The Global Conversation

Plus Social Good

Fri, 03 May 2013 15:15:38 -0400

Over the last year, The Global Conversation has connected innovators across the globe around a shared vision: Leveraging the power of technology and new media to make the world a better place. We’ve met amazing people along the way, and are excited to share our latest plans with you.

Later this month, we’ll be re-launching as +SocialGood, and moving our global conversation to www.plussocialgood.org. Our new Twitter handle is @plus_socialgood.

Through a dynamic mix of online connections and real-world events, +SocialGood will provide a place where connectors can collaborate, share best practices, influence local and global agendas, and find new ways to translate vision into action. Sneak a peek at what we’re working on, and tell us what you think!

#PeoplePower: New Media, Technology and the Millennium Development Goals

Tue, 02 Apr 2013 13:01:00 -0400

Watch our Momentum 1,000 G+ Hangout with Afrinnovator’s Mark Kaigwa, and Prayasam’s Amlan Ganguly, Sikha Patel, and Salim Sheik.

In 2000, when the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) were established, most Internet connections were dial-up. YouTube, Twitter and Facebook didn’t exist. Mobile phones? An expensive luxury.

Now, these tools play a critical role in global development, empowering citizens around the world to help advance the MDGS.

On Friday, April 5th, we marked the 1000-day milestone towards the MDGs, joining with a community of individuals, organizations, and institutions for a 1,000 minute social media rally to celebrate success so far, reinvigorate discussion on the MDGs themselves, and begin to advance a post-2015 development framework that builds on #MDGmomentum.

Hear from Social Good communities around the world

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 16:50:00 -0400

At the 2012 Social Good Summit, more than 300 communities around the world met up to talk about Social Good. Hear what they had to say:

How Technology Is Powering Up New Solutions to Global Challenges

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 16:32:22 -0400

Guest post by Rick Leach, President & CEO, World Food Program USA

The world as we know it has entered an information age that’s powering up incredible new solutions to tackle global challenges, from solving hunger to ending extreme poverty. In working on these issues, I have seen the many ways that technology is changing how we communicate, how we collect data and how we interact with our world. This year, we are joining with our partners at the United Nations Foundation and Social Good Summit to present GoodxGlobal, an inaugural day of social good programming at South by South West (SXSW), the nation’s seminal conference on technological and digital innovation.

For all of the new ways to address old problems, we know one thing for certain: Technology is changing the way the world fights poverty.

At the United Nations World Food Program (WFP), the largest humanitarian organization in the world and the logistics arm of the UN, a new era of innovation has enabled smarter, faster assistance to those hungry and in need. WFP works to predict who is most vulnerable to hunger, long before disasters like drought, famine or flooding, strike. WFP does this using data and advanced technologies such as satellite imagery, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and mobile data collection platforms, such as smart phones, tablets and Personal Digital Assistants. With better data and mapping tools, WFP is able to get a clearer picture of how many people require food assistance on a daily basis and in the wake of a crisis.

In 2012, the international community prevented a famine in the Sahel region of West Africa in part through the use of early warning systems designed to predict when a severe hunger crisis will strike.

One such system, FEWS NET—an effort of NASA, USAID and other US agencies—uses a diverse set of indicators, including both raw satellite imagery as well as market trends, to forecast where and when people will be most affected by hunger. This information enabled WFP to act faster to stem the crisis.

New technologies are also helping to empower people affected by emergencies to get back on their feet. In Syria, a major humanitarian crisis created by conflict has scattered families and sent millions in search of refuge from violence and insecurity. WFP is putting electronic voucher cards directly into the hands of refugee women who have fled Syria to neighboring countries, enabling them to buy their families nutritious food from community sources. Vouchers serve to increase access to food for those in need while reinvesting in local markets and offering opportunities of greater dietary diversity.

As we work to end global hunger and poverty, we are proud to be able to collaborate with partners, developers and entrepreneurs to bring game-changing ideas about social innovation to the global stage.

