Communicating in a networked world
Sharing data and sharing services
Non-profit organizations generally have to make-do with fewer resources than so-called for-profit corporations, isn’t that right?. It certainly seems like it’s impossible to get venture capital for non-profits, so it almost goes without saying that non-profits should share resources whever their goals are aligned. Nobody should have to reinvent what another organization has spent precious resources developing.
Putting “dynamic” content into every web site.
I’d guess that upwards of 90% of the web sites around today have more-or-less static content. They’re maintained by folks who use DreamWeaver or GoLive or FrontPage to build HTML pages which they then upload to their server. Nothing wrong with that, of course.
We have posted a number of volunteer “jobs” at our web site. They all have significant online components. We’re looking for an online bookstore manager, for newsletter editors in several languages, and Peace and Ethics Curriculum managers. See the web site for more details on the jobs.
There’s a key orientation which I’d like to explain here. Each of these is a volunteer position, of course, which means that there’s no pay for doing the job. But, ultimately it should be our goal to develop these into paying positions. The bookstore manager position is a good example. If someone smart can take on the task which we’ve described there, they can become a general manager for the store, and the store can become profitable, thus generating the funds to pay the manager to run the store in the future. And, as one of our supporters has suggested, the store could have a physical presence, could sell things other than books, and could become a well-run contributor to the work of the Foundation.
And let’s take the newsletter editing as another example. Why not get a good, robust, widely-distributed newsletter going in Chinese, let’s say, and then turn that into a position funded by a person or group interested in the causes of peace and ethics within the Chinese-speaking world? A grant could then provide enough cash to pay for the newsletter editor position. Of course, you need to get things started – get things up and operational – before you can really propose this to a funding agency. But, ultimately that’s one direction we could go.
If you’re motivated by this, by all means let us know via email at info@dlfound.org
I’m working with a group of folks who are developing their own online requirements and interested in finding online tools they can use to further their goals. The group was spearheaded by Mark Roest of oneVillage.biz, and includes Kaliya Young, Sasha Noble, Joerg Geier, Greg Walton, Michael Mitchell, Joy Tang founder of oneVillage Foundation, Dennis Reinhardt, Sherry Reson, Jennifer Holmes, Nancy Glock-Grueneich of Higher EDge (and I’ve missed some others).
We’ve created a project at the Chaordic Initiatives web site. The project is named Community Online Support. (Chaordic is interesting in its own right, and I will return to this subject at a later date – in that it presents a “new” model for the ownership and promotion of sharing of intellectual property. You can see the organizing principles behind the Chaordic Commons and the Creative Commons licensing proposal online.)
Related projects include kundrel.org.
[Removed dead image links 2007-08-14]
Dalai Lama Foundation
I’m converting my personal blog over for use by the Dalai Lama Foundation. I have been acting as Chief Technology Officer for the Foundation for 5 months now, surveying needs and developing online capabilities to support the Foundation’s needs for the next year.
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