Tech Matters: Using tech for positive social change

Sri Lanka is an incredible place. I've been meeting with human rights organizations here and just beginning the grasp the complexity and extent of the violations over the last 25 years. My last two days here involve giving a lecture on technology and human rights at the University of Peradeniya, and meeting with a coalition of human rights groups to talk about how Benetech and our main partner here, The Asia Foundation, can help Sri Lanka move forward as settlement talks hopefully continue.

This post is coming to you from Singapore, where I am attending the World Blind Union Asia Pacific meeting. Interesting discussions with delegates from places such as Malaysia, Indonesia, East Timor, Cambodia, Thailand, Australia and New Zealand. I was honored to give the conference keynote on the topic "In the Palm of Your Hand," my vision of how the cell phone is going to become the platform of choice for most blind people in the coming years. I'll post my remarks shortly. On a lighter note, when I arrived I was treated by the sight of 100,000 rubber duckies floating down the Singapore river! The Great Singapore Duck Race Official Website

Speaking publicly about social enterprise and technology is one of the most rewarding tasks I have. Benetech wants to encourage the expansion of our field: there's far too much work for us to do! Many great people are working hard to create opportunities for interested individuals and organizations to gain more exposure to these topics. I have some great speaking gigs. Last week I spoke at UC Berkeley at a class organized by Richard Newton, the Dean of Engineering, Prof. Eric Brewer and Tom Kahlil: CS294-12: ICT for Developing Regions , as well as a session at the Commonwealth Club Conversations In Social Enterprise organized by the great folks at Origo. This week, I get three chances to speak: at Stanford Business School to students interested in social entrepreneurship, at Juma Ventures | Social Enterprise Institute and on a keynote plenary at the Business for Social Responsibility conference: BSR » 2003 Conference Overview Next week I keynote the World ...

We are greatly expanding our Human Rights work, with the addition of the Human Rights Data Analysis Group to Benetech! Dr. Patrick Ball, who was instrumental in the creation of our Martus Project , will be arriving in Palo Alto this weekend as our new Director of Human Rights Programs. Patrick is a passionate advocate of human rights, science and technology. He also is a huge Free/Open Source software fan, and has played a major role in encouraging us to consider this exciting option (which we did in choosing a GPL-style license for Martus). We're looking forward to Patrick and his team joining us and growing our services to the social justice sector!

Another article published, by Alison Lingane and me, in the journal of Information Technology and Disabilities October 2003 issue. Note the DMCA reference that has been addressed in last week's decision by the Librarian of Congress. The Chafee Amendment