Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

I don’t really think of myself as a pundit, probably because I am very willing to admit that I am sometimes wrong. Sometimes I don’t have enough information and come to somewhat erroneous conclusions because of it. So, in that spirit, I’m eating a bit of, as Katrin called it, humble pie.

A while back, I had a post called “Metaphors” where I lamented the fact that there had been a large movement toward using Salesforce. I questioned the use of business metaphors in nonprofit organizations (which is still something I find problematic,) and questioned the use of sales metaphors in software that nonprofits use.

Well, I didn’t have enough information. Because I’m writing a whitepaper on APIs for NTEN, I had a great conversation with Steve Wright of the Salesforce Foundation, the part of Salesforce that is giving away their services to nonprofit organizations. And I learned a lot about what they are doing, and why. And I think I’ve realized that I jumped to the wrong conclusion about the use of Salesforce in nonprofit organizations. It sounds like they have some pretty interesting ideas about building horizontal platforms, that, in the end, might benefit the sector more than it detracts, especially given the kind of resources they have available to them.

So, live, work, talk to people, and learn more. There are some interesting things brewing in my head about open source and the new ways that the open source ethos and mentality is spreading faster and broader than the actual thing itself. But that’s another post. This is the humble pie post.

Technorati Tags: nptech, openapis, opensource, salesforce

Well, both in the process of learning about all of the very cool web 2.0 apps out there, and beginning to try and use them to create content and organize my life, I have come to the following conclusion: the apps are great, but integration still sucks.

First, there’s the blogging issue. I keep 2 blogs of my own, and contribute actively to one community blog (at nosi.net) and could, potentially, contribute to quite a number of others. I don’t get paid to blog, so I don’t really want to spend my time doing that. And, I also don’t want to do too much cross-posting of content. But the community blogs do provide a way for a wider audience to read the content that I have created. Unfortunately, the nptech world hasn’t yet caught on to the “Planet” phenomenon of the open source world (see Planet Ubuntu Women.) These are sites that are simply aggregators of the blogs of those involved in a particular open source project (like, in this case, women involved in Ubuntu). It’s a great idea, I think. I’m aggregated on live.linuxchix.org - a planet for those who are involved in Linuxchix. I think it would be very great to have a few nptech-focused “planets” out there. I think those are better ideas than community blogs - and it’s so easy for people to get involved. (Hint to NTEN: Affinity Group Planets!)

Second, is bookmarking. I now have accounts at del.icio.us, ma.gnolia, furl, and stumbleupon. They each have their good points and bad, strengths and reasons I use them (I use furl, for instance, to save pages I think might go away, or become paid content after a short time being free.) But I’m really getting toward the end of doing double or triple bookmarking. It’s just so … painful.

And then there are to do lists. Right now, I am a pretty multi-faceted person (well, I always was, but right now, I am very much so in practical terms.) I am working on several projects, both collective and personal. And I like and use to do lists. But, I have some to do lists I need to share, and others I don’t. And, of course, not everyone I work with is choosing the same to do list or project manager. And even if they were, they might not integrate well (For example, I use three different Basecamp accounts - which don’t integrate with each other.) Wikis are another great collective to do list/project management tool, but they don’t integrate, either.

Luckily, it seems that most of the project manager type apps in web 2.0 land are either using iCal, or integrating with Google Calendar (my present calendaring software). So that’s good. But the integration there even can be clunky. And it’s one way. I can’t change a basecamp milestone in Google Cal, I have to go back to that particular basecamp account to change it. Sigh.

It’s a mess out there. Anyone going to help clean up? I’m getting tired of wasting more time in front of my computer. I’m ready to save time so I can go out in the sun.

Technorati Tags: linuxchix, nosi, nptech, nten, opensource, web2.0

Watch this video. It’s interesting, and should make us think a lot about why to use open source software.

Thanks to Jon Stahl for the heads up.

Technorati Tags: economics, intellectualproperty, nptech, opensource

Next week is Ubuntu Open Week, a series of events and classes about Ubuntu Linux, and for people interested in getting involved in Ubuntu. The events are all on IRC (Freenode). I’ll be sitting in on a few, I’m sure, mostly for curiosities sake. Ubuntu seems to be becoming the linux distro of choice for a lot of people, and so far, it’s my favorite. Using Red Hat, as I often do sometimes, feels like doing battle in comparison. Ubuntu took the best that Debian had to offer, and left the weaknesses behind, I think.

Anyway, I think it’s worth checking out.

Technorati Tags: linux, nptech, opensource

I have, for a while, maintained accounts on just about all of the IM protocols out there (AIM, ICQ, Jabber/GTalk, MSN, Yahoo) mostly because there are some people that I know who are on one of the less used ones (like Yahoo or MSN). And most of my work colleagues use AIM or ICQ, if they are on IM. Lately, however, I’ve been noticing that a lot of nptech folks use skype possibly exclusively. I like Skype, and certainly the ability to actually talk with people is really useful (I have both SkypeOut and SkypeIn as well.)

So, is this a trend? What are people’s opinions on using Skype vs. other IMs? Do you mostly use Skype to IM or actually talk? Inquiring minds want to know.