We hope that you will join us on March 10th in Austin or on our live stream for GoodxGlobal, an exciting day of ideas, conversations, and brainstorming on how technology can change our world for the better.

This post originally appeared in the Huffington Post.

Rick Leach serves as president and chief executive officer of World Food Program USA (WFP USA), a nonprofit organization that builds support in the United States to end global hunger by engaging individuals and organizations, shaping public policy, and generating resources for WFP and other hunger relief operations. WFP USA educates members of Congress, the administration, and other government officials about international hunger issues and specific policies that could improve U.S. government efforts to address global hunger. WFP USA also advocates sufficient funding to ensure that U.S. government programs are reaching as many people as possible who are in need around the world. Leach established WFP USA (formerly Friends of the World Food Program) in 1997 and led the organization until 2004. He returned to lead it in 2010.

GoodxGlobal at South by Southwest

Fri, 08 Mar 2013 17:13:00 -0500

Are you going to the South by Southwest® (SXSW®) Conferences & Festivals? Do you want to do some social good while you’re there?

On March 10, 2013, GoodxGlobal (GxG) will host the first-ever day of events dedicated to the local and global power of social good and entrepreneurship. GxGwill showcase tech-driven approaches to aid effectiveness, mobile innovation, women’s empowerment, social entrepreneurship in action, and much more.

Over the course of the day, events will bring together local, national and global leaders to showcase emerging approaches, build new collaborative relationships and share knowledge on how evolving digital solutions can power new solutions and partnerships.

Speakers include:

Larry Irving, Co-Founder, Mobile Alliance for Global Good (@mobilizeforgood)
Michael Wilde, Chief of Awesome, Office of the CTO, Splunk, (@michaelwilde)
Beth Kanter, Author, Blogger, Master Trainer (@kanter), and
Elizabeth Gore, Chair, Global Entrepreneurs Council and Resident Entrepreneur, UN Foundation (@emgoreun)

Mark your Calendars for #RiseUp on Google+

Wed, 27 Feb 2013 15:27:00 -0500

Join the United Nations Foundation on Google+ to continue the conversation started at the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) side event Rise Up: Advocating for Girls Around the World.

We have invited girl advocates and adult champions from all over the world to discuss the challenges adolescent girls face in their communities and effective advocacy strategies – especially those involving technology and new media – that can be used to help girls overcome these challenges.

Tune in at 3:00 PM EST on Monday, March 4 to hear voices from Latin America, Asia and the US talk about ending violence against women and girls in Sri Lanka, how the film Girl Rising is using movie-making to end poverty, ways American girls can help their peers in Guatemala, and more!

UPDATE - Here is a link to a video of the Hangout: http://youtu.be/8O-wLaEYd3w

The promise of the “G-Everyone” Summit

Thu, 21 Feb 2013 15:14:00 -0500

Guest post by Henry Timms, (@htimms) Deputy Executive Director of the 92nd Street Y.

September’s UN Week used to be about closed doors and closed streets. Up went the barriers as soon as the most important leaders arrived.

We launched the Social Good Summit to try to open the conversation. We believed that the “connected generation” had both a desire to be at the table, as well as something important to say.

We’ve been overwhelmed by the response. Every year during UN Week, almost 2,000 digital leaders and social entrepreneurs join us here at 92nd Street Y in NYC, and around a hundred thousand watch the live stream. Even more exciting has been the way the Summit has become “community-sourced”, with local organizers all over the world now hosting their own meetings.

In 2012, a network of hundreds of events took place simultaneously. From Beijing, to Dhaka to Austin, a new generation of leaders got together—in person—to think about old problems in fresh ways. Then, using new media, the local groups shared their ideas in a globally scaled break-out session. (We invite you to join that conversation as it continues http://theglobalconversation.tumblr.com )

These kind of dynamic movements are beginning to take place all over the world. Their potential is extraordinary. I’ve had the privilege of seeing the results they can create both through events like the Social Good Summit, as well as campaigns like #GivingTuesday.

