Tim's Going to Kenya

OK. So I take off on Monday morning for Kenya. That's in 3 days. Got a few things to do.

I'm traveling with a team from The 1010 Project, a humanitarian organization here in Denver. We partner with creative and innovative social entrepreneurs in the developing world to break the cycle of poverty. As the Fundraising Coordinator, a big part of my job is writing the grants that help keep us trucking along. But to write good grants, and to keep our international development work running smoothly, we need DATA.

We're going to Kenya to meet with partners and friends in our community-based organizations. They're mostly in Nairobi, scattered across the various slums and estates, but we do have a few rural partners as well. We'll be going all the way out to Kisumu near Lake Victoria. We're collecting boatloads of photos, lots of video and audio, and most importantly, stories. We view ourselves as storytellers - our tagline is "Join the Story" - and we're going to talk with the people that our income-generation activities benefit. We'll be visiting schools, orphanges, microfinance institutions, women's empowerment groups, and HIV/AIDS support groups.

I've never been to Africa, but I hear good things. Our team is super-talented and super-cool, so I don't expect any problems. I'll be tweeting along with our Director of Communications, Mark Mann. With luck, we'll be tweeting like mad by next Wednesday morning, or for those of you in Denver, late Tuesday night (there is a 10-hour time difference). So stay sharp, keep up with us, and we'll see you when we get back!

poverty, the 1010 project, africa, kenya, mark mann, twitter

Eradicating Malaria With the Tony Blair Faith Foundation

Hello web-friends,

I have been appointed to my dream job and I need your help to make it rock.

I have been selected to join the Faiths Act Fellows, a cadre of 30 young interfaith leaders in the US, UK, and Canada who will spend August 2009-June 2010 working to promote malaria eradication. This is a brand-new program which will operate under the auspices of the Tony Blair Faith Foundation (yes, THAT Tony Blair) and the Interfaith Youth Core. It's all fantastically exciting! I'll be traveling to London at the end of July (farewell, Denver) for induction and training. Then it's off to a malaria hotspot in Africa for on-the-ground work. We finish with training in Chicago. I report for duty to the Islamic Networks Group in San Jose, CA on October 1st. My job will be recruiting faith communities, and especially young people of faith, to work towards malaria eradication. Getting rid of this wicked mosquito-borne sickness can be done!

It goes without saying that I will utilize the fluid world of social media in order to reach these goals. I blog, tweet, and share most things, so this will be no different. I will be relying on my network (all of you) to help me spread the word and find kinds of people who can partner with me to get things done.

I'm short on the finer points and details, and for that I apologize. As a first order of business, I need to know ANYTHING about San Jose. My first ever trip to California is this Saturday when I attend the Nonprofit Technology Conference, so any advice/thoughts are welcome.

Post what you will, and send this one far and wide - the more, the merrier!

social media, technology, twitter, facebook, ntc, ntc09, nonprofit, malaria, tony blair, tony blair faith foundation, malaria no more, interfaith youth core, tbff, ifyc

Twitter: Training Wheels, Airbag, or Insurance?

I'm pursuing a number of job opportunities right now. If I'm hired, I might move away from Denver. I'm casting my net wide, so I'm not really sure where I might end up, but I know that before I get there, I'll try to build up my Twitter network with local contacts - people who might be able to help me navigate the move and so on.

As I thought about how I could best leverage my current and future network, it occurred to me that we can look at Twitter in three distinct ways: as training wheels, as an airbag, or as insurance.



Training wheels - The world moves at about a million miles a second nowadays. It can be frustrating and time-consuming to enter the stream all at once without help. One of the much-touted uses of Twitter is helping people. We need to know where to go for Kindle support, or what kind of RAM our computers need, or even how to use Twitter itself. Other users can act as training wheels to help speed us along into the web and in real life.

Airbag - Bad things happen. As an airbag, Twitter can help to insulate us against problems. Closely related to its use as training wheels, there are many ways that we've seen the community come together to help those in need, as it did when David Armano helped Daniela and her family. With many of our jobs in crisis, Twitter can be helpful for job-finders or even those seeking state and federal help to get by. An airbag is used to slow us down in an accident and prevent big hurts; Twitter, as a community of interesting and interested people, can be that airbag.