Technorati Tags: instantmessaging, nptech

Here are some tidbits from the open source world that might be of interest…

• Sun makes Java open source. This is a big one. A few components (like the compiler javac, and others) have been open sourced under the GPL, with the rest of the SDK to follow next year. Find details at the Open JDK Project.
• Make has a kit for an open source mp3 player. Yes, open source hardware. Cool!
• This is old news, but I’m finally getting to understand it. Some really big 800-pound gorillas (Microsoft and Oracle) are bullying their way into the open source sandbox. The Oracle issue is much more straightforward - Oracle unveils “unbreakable Linux” - providing support for Linux that severely undercuts Red Hat’s support prices. There are some interesting theories afloat about this one (a ploy to then do a hostile takeover of Red Hat?) The second was the deal with Microsoft and Novell. Basically, they have agreed to collaborate on technologies and support. Here’s the kicker. Novell is paying Microsoft basically protection money. Microsoft agrees to give Novell customers indemnity against any patent or IP challenges. Eben Moglen thinks that this deal will be dead in the water because of the GPL 3.0. I’m not so sure, since no software project has to choose to adopt 3.0. It does mean that there will be a lot to watch in the next year or so.
• After you camp out, and fend off the violent hordes to get your Sony Playstation 3 - you can boot linux on it.
• Watch this documetary on Net Neutrality:

Technorati Tags: java, oracle, netneutrality, linux, puppy, microsoft, mp3, opensource

I bet you thought I’d stopped reading? Or given up? Nah. It gets chewy, for sure, but it feels like every chew is worth it. I’m reading this book at the same time as I’ve been working on the Nonprofit Open Source Initiative. I’m realizing that all of the justifications for why I am so into open source and free software is right here in this book! So here’s the summary for Chapter 3.

Chapter 3 is a discussion on Peer production - it talks about how it is that people have come together to collaboratively create software and content - basically, knowledge production. A salient quote:

… the networked environment makes possible a new modality of organizing production: radically decentralized, collaborative, and nonproprietary; based on sharing resources and outputs among widely distributed, loosely connected individuals who cooperate with each other without relying on either market signals or managerial commands. This is what I call “commons-based peer production.”

He talks about three examples which have become classic - free/open source software, SETI@Home, and Wikipedia. He spends a fair bit of time talking about the Wikipedia model, and how, basically, amazing it is.

The important point is that Wikipedia requires not only mechanical cooperation among people, but a commitment to a particular style of writing and describing concepts that is far from intuitive or natural to people.

He then spends some time making clear how the new networked environment makes peer distribution possible. Napster and and it’s follow-ons are a prime example:

What is truly unique about peer-to-peer networks as a signal of what is to come is the fact that with ridiculously low financial investment, a few teenagers and twenty-something-year-olds were able to write software and protocols that allowed tens of millions of computer users around the world to cooperate in producing the most efficient and robust file storage and retrieval system in the world.

He then talks about something that I find really interesting, and hadn’t fully understood until I read it: why the radio spectrum was regulated in the first place, and why now, regulation is basically moot. It’s really worth a read.

In the next chapter, he will talk about the economics of social production, and the motivations behind peer content creation.

Technorati Tags: media, opensource, economics, peer2peer

One of the things I really like about the nonprofit technology community is that there are so many women involved. There are lots of women on the varied lists I read, there are nonprofit technology organizations that have lots of women leaders, and all of that is great. But then, there is the little secret (well, it’s not so secret). When you look at systems administrators, or coders, or net-heads … the women kinda vanish. When it comes to conversations about things like the innards of APIs (REST or SOAP?), why Ruby on Rails rocks (or doesn’t), what’s a good alternative port to run SSH, when we’re going to implement IPv6 or … there’s a whole lot of testosterone, and not a lot of estrogen hanging about. So where did the women go?

As someone who was a real rarity in my early years (how many African American women neuroscientists have you heard of?) I didn’t ask this question too often (it would just depress me.) But as I re-enter this field I love, I can’t help but think about this question again.

This is why, by the way, I love hanging out with Linuxchix. This community has been around for a while, and its full of women who know their way around a linux kernel (some of them even get paid to hack it,) and can answer just about any question on Apache mod_rewrite I can come up with. There are some really great men who hang out too, who don’t mind being around a bunch of geeky women.

So maybe, we can get some Linuxchix to get involved in the nptech community, and we can get some nptech women who might be a little shy getting their toes wet with technology installing linux and writing code, with Linuxchix support, and have some nice synergy.

Technorati Tags: linux, linuxchix, nptech

This is great. It’s the announcement for NTEN’s video/mashup contest. You gotta watch the video!

Technorati Tags: nptech, nten, 07NTC

I’ve been asked by NTEN to write a whitepaper on APIs, following their Open API debate. I’ve been learning about some interesting examples of the use of APIs in nonprofit organizations, as well as learning what vendors (both proprietary and open source) are thinking about the issue. I’m looking forward to getting into the meat of the writing. It’s funny, I write a lot here on my blog, and I forget how much I enjoy technical writing (or semi-technical, in this case.)

In the process of reinvigorating the NOSI (Nonprofit Open Source Initiative) website, I took a look at the Primer on open source software I wrote eons ago in Web time. I think it needs some updating, but it’s actually still pretty relevant. That’s a good thing.

If you have any API wisdom, examples, strategies, what have you, that you’d like me to hear about, please drop me a line.

Technorati Tags: nosi, nptech, openapis, nten