Last month I had the honor of joining a panel at Davos to share some of what we had learned with the leaders attending the World Economic Forum, alongside Kathy Calvin from the UN Foundation, Mark Suzman from the Gates Foundation, Jeremy Heimans from Purpose and Salil Shetty of Amnesty International.

As we talked about the huge promise in harnessing #peoplepower - and the ways we can expand participation around events like the UN General Debate - I think we identified three especially important themes:

1) We can shift the conversation from download to upload

It’s been thrilling to see the conversation change direction. The Social Good Summit is now far more about people in New York listening to what’s happening around the world, than people around the world to listening to what’s happening in New York. Bringing people on the ground into the conversation is crucial. Watch some of the insights we received from these meetings: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXcFXNcpgHk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4LK_5QK9Lc

2) Summits can be about more than people at the top

The Social Good Summit is—and perhaps always should be—a work in progress. Each year we find new ways to broaden the conversation, deepen its impact, and make the Summit more inclusive. In the local events that took place, it was fantastic to see so many new leaders come to the table. And most promising of all was the interchange between emerging and established leaders.

3) The big challenge is balancing “scale and substance”

Mark Suzman, my colleague on the panel, spoke powerfully about the greatest challenge ahead for this kind of movement: how to balance scale and substance. Convening groups in locations all over the world is the first step; now we must ensure the sharpest outcomes.

We’ve seen some initial successes in groups who came together under the Social Good Summit banner and have stayed together to tackle important challenges. But there is great potential in using the inflection of a global convening to drive significant local change. For efforts like ours, this is the task - and prize - ahead.

What is most exciting, as we look towards the future, is how we can expand the concept of the “Summit”. We can now think outside the closed door deliberations of a UN General Assembly, G-20, or a G-8. We can start to imagine open platform conversations that welcome G-Everyone.

A Valentines for the Social Good Community

Thu, 14 Feb 2013 16:00:00 -0500

Last month, we had the opportunity to sit in on a special panel at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

We invited our community to come along, asking them to send questions for the panelists, and to tweet about the issues they care about using #PeoplePower and #SocialGood.

We asked Marc Smith at the Social Media Research Foundation to help us track the impact on the overall conversation around #WEF. Here is what we saw.

Two days before the event

In the run-up to the World Economic Forum, the network of Twitter followers talking about #WEF is somewhat insular, with core groups of insiders talking with each other.
#PeoplePower & #SocialGood enter the conversation around #WEF on Twitter in the two days prior to the panel.

The day before the panel

The day before the event, the community helps bring entirely new voices (the “isolates” depicted in G1) into the conversation.
#PeoplePower and #SocialGood grow to take a place in the top three topics by volume of conversation (G2).

During the panel

On the day of the event, #PeoplePower & #SocialGood conversation spikes to amongst the second-most set of themes discussed around #WEF.

Two days after the panel

#PeoplePower & #SocialGood remain relevant to the conversation around #WEF even two days after the panel.

So—in honor of Valentine’s day, a huge “thank you” to the #socialgood community for helping to reshape the global agenda at Davos. We can’t wait to see what else this amazing group can do.

Can Social Media Save the Planet?

Tue, 12 Feb 2013 13:13:00 -0500

Join Nigerian Youth Climate Coalition for a Twitter Debate Saturday, February 23 at 3pm GMT (10AM EST)

Guest post by Esther Agbarakwa

For those that are already interested in environmental issues, technology has made it possible for them to be updated instantly on recent reports and environmental issues, such as 2012 flooding in Nigeria (#NGFloods), oil spill in the Niger Delta, etc.

Rallying people together through social media puts a tremendous amount of pressure on corporations and government as in the case of #savebagega (Lead Poisoning in Northern Nigeria) which resulted in the release of funds for the environmental remediation and full support to victims.

