ProductiveWise

In this one hour talk, two Google employees tell about Internet tools developed at Google and by other organizations to help manage crisis situations. When earthquakes, floods, hurricanes and other disasters occur, tools like People Finder and Ushahidi are deployed. These tools are used for data collection and retrieval about missing persons, visualization of places in which help and rescue is needed, better communication, and and so on.

Other tools and resources for crowdsourcing of emergency and disaster relief:

• CrisisCommons and CrisisCommons Wiki - "CrisisCommons seeks to advance and support the use of open data and volunteer technology communities to catalyze innovation in crisis management and global development."
• InSTEDD - "InSTEDD has a unique niche — we design and use open source technology tools to help partners enhance collaboration and improve information flow and knowledge sharing to better deliver critical services to vulnerable populations."
• Ushahidi - "We built the Ushahidi platform as a tool to easily crowdsource information using multiple channels, including SMS, email, Twitter and the web."

Video - Google I/O 2011: Crisis Response 2.0 – Empowering Developers in Times of Crisis

Professor James Boyle tracks back the origins of a song ("George Bush Doesn't Care About Black People") to show how each song and musical style relies on previous work. Boyle uses this exmaple to explore and hypnotize how copyright law effects, or might effect, the development of culture.

Schema.org is a new initiative by the three major search engines (Google, Bing and Yahoo!) to make websites more readable for machines. It was announced a few days ago, accompanied by the Schema.org website, aimed at web developers.

Continue reading “The web gets smarter with Schema.org – how will you be affected?” »

This is a very interesting talk by Barbara van Schewick, about net neutrality. One of the interesting things is her answer in the Q&A part, where she says that Android is a better platform for innovation than iPhone. She tells about app developers who say that they prefer first to develop for Android, which is more open (you don't have to get Google's permission to install an app). Then, if they succeed, they consider also making one for iPhone. I think that's a fascinating observation.

She also talks about several points of view about net neutrality, and the importance of preserving the characteristics of the internet that led to innovation. She emphasize that it doesn't mean preserving the same architecture, but identifying the things that enable anyone to innovate.

While the rise of social networking sites has given unprecedented access to the latest information and news, finding that information can be a daunting task. This guide will teach you which sites to use, provide some tips for successful searches, and use the current unrest in the Middle East as an example.

This is a guest post by Maria Rainier. Maria is a freelance writer and blog junkie. She is currently a resident blogger at First in Education where she writes about education, online degrees, and what it takes to succeed as a student getting an online masters degree from home. In her spare time, she enjoys square-foot gardening, swimming, and avoiding her laptop.

Continue reading “A Guide to Finding Up to the Minute Details on the Latest News” »

I've collected some places across the web where you can get upadates about the Christchurch earthquake.

Flickr Images

maching the quary christchurch earthquake.

Continue reading “Christchurch earthquake: images, updates and information resources” »