Insurance - Last but not least, we cannot ignore the power of microblogging to aid us in our most desperate...or our most powerful. Let me explain: Last April, a blogger tweeted about his arrest in Egypt. The message got out and so did he. Imagine witnessing a crime on a city street. Unable to stop the criminal, the best you can do is shoot out 140 characters describing his or her appearance. It's a rough example, to be sure, and there's no guarantee that it will necessarily help the situation, but at least it's something. And in terms of power: a Twitter user snaps/uploads a Twitpic of an elected official engaging in questionable activity (let your mind wander). Boom! Lights out. Twitter in the hands of a disgruntled employee can also be wielded with frightful results, if that employee was so inclined.

Training wheels, airbag, or insurance. It can be one, all three, or none of these. How do you see Twitter?

Flickr photo from user kate at yr own risk

What is Twitter?

This video explaining Twitter is awesome. I think it should replace the Common Craft version that Twitter uses:

social media, twitter, supernews

Of Advertising and Return

A little while ago, I caught a tweet from @davewiner pointing out that super web-guy and blog-champ @jasoncalacanis was offering Twitter $10000/month to be on the "Suggested Users" list. I retweeted it and offered Mr. Calacanis $5000/month to relentlessly promote him and his work. I wasn't entirely serious, and I'm convinced that my response was out of line. But that is neither here nor there.

Calacanis responded to @davewiner, clarifying that the offer was payable in advance for two years' standing on the "Suggested Users" list. Do the math. That's $250000 for a presence on a list for a service that hasn't completely figured itself out (this is largely due to the fact that Twitter morphs on an hourly basis!). Calacanis is entirely justified in wanting a spot - Twitter continues to explode, and as more and more people come to it, they'll likely check the Suggested list for who to follow.

But I'm not so sure that dumping a quarter of a million dollars on the "Suggested Users" list is the best way to promote his stuff. If Mr. Calacanis was serious about attracting not only regular web-users but also the people new to the social web, he could find better ways to spend the money. Why not "blow" the money on anti-malarial bednets; 25000 bednets is a lot of safe families in the developing world. Such a gift would generate immediate mainstream media attention, and the story would certainly get around on Twitter. $250000 would also start a lot of businesses in the developing world (shameless plug there).

I'm not questioning his methods, and I'm certainly not complaining about his advertising budget. But if he wanted to make a big splash, both in terms of regular and web-media, there are many "Suggested Awesome Things" that he could do instead.

poverty, the 1010 project, calacanis, twitter

Because People Want To Know...

I happened upon an ABCNews story about Twitter that featured such luminaries as George Stephanopoulos and MC Hammer. I've got no idea how to post the damn thing in here, so I'll just link out to it: John Berman catches up with MC Hammer about Twitter. John Berman (@abcdude) gave a pretty good rundown of Twitter, although I again got the feeling that microblogging was some sort of funny joke.

Still, it got me to thinking. Mashable's recent-ish article about Twitter's growth is enough to make one's head spin. 752%? That's insance, but even with ~6 million users, the distinction between "user" and "USER" should be clear to anyone who has spent a few months tweeting. My curiosity is this: What is the "saturation point" for Twitter, i.e. when does it become normalized in much the same way that searching with Google or finding friends on Facebook has become blasé?

Is it going to be 15 million in the US? 40 million worldwide? When does Twitter use become so commonplace that we take it as a sine qua non of our online experience?

twitter, future, "tim brauhn"

What Comes Next?

I spend a lot of time wondering about "what comes next," not so much to catch the wave, but to be inspired by what we might do in the future. Guy Kawasaki has an interview on the I Am Paddy blog about Twitter and business and connections. It's an interesting read, but as I scrolled through it a week ago, the one question that caught my eye, and mind, was this:

Paddy (interviewer): Will we still be tweeting in 5 years time?

Guy Kawasaki: I hope that I’m not. Or at least that I’m just tweeting for the sheer pleasure of it–about stuff like my cat rolling over and the line at Starbucks.

It's an innocuous comment, of course, but it got me wondering, "What comes next?" Are we bound to continue using Twitter for microblogging/marketing/discovery/etc. for all time, or will it be replaced by a more glorious service? Will Twitter become blase, and be discarded for something more personal or shiny? It's an interesting thought. 5 years ago, few of us had any idea that the net, and indeed the world, would look like it does today. Without Facebook or Skype, things would be vastly different.

So what comes after Twitter? What's the next big thing?

future, technology, twitter