Across Africa and In Nigeria in particular, we have seen increased participation of young people in governance, enhanced by access to smart mobile phones and innovative social media tools. Is on this background that the Nigerian Youth Climate Coalition (@NigYCC) is embarking on this manageable social media project. The foremost goal is to utilize the amazing change momentum of African youth using social media to begin to think about ecological governance and actions to help save our planet.

We’ll hope you’ll join Twitter users in Africa and across the world for a special debate on new media, technology, and the environment.

Topic “Can social media save the Planet?”

Date: Feb 23rd
Time: 3pm GMT
Hash tag : #AdoptAPlanet

Tweet-debaters:

Tim Ruge, Lead Social Media Strategist – Connect4Climate, WorldBank, Washington D/Uganda - @tmsruge
Corrie Frasier, Social Good Summit, USA - @global_convo
Abang Mercy-Asu, environmental advocate and Journalist, Nigeria - @AbangMercy
Blossom Nnodim, Partner, New Media Nigeria Ltd. Nigeria - @blcompere

Facilitator/Moderator - Esther Agbarakwe, Founder and Director, NYCC Nigeria - @estherclimate

Esther Agbarakwe (@estherclimate) is the Founder and Director of The Nigeria Youth Climate Coalition (NYCC, a network of young people that use innovative ways to amplify youth voices on climate change. NYCC works to inspire, empower, mobilize and unite young people to take positive action on environmental issues across Nigeria (www.nigycc.net).

At the World Economic Forum yesterday in Davos:Mark...

Fri, 25 Jan 2013 04:59:37 -0500

At the World Economic Forum yesterday in Davos:Mark Suzman, Managing Director for International Policy and Programs, outlines the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s approach to transparency in response to a question from Austin, Texas:

In the new age of our world and its increased desire for transparency is full online transparency needed?

- Ruben Cantu

Amnesty International’s Secretary General Salil Shetty...

Fri, 25 Jan 2013 04:41:36 -0500

Amnesty International’s Secretary General Salil Shetty takes time out from the special session at the World Economic Forum in Davos for this question from Esther Agbarakwa:

#PeoplePower: In another way, what is people’s power without tech? Are people without tech POWERLESS? Cc @unfoundation @global_convo
— Esther Agbarakwe (@estherclimate) January 24, 2013

We asked our community for questions to take to the leaders at...

Fri, 25 Jan 2013 04:21:17 -0500

We asked our community for questions to take to the leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos. Here, UN Foundation President and CEO Kathy Calvin responds to this question from Yangbo Du (@mitgc_cm)

Has there been much discussion of emergent, bottom-up innovation in ICT for development as part of this discussion? Based on my observation of concerns that the conversation about global development is still heavily top-down oriented I look forward (cautiously optimistically) to a shift in the discourse towards solutions more responsive to local needs. What can you tell me about this discussion?

Yangbo Du

Global community shapes conversation in Davos

Thu, 24 Jan 2013 05:54:09 -0500

This morning, our global community joined in a conversation about people power and social good via Twitter at the World Economic Forum in Davos, quite literally changing the shape of the conversation.

Here’s a quick rundown of some of our favorite posts.

Before the session, we asked for examples of #peoplepower at work for #social good…

@global_convo clean #cookstoves are a#disruptiveuseoftechnology for #socialgood. #peoplepower #Davos #KOT
— Kenya Stove (@KenyaStove) January 23, 2013

@gatesfoundation @global_convo my global connection: @anchalproject re women’s issues India & @shotatlife #globalvax i’m an honored champion
— Myrdin Thompson (@MyrdinJT) January 23, 2013

Don’t forget @holstee’s #BlockFriday. > @global_convo: @givingtuesday gets shoutout as great example of #peoplepower for #socialgood @davos.
— Yangbo Du (@mitgc_cm) January 24, 2013

@global_convo …we believe in #peoplepower and proving people can work with technology and each other. Www.runaclub.com
— Sally Higham (@SallyHigham) January 23, 2013

During the panel, we heard from those at the session at Davos, and those following the conversation online…

Old power views power as a currency, but new power views power as a current. #peoplepower
— Sarah Noble (@noble_sarah) January 24, 2013

