I attended the Mobile Tech 4 Social Change barcamp in New York with MIT colleagues Audubon Dougherty, Nadav Aharony, and Danielle Martin last weekend.
Unfortunately, I missed Ethan Zuckerman’s keynote (hoping it will be posted online) but according to Patrick Meier’s informative post about the day, one of Ethan’s biggest takeaway points focused on the importance of using of multiple technologies together:
(The) convergence of ICTs is far more powerful than the increasingly ubiquitous mobile phone. When mobile phones and SMS are paired with radio talk show programs, the combination replicates much of the functionalities that characterize the Internet. Once information is broadcast over radio, it becomes public knowledge.
I find this to be a valuable take away not only because of my own interest in radio and mobile but also because it suggests the larger need to focus on strategies over technologies. Mobile phone by themselves probably won’t solve entrenched issues, particularly those that extend beyond geographic and disciplinary boundaries, but they can be a valuable part of larger tactics.
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One of the more interesting projects I learned about is called Groundcrew , an initiative that focuses on the real-time coordination of volunteers. According to their blurb:
Using our web interface, worthy projects, organizations, and businesses can build “squads” of real-world helpers/participants. Organizers can view data from their squad in real-time, using text messaging and GPS; they can see who’s available at any moment; and they can give assignments—either mass assignments or systems of individual assignments—to help people work together.
Rather than depending on friends as most social networks do, this project relies explicitly on strangers to donate their spare time to help one another. This is accomplished by allowing people to easily follow their particular interests and passions. For example, members might have twenty minutes to devote to a small act of kindness, or an hour available to help with the renovation of a bike path.
The site works by allowing participants to earn points for good deeds, and supports “the sharing of resources—cars, tools, extra homes—with those who’ve done good work.” I’m not clear how successful the point system will prove to be but the dynamic management, reuse, and exchange of resources has great potential for a wide range of applications. The sites offers scenarios like a newspaper looking for citizen reporters for a story to participatory events like augmented reality games as well as a company organizing an event that requires large scale coordination. I can also imagine the site might be used by doctors answering simple medical questions or for a community pitching in to help neighbors keep houses out of foreclosure.
This should be an interesting project to watch. One key will be whether it can build enough capacity that it can sustain itself. Obviously, the developers have considered this as well as they’re seemingly not only savvy about revenue models that will support a public community-drive site of the site as well as “hiring community organizers in multiple cities to run free workshops with local non-profits, helping them begin to develop squads and to adapt their volunteering for larger crowds and more enjoyable tasks.”
Another presentation that I found interesting was “Mobile Computing for Informal Economies.” Despite the rather lackluster title, several computer scientists from SUNY-Stony Brook have created a program that allows individuals to track their finances on their mobile phones using a visual-based interface (built in Java) that makes it accessible even for illiterate users. The project is still quite rough but has potential. For example, it might be used in conjunction with microfinance organizations like the Grameen Bank (which incidently launched in New York last year) or ACCION International as well as a project like Safaricom’s Kenyan mobile money transfer service M-Pesa, that helps individuals move money and engage in long distance business in region with poor banking services. [Safaricom is a private company but I don’t know of any non-profits operating in this sphere…let me know if you do] To my understanding, none of these initiatives currently offer financial planning or other services that help individuals budget their expenses or easily manage their finances on a mobile device.
Furthermore, although the project was billed as one for illiterate women in countries like Senegal, I’d loved to see this application adapted for use in communities in the U.S.
Mobile Commons presented on the efficacy of mobile messaging in campaigns. They offered some interesting statistics, based in part on 2006 research conducted by Allison Dale and Aaron Strauss. The full report can be found here. In it, they note that text messaging is clearly persuasive – and cost effective.
According to the MCommons team, text messages are persuasive about 10% of the time, which is far more effective than simple phone calls. They also noted that although canvassing is more effective than SMS, it is more difficult and at an estimated $30/per additional vote, more expensive than text messaging, which costs approximately $1.50 per additional vote.
The Mcommons team also explained that list building with text messages is very powerful. For example, asking attendees at an event to send texts to the sponsoring organization and responding to those texts with a request for email results in a 65-80% response rate, noteworthy numbers that begin to suggest why Obama’s campaign was able to use text messages as part of their strategy was able to marshall so much support in 2008.
Finally, I had the opportunity to briefly catch up with Andrew Zolli of PopTech! at the barcamp. Although his project wasn’t presented at MobileTech4Change, it’s worth a mention. He’s part of a diverse team that has been working on Project Masiluleke , an ambitious initiative that aims to leverage widespread access to mobile technologies to help tackle HIV and TB in South Africa. In addition to using SMS messages to encourage people to contact a helpline and continue treatment, the project is also planning to creating virtual Call Centers staffed by HIV+ patients who will field questions remotely, via their mobile devices and at-home HIV testing with mobile support. Self-testing raises ethical and implementation questions, but it will be interesting to see how the project shapes up when the first phase formally launches this spring.
Also PopTech! just announced their 2009 Social Innovation Fellows Program. Check it out. Seems like a fantastic opportunity for anyone who is looking for strategic support to implement a great idea.