology, community, the sharing economy and how we might promote better understanding and economic co-operation among neighbours, communities and neighbourhoods? If so, our Means of Exchange project is looking for someone for a short three month Internship to help with the following: 1. Managing and maintaining our Twitter feed 2. Posting … Continue reading Internship opportunity at Means of Exchange
Category: Means of Exchange
Posts from Means of Exchange, Ken Banks’s work on rethinking livelihoods and building more resilient local economies.
Rethinking livelihoods.
This post appeared on the PopTech blog and has been republished with permission. You can read the original post here. This post is co-authored by PopTech president Leetha Filderman, and Ken Banks, founder of kiwanja.net and FrontlineSMS. Together they are co-facilitators of the 2014 Bellagio/PopTech Fellows program. We are pleased to announce the 2014 class of Bellagio/PopTech … Continue reading Rethinking livelihoods.
Time to think message and motivation
Few companies succeed if they don’t take the time to understand their users. Fewer non-profit ventures succeed if they don’t either. After recently ‘moving on’ from FrontlineSMS and a ten year spell focusing exclusively on ICT4D, I’m beginning to realise that much of the wider technology-based social sector suffers from not-too-dissimilar problems. Few people, it … Continue reading Time to think message and motivation
Means of Exchange: Enabling more resilient economies
“Citizen movements are compelling reforms that were unimaginable only a short time ago. Solutions to today’s challenges involve a complex mix of actors that include governments, nonprofits, foundations, civil society and the business sector in major new ways” – Rockefeller Foundation This year, the Rockefeller Foundation will be one hundred years old. As part of … Continue reading Means of Exchange: Enabling more resilient economies
2013: The end of sustainability?
One of the most interesting comments I’ve read for while came in this article by Andrew Zolli for the New York Times, written in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy late last year: Today, precisely because the world is so increasingly out of balance, the sustainability regime is being quietly challenged, not from without, but from within. … Continue reading 2013: The end of sustainability?
Means of Exchange at Pop!Tech
Last month I returned to the US for one of my favourite annual events – Pop!Tech. It’s generally an opportunity to be re-inspired, meet old friends and help out as a Faculty member on the Social Innovation Fellows Program. This year I had the added opportunity of giving the first public talk on my latest … Continue reading Means of Exchange at Pop!Tech
Smart mobs, flash mobs. Meet cash mobs.
A couple of months ago I wrote about my new initiative – Means of Exchange – which focuses on how emerging, everyday technologies can be used to democratise opportunities for economic self-sufficiency, rebuild local communities and promote a return to local resource use. It’s been a busy few months, culminating in the launch of our first … Continue reading Smart mobs, flash mobs. Meet cash mobs.
The death of a town centre.
The vast majority of my work over the past ten years has been focused specifically in the developing world. Various countries across Africa, in particular, were destinations for most of my travel and research. I’ve had an incredible time quenching a thirst for knowledge going all the way back to the early 1990’s when I … Continue reading The death of a town centre.
From text messaging to economic resilience
Three weeks ago we announced that I was stepping down from day-to-day operations at FrontlineSMS to hand over to a new senior management team. It’s clear from the success of the global launch of version 2 of the software over the past week that FrontlineSMS is in safe hands, and the reworked software, outreach and … Continue reading From text messaging to economic resilience
Innovation: Beyond technology.
Last week we made one of the most important announcements in the near-seven year history of FrontlineSMS. As I hinted in my “Rolling Stones School of Management Innovation” post last December, I only felt able to take the project to a certain level and that it required different people with a different set of skills … Continue reading Innovation: Beyond technology.