Terrific panel talking #peoplepower.Salil Shetty of Amnesty stressing courage of people as guide for tech twitter.com/mcarthur/statu…
— John McArthur (@mcarthur) January 24, 2013

“My humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only be human together,” -Desmond Tutu#PeoplePower #WEF
— UN Foundation (@unfoundation) January 24, 2013

Good reminder 4 all “@global_convo: Suzman: @gatesfoundation may be big, but can’t do all alone—need #peoplepower for effective advocacy”
— Aaron Sherinian (@ASherinian) January 24, 2013

We must recognize the various cultural and political barriers to holding govt accountable #peoplepowercc @global_convo @salilshetty
— Esther Agbarakwe (@estherclimate) January 24, 2013

Now, we want to hear more from you. What will #peoplepower change next?

#humanrights What will #peoplepower change next? Today’s @global_convo w @htimms @davos on #socialgood… dlvr.it/2r95rs #Egitto3000
— Mohamed Allam (@Egitto3000) January 24, 2013

Tweet your answer to @Global_Convo using #PeoplePower!

What will people power change next?

Fri, 18 Jan 2013 17:36:00 -0500

Follow our live Twitter coverage of a special session on technology, social media, and mass-participation on Thursday, January 24 at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

Recent developments in mobile and social technology—combined with the emergence of mass participatory models in business, media and politics— are rapidly changing citizen expectation about empowerment, democracy, choice and engagement— not just in the North, but globally.

What do world leaders think about this emerging trend? And what should they know about how people power is shaping your world?

Join us on Twitter @Global_Convo Thursday, January 24^th at 7:30 AM CET (1:30 AM EST) for live, behind-the-scenes coverage of this special session at The World Economic Forum.

Speakers include:

Kathy Calvin, President and CEO, United Nations Foundation
Jeremy Heimans, Co-founder and CEO, Purpose
Gordon Brown, US Special Envoy for Global Education, Former Prime Minister of the UK
Arianna Huffington, President and Editor -n-Chief, Huffington Post Media Group
Salil Shetty, Secretary General, Amnesty International
Mark Suzman, Managing Director for International Policy and Programs, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Henry Timms, Deputy Executive Director, 92Y

We want to hear from you: Where is people power at work for social good in your community? Tweet your replies to @Global_Convo using #PeoplePower and #SocialGood.

What's working in mHealth? Visit Tanzania to find out

Fri, 11 Jan 2013 17:27:00 -0500

The mHealth Alliance is headed to Tanzania next week for a hands-on workshop with mHealth leaders in East Africa. Community Manager Mandy Sugrue previews the workshop here for The Global Conversation, and invites us to follow along on HUB: Health Unbound

Driving Change on Mobile Innovation

by Mandy Sugrue

As it currently stands the mHealth (mobile phones for health) field is fairly fragmented. The term “thousand flowers bloom” is a commonly coined phrase at this point. This is a far leap from where we were not too long ago—Where conference goers and thought leaders in the mHealth community were advocating on the power of mobile technology as a global health solution.

Since then, mHealth projects have cropped-up by the thousands, proving in several ways, that mobile is an innovative solution and can broaden the reach of healthcare to developing and rural communities. Now, the problem isn’t proving the value of mobiles, but how to create standards on the global level and work together to identify what’s working and what’s not.

The 2012 Social Good Summit focused a common theme—Utilizing social media for global collaboration to drive positive change. Following that same vein, the mHealth Alliance is organizing a workshop in Tanzania that will focus on mHealth evidence in the East African region.

The driving purpose for this workshop is to bring together thought-leaders, representing the different sectors that make-up mHealth, to one table. What mHealth programs are currently happening in East Africa? What makes them successful? How can we build these programs up from the pilot stage? Who will pay for the programs to continue? How can the government change policy to incorporate mobile as a healthcare intervention? These are the questions that we aim to address in this workshop.

