PopTech Blog

This week in PopTech: OK, here we Go

Emily Qualey — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 18:28:53 +0000

There’s always something brewing in the PopTech community. From the world-changing people, projects and ideas in our network, a handful of this week’s highlights follows.

PopTech is heading to Africa! This February 7-11, 2012, we will be hosting our Climate Resilience Lab in Nairobi, Kenya. The Lab will bring together a carefully chosen network of climate researchers, gender experts, social innovators, technologists, designers, and community champions, to explore new possibilities in this domain. Our goal is to move “beyond the white paper” to identify and collaborate on high-potential new approaches that can be tested, scaled, and implemented. Follow along with #poptechlabs.

Nominations are now open for our 2012 Class of Social Innovation Fellows. Check out the Call for Nominations to help spark your thinking. Our alumni from the classes of 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011 also offer great examples of changemakers putting new ideas into action. If you or someone you know is a great fit, head to poptech.org/nominate and submit a nomination. Get it done soon: nominations close this year on April 3, 2012.

We are thrilled to announce that our Hot Studio designed World Rebalancing iPad app has won an Interactive Media Award for Outstanding Achievement! Haven’t had a chance to check it out? Download it for free.

Enough about us! How about some pure, unadulterated entertainment for this Friday afternoon. For the kids (or kids at heart) watch OK Go (PopTech 2010), together with Sesame Street teach young viewers about primary colors in stop mo’ OK Go style. For the rest of us, the boys have something up their sleeve for the Super Bowl as well; this teaser alludes to a giant car-powered, pianola-style music sequencer. Looks like fun.

If you’d like to receive a stream of these updates (and more) throughout the week in real time, follow us on Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook, sign up for our newsletter, and subscribe to the PopTech blog.

Image: Peter Durand

#IAmScience: The stories behind scientists

Michelle Riggen-Ransom — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 18:26:17 +0000

If the word “scientist” conjures a near-sighted nerd in a lab coat, you may be spending too many late nights watching the SyFy channel. A recent movement on Twitter using the hashtag #iamscience is enabling scientists from all over the world to share their pictures, tell their stories, and show off their particular science to the world at large.

Inspired by a post by science writer and marine biologist Kevin Zelnio written after he attended the Science Online Conference, the hashtag has been a fascinating way to learn the varied backgrounds of people who now make their careers in the sciences; people who were homeless as teens, became interested in science when a friend got sick and are now working on a cure, or as kids who performed stress-tests with tarantulas on their arachnophobic dads.

In its short existence, the movement has already grown beyond a hashtag: there’s now a Storify page, a music video and Tumblr logs of both archived tweets and stories and pictures of cool scientists doing cool things.

In the often self-serving and solipsistic world of social media, it’s refreshing to see real stories being told and real connections being made through sharing experiences. Student neuroscientist and self-described science geek @katiesci tweeted “We are a bunch of misfits who found what we love.” As #iamscience demonstrates, sometimes when you whisper into an echo chamber, a thousand voices answer back.

Image via This is What a Scientist Looks Like

Nominations now open for 2012 PopTech Social Innovation Fellows

Ollie Wilder — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 22:47:38 +0000

How do we encourage resilience in the face of the world’s many challenges? PopTech’s major focus in 2012 centers on that very question. And some of the best new solutions we’ve seen have come directly from social innovators, visionaries on the front lines of social change. Now is your chance to help speed up their impact, by nominating candidates for the PopTech Social Innovation Fellows program.

Fellows are invited to Maine in October for a five-day training, immediately followed by an opportunity to attend and present at the PopTech conference. They gain new skills and broad exposure, and benefit by connecting with the program’s faculty and the larger PopTech network. Our primary goal with the Fellows program: to enable these emerging leaders to reach real, wide, sustainable impact as quickly as possible.

Check out the Call for Nominations to help spark your thinking. Our alumni from the classes of 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011 also offer great examples of changemakers putting new ideas into action: a mushroom-based alternative to Styrofoam™, peer-to-peer education loans, a platform for sustainable food distribution, and solar systems sold like mobile phone minutes, among others.

If you or someone you know is a great fit, head to poptech.org/nominate and submit a nomination. Get it done soon: nominations close this year on April 3, 2012.

The Social Innovation Fellows program is supported by the Rita Allen Foundation, the Nike Foundation, the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, PwC and American Express.

Image-wise: Fiber architecture

Emily Qualey — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 15:50:46 +0000

White matter fiber architecture of the brain. Measured from diffusion spectral imaging (DSI). The fibers are color-coded by direction: red = left-right, green = anterior-posterior, blue = through brain stem.

Navigate the brain in a way that was never before possible; fly through major brain pathways, compare essential circuits, zoom into a region to explore the cells that comprise it, and the functions that depend on it.

