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- Kabissa 2.0: Strengthening the Social Web in Africa
Kabissa 2.0: Strengthening the Social Web in Africa
Voting Summary (Elevator Pitch):
Marries power of Web 2.0 with passion of 950+ African orgs in our network. Savvy Web 2.0 Ambassadors will collaborate through the Kabissa site and face to face to develop and promote homegrown strategies for employing Web 2.0 for social change.
Supporting organization:
Kabissa - Space for Change in Africa
URL:
http://www.kabissa.org
Give and Take: Describe your project's top three needs
Type of expertise needed:
Management Expertise We welcome help in creating a detailed sustainability model, which includes Kabissa and a network of 20 partners in Africa. Advice on how to structure the relationship with the partners would be very helpful, e.g., contract and payment structures.
Type of expertise needed:
Marketing/Media Expertise We need help in creating Web 2.0 features that are visually compelling, simple to use, and engaging for a wide range of stakeholders. We are looking for innovative ways to tell the individual stories of our Web 2.0 ambassadors to a larger audience.
Type of expertise needed:
Technical Expertise We would love expertise in customizing Drupal to be extremely user friendly for people working in difficult low-bandwidth environments, e.g., creating new modules, browser and usability testing, email/mobile phone integration, working offline, etc.
Project Vision Statement & Potential Social Impact:
Kabissa was founded on the belief that technology is a revolutionary force for change in Africa. Over the past 8 years, we have built a vibrant network of over 950 African civil society organizations who are all striving to integrate technology into their work – from fighting human rights abuses to feeding AIDS orphans.
The latest wave of Web 2.0 technologies has the power to take the work of these organizations to a new level. Blogs, wikis, tagging, podcasts, social networking sites – they all provide new and easy ways for African grassroots organizations to participate in -and indeed drive - global conversations about social change issues that affect them.
To this end, Kabissa has already embarked on several Web 2.0 projects to give African organizations a stronger voice on the Internet, including turning our print ICT training materials into a wiki, creating a Kabissa blog, and transforming our member profile directory into a social networking site. But all of these technology changes won’t bring social change without the vibrant Kabissa community putting them to use.
Through this project, we will develop a strong network of African technology activists and advocates who can effectively take advantage of the many possibilities Web 2.0 has to offer. We will recruit twenty key partners throughout the continent who are very motivated to serve as “Web 2.0 ambassadors” for their local communities where they already work as well as to the larger Kabissa community of civil society organizations throughout Africa.
Together with our partners, we will develop a shared understanding of how Web 2.0 technologies work, their application to the Kabissa community, and how they can be used by different types of African civil society organizations working in different environments. Kabissa will support these partners in applying these lessons to their own organizations, but also to the larger community, creating a viral spread of tech-activism throughout African civil society.
Sustainability (financial) model:
After the initial investment to develop the network of twenty key partners, there will be three main categories of costs: 1) specific projects initiated and run locally, but with the support of Kabissa/the Kabissa network, 2) specific projects that span the entire network, and 3) on-going infrastructure costs to run the entire network, e.g., Kabissa community Web site, community coordinator, etc.
For local projects, partners would be responsible for fundraising for those costs, likely from a combination of fees-for-services and grants, depending on the nature of the project. Because this project targets the “sweet spot” between the mission of the local partner and the goals of the entire Kabissa community, the local partners will likely naturally begin to integrate these projects into their existing programs and infrastructure.
Kabissa will be responsible for raising funds for projects that span the entire network. As one-time, limited-term projects, these will likely be grant-funded.
The costs for the community infrastructure will be borne equally between the local partners and Kabissa. We envision many opportunities for synergies here, such as partners collecting fees for Kabissa services in local currency, opportunities to offer on-going services such as consulting or training that can raise funds, etc.
Potential obstacles:
- Finding the "right" partners – innovative, passionate belief in the power of technology, sustainable and stable organizations
- Keeping the momentum/motivation of the network over the long-term. We need to motivate people with local content, activities and concerns, but also share benefits of lessons learned etc with the larger community
- Finding synergies with likeminded initiatives and not reinventing the wheel
- Finding balance between the power of online Web 2.0 tools and support for offline tools and existing ways of engaging
Resource Needs:
- Funding: US$500,000 over two years as the network becomes sustainable