You don’t have to be in Tanzania to get involved in the workshop! In an effort to continue the “Global Conversation” the Alliance has created an online forum www.healthunbound.org/tzw that will include video interviews from our workshop participants, blog updates from the workshop discussions, and resources recommendations on mHealth evidence.

As the Community Manager for the mHealth Alliance, my job is to build collaboration for more and better for knowledge sharing. This workshop is a huge step in moving that needle and opening the discussion to the broader audience.

Credits: This post and the accompanying photographs originally appeared on HUB: Health Unbound.

Do global summits help to tackle poverty? Not without you.

Thu, 10 Jan 2013 11:48:58 -0500

COP18, Rio+20, the G20: These and other big global summits have come under increasing scrutiny from the media. Do they actually do any good?

In his recent post for The Guardian’s Poverty Matters blog, Oxfam’s Stephen Hale (@SHaleGeneva) says they can—but only when the global community takes their seat at the table:

The voice of civil society is vital at global events because it enables us to confront the stories our leaders want to tell their public, and to tell home truths about the progress made and the action needed. Civil society mobilisation and media work can do much to shift the terms of debates on, for example, the true causes of global hunger and the inadequacy of debt relief.

Should we invest more or less in global processes? What if civil society ignored these completely? Of course, we could then divert substantial resources to strengthen national campaigning. But it would leave our leaders free to make global commitments and proclaim their benefits without a strong voice outlining the scale and urgency of action needed, and the scrutiny of civil society on the (in)action of our leaders. It also risks limiting advances at a national level, which on issues from women’s rights to arms negotiations is often highly influenced by progress (and setbacks) at global level.

It’s not time to walk away. But we’ve got to get much smarter. We need to be far more ruthless about our priorities, and clearer about what we’re trying to achieve.

Later this month, world leaders will meet up again in Davos for a sort of global summit season opener: The World Economic Forum. It’s a great opportunity to pull up a chair and add your voice. What items would YOU put on the agenda? Tweet your ideas to @Global_Convo.

From our inbox: Facebook and the power of social media

Tue, 08 Jan 2013 13:30:00 -0500

We’re always on the lookout for great stories about our community using social media for social good. That’s why we were delighted to find a Jay Jaboneta’s email about The Yellow Boat of Hope in our inbox last month.

What started as a simple Facebook status update has grown into a foundation serving eight communities across the Philippines. Jay shares his story— and the lessons his organization has learned along the way— below.

Facebook and the power of social media
By Jay Jaboneta

Last December 6, 2012, Facebook released a video called “Beyond the Yellow Boat” through their Facebook Stories platform. It has been an amazing ride for each one of us on board the Yellow Boat (of Hope Foundation) during the last 24 months.

The organization which basically started from my Facebook status at the end of October 2010 is now a foundation – registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of the Philippines.

We are also now present in 8 communities around the Philippines and also assisting various other causes in the Philippines from time to time especially during natural disasters. One of the biggest lessons we’ve learned so far is that solutions must always come from a local perspective. And that is basically one of our driving philosophies – we look for and partner with talented individuals who already have existing organizations or projects in their own localities. We get to learn from them and they get to learn from us. More importantly, we also get to learn from the communities we are helping.

When we set out to build the very first school boat for the first community in Layag-Layag, Zamboanga City, we never realized that we were beginning a relationship with this community and build relationships in 7 more communities in Masbate in the Bicol region, Zamboanga del Sur, Zamboanga Sibugay, Zamboanga del Norte, Cagayan de Oro and Negros Occidental. We are now collectively touching almost 10,000 lives.

The Yellow Boat has taken me to the US, Singapore, India, France, Italy, Spain and now Pakistan. Hoping to learn more on how to run nonprofits and social enterprises, I applied to be a Global Fellow of Acumen Fund. And that’s why I’m currently in Lahore, Pakistan working with a social enterprise that distributes affordable high quality drinking water to the underprivileged.

I know the recently released Facebook video is also an ad for the social network behemoth but again our organization would not have been possible without it.

We are still using Facebook Groups creatively to connect with friends, donors, partners and supporters. It is a platform for our communities to discuss and to engage in ideas. It allows us to transcend borders.

It also allowed me to meet wonderful people along the way. One of them is my Co-Founder, Dr. Anton Mari Lim, who is the driving force behind our organization

It allows us to tell our story better – in a way, that we can share our successes and failures. The best kind of relationship is one where your donor or supporter can see your mistakes, your faults and you both work hard at it to make it better.

Collaboration is so much better than competition. We believe that leadership needs to be shared – because at the end of the day, we are all leaders of our own destinies. It is our individual and collective responsibility to help make the world better especially for children.

We believe that leadership is about sharing powerful stories that will empower and inspire even more leaders.

We believe that leadership has two key responsibilities: one of inspiration and another of reproduction. For leadership to be truly shared, a leader must empower others – empower them to do something about the things they are passionate about.

We believe that for leadership to last, a leader must nurture more leaders and not just followers.

Social media allows us to bridge this leadership gap. My experience tells me that people want to do something good, they want to be part of something bigger, and they want to lead authentic and fulfilling lives. And all these mentoring and coaching is possible now in the age of Social media. Facebook for one has allowed us to connect with amazing donors, leaders and partners around the globe who empower us with the resources we need to make a difference.

We collaborate with individuals and organizations from Taiwan, the United States, Australia, France, Spain, Singapore, Hong Kong, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Botswana, and Kenya. The world has truly become flat and interconnected.

We now have the world’s greatest minds at our fingertips. And we also now have more access to each other. The best inventions and discoveries were made by ordinary people doing extraordinary things. And social media allows even more collaboration, even among people who haven’t met personally.

That is the true power of Facebook and Social Media and explains why a simple yellow (school) boat built in a far-flung community in the Philippines has sailed across the world and touched more lives than we can possibly count.

***

Jay’s post originally appeared on his blog, “Hope” You can also find the video on www.facebookstories.com. To learn more about The Yellow Boat of Hope Foundation, please visit http://www.yellowboat.org.

Online interaction spurs offline action

Mon, 17 Dec 2012 10:01:00 -0500

A recent study has shown that more than 50% users on top social networks have done something offline—made a call, taken a class, attended an event— as a direct result of something they’ve seen online.

That got us thinking about social media for social good. What real-world actions have you taken as a result of something you’ve seen online? Tweet your answer to @Global_Convo.

Add your voice to our special report

Thu, 13 Dec 2012 18:52:00 -0500

This September at the Social Good Summit, we launched The Global Conversation—a record-setting worldwide dialogue about the change-making potential of new media and technology.

Now, we hope you’ll help us shape the dialogue again.

Over the next several weeks, we’ll be working with our community to co-create a special report.

Our report will be centered on the big themes we heard coming out of the summit. We’ve outlined our top picks here, but want to hear from you:

Do these themes resonate with you and your community?
What themes and topics arose in your Meetup that others should be aware of? What are we missing?
What’s happening now in your community? Do you have any examples of new collaborations, projects, or connections you can share?

We also want your help as we think about what’s next for 2013. How can we continue to come together as a global community to take on big challenges, celebrate new solutions, and share what we’re learning.

Our favorite things

Thu, 13 Dec 2012 15:24:51 -0500

Today, Armchair Advocates came out with their list of favorite things of 2012. We’re honored that The Social Good Summit and The Global Conversation made the list!

Here’s what they had to say:

The Social Good Summit and Global Conversation was no ordinary conference. This international discussion on “the role of digital technology to advance social good” extended beyond the walls of the Summit in New York City, and included panel discussions via live-feeds from China, Kenya and Somalia. Meanwhile, over 200 “meet-ups” in cities around the world – organized by Mashable‘s Meetup Everywhere platform – added thousands of diverse voices and perspectives to the dialogue.

What’s on OUR “favorite things of 2012” list? Our Meetup organizers, and our amazing online community. We couldn’t have done it without you!