ONLINE EVENT: Mobile Tech and Advocacy and Engagement -- Welcome

As we are getting ready for the next webinar on Mobile Technology for Advocacy and Activism, I wanted to quickly introduce myself and give you a sense of what you can expect.

I run MobileActive.org, a global community of people who are using mobile technology for social change.  I have written, researched, consulted on, and implemented campaigns using mobiles for social change.  A few resources that might be useful in this regard - including case studies, resource guides, and strategy considerations are listed here on the MobileActive.org wiki.

And here is what we will be focusing on in our discussion:

* How can mobiles be used in advocacy, activism and engagement?

* What do we know about what works and what doesn't?

* How do I get started as an organization?

* What vendors and tools are our there?

* How about raising money, recruiting and managing volunteers, and mobilizing members?

Well have an hour to explore some of these questions to get you started. 

What questions do you have that you would like to see answered here or during the webinar?  What stories can you tell of successful use of mobiles in a campaign or to engage people?

Hi. This is Ben Rigby. I'll also be on the Mobile Activism webinar tomorrow. I started a nonprofit called Mobile Voter in 2004 - intending to use text messaging to register young voters. Over the last several years, the world has changed quickly and we've learned a lot. It's also about 1000x times easier to get started with mobile than it was just less than 1/2 a decade ago.

Over the past year, I've been keenly interested in the Smartphone (ie: iPhone) space - where there are some major innovations happening. In the next 1/2 decade, smartphones are going to be where it's at. Am currently working on a project called The Extraordinaries (www.beextra.org) where we're building a smartphone app that enables volunteers to work for their favorite causes on-demand and on-the-phone.

Looking forward to discussing this and more tomorrow.

ben

Hi everyone--

I'm Megan Keane, the Online Community Manager here at TechSoup. I've only just gotten a Smartphone in the last six months so I'm pretty new to mobile applications, but I've been keeping an eye on many of the exciting mobile projects being developed, especially some of the ones submitted for the NetSquared mobile challenges. So I'm really looking forward to hearing more from Ben and Katrin, as well as the rest of you in the TechSoup community about how to make the most out of mobile.

Best,

Megan

PS: For those of you also monitoring the action on Twitter, we will be using the hashtag #tsmobile to track conversations from the event.

Hi Everyone,

I'm Becky Wiegand, a staff writer at Techsoup. I also helped co-present the webinar this morning and will be posting some of the questions that didn't get answered in the forums to be discussed by our experts today.

Thanks!

Becky

Will the slides/powerpoint for this presentation be shared?

Thanks, loved it!

- Kathryn

I unfortunately missed the conference call.  (I would have liked to have been a part)

I work with carriers and public safety on large wireless mesh, internetworking, and open source projects. I have an iPhone, but, for the most part, am largely ignorant of the various applications people run on them.

I look forward to seeing what other cool projects others here link to.
 

You can see the webinar archive for this event here: https://cc.readytalk.com/cc/schedule/display.do?udc=15rcbmtfpblty

On the top right navigation, you'll see the option for downloading the files/slides and the option to listen to the recording.

There's a lot of really useful information in there so definitely check it out!

Hello, this is Kami Griffiths, the Training and Outreach Manager at TechSoup. I had the pleasure of facilitating the webinar this morning and was impressed by all the great information that was shared. Take advantage of their expertise today while they're online!