The Human Connectome Project aims to provide an unparalleled compilation of neural data, an interface to graphically navigate this data and the opportunity to achieve never before realized conclusions about the living human brain.

via The Human Connectome Project

Bhagwan Chowdhry sums it up

Emily Spivack — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 17:46:36 +0000

UCLA Anderson Finance professor Bhagwan Chowdhry introduced us to his Financial Access at Birth (FAB) project at PopTech in which newborns are given an initial $100 in an online saving account. While FAB is in its infancy (excuse the pun), the potential is great: it would give “every human being…the dignity of financial citizenship,” thereby giving a voice to the world’s poorest, who often aren’t accounted for.

He answered some key questions about the project during his PopTech talk. And he detailed how much work is still ahead in an interview which took place during the conference.

In addition, a colleague of Chowdhry’s, Rosita Najmi, provided this succinct yet thorough recap about PopTech on the Center for Financial Inclusion blog, which was recently posted on FAB’s blog as well.

1. For those of us who design and deliver products and services for the poor—
Be Tough on Ideas, Gentle on People: A “recovering” visual artist turned community builder, Milenko Matanovic shares his path from the pallet to The Pomegranate Center that builds much more than open-air gathering places—certainly a different approach to community development that honors consultation with all. Here’s a must see for anyone who calls themselves a community organizer as well as great ideas on methodology for the design of a product or service for a wider population.

2. For impact investors and practitioners working in Africa—
Rethink Africa: Unity Dow (Botswana’s first female high court judge, human rights activist, and writer) presents her version of “Dead Aid” and encourages those of us who seek development in Africa to think beyond grants and invest in its productivity. Enjoy her festival of ideas here.

3. For those who seek to enable common tasks in uncommon ways—
Reprogram your Brain: Founder and leader of World Access for the Blind, Daniel Kish explains how the visually impaired can reprogram their brain to achieve greater freedom and mobility through echolocation—yes, the same technique that bats use to navigate using sound. See and hear how here.

4. For those who are in the business of empowerment training—
Remember Power Poses Work: Amy J.C. Cuddy’s presentation demonstrates (with the help of Wonder Woman) how body language might empower us and send inferences that determine outcomes related to decisions, elections, hiring, promotions—perhaps success at accessing credit? Learn some moves here.

5. For those who write and report about our work in development finance—
Refer to it as the Majority World: Especially for those of us in Washington, we often pause to make the appropriate and respectful word choice when writing about our work outside our borders. Photographer, writer, curator, and activist Shahidul Alam suggests that instead of the “developing,” “Southern,” or “low income countries,” we call it what it truly reflects—the reality experienced by the majority of the world’s population. Click here to consider his rationale.

6. For those who work with youth—
Hey young people: don’t apologize for being smart. Aidan Dwyer (13-years-wise) reminded us of the power of youth and how they can move the world with their ideas—or in his case, design more efficient solar power. Yes, he is a junior high student with Venture Capitalists trying to “friend” him on Facebook. See his solar innovation here.

7. For those who manage foreign exchange risk—
Consider alternative currencies: Bernard Lietaer explains how we might reduce economic instability and liquidity crises by setting up alternative currencies, such as our frequent flyer miles. Learn more here about successful initiatives of new currencies, such as the Lithuanian Doraland Economy, the Torekes in Belgium, and Switzerland’s famous alternative currency, the WIR.

8. For those who seek real, new solutions instead of tweaking others; copying and pasting—
Build from scratch: Designer Thomas Thwaites can relate to what it’s like to produce a product from scratch. His story of reverse engineering a $7 toaster is relevant to those of us who design products and services for people whose lives are very different than ours as well as senior managers who aim to develop sustainable strategies that yield measurable and sustainable change. Watch how he made plastic from potatoes and what type of patience and tough-thinking is required to understand a value chain, opportunities of economies of scale, and importance of access to resources here.

9. For those who believe in transitioning from informal systems to formal systems—
Think differently about “System D”: Robert Neuwirth argues that if the world’s street markets and other unregistered businesses were allied in a single political structure, it would represent the second-largest economy in the world, behind the United States. Listen here to find out to what he refers as “System D” and how it might create opportunities of employment and access to capital, one umbrella at a time.

10. For those who believe in using the arts for financial education—
Crowd sourcing and gaming can help you do your work better: Professor of Computer Science and Robotics, Adrien Treuille directs research that brings crowd sourcing, games, and advanced simulation techniques together to advance key areas of engineering and medicine. Click here to see think about how computer games, simulation, and animation might be useful to your work on educating clients or conducting market research.

11. For those who finance SMEs—
The American dream is alive in India: Despite all the challenges the Indian microfinance industry has faced Anand Giridharadas presents how access to finance and other changes in India are creating a “me-centric” individualism that breaks the shackles of the class system, which has limited upward mobility. Click here to consider his findings.