It's great to be a part of this effort. Like most of us, I am far too busy with my nose at the screen, keeping up with the latest and greatest of nonprofit technology.
I started my my dream with wild ambitions to become elected "by the people" to do wonderously good things, and soon learned that working with the people is far more rewarding and productive. I started in international politics and started honing my geopolitical chops in Washington DC, then found out about nonprofits and social advocacy - a world of people often utilizing very little to accomplish so much social good. Wow. I spent time working on technology issues for several human rights groups (including Amnesty, Human Rights First, Witness).
I learned my best tech tricks on my moms PC jr. (yes, the fancy model with the chicklets shaped keys), telneting here and there to see what I could find. I remember befriending folks from Die Universitaet Hamburg, practicing my German in chat windows before traveling there abroad. It was fun, and I could blame my bad german on IBM... At the time it was amazing to have met so many people and know them so well without having seen them, then to arrive f2f with a support network in place. Its this virtual extension to the f2f world that captures my attention the most when thinking about web 2.0.
I have been with CompuMentor for 5 years now in all sorts of capacities, and consulting with Leland Design along side - serving nonprofits with technology best practices, strategic consulting, and web/database implementation.
I look forward to the conversations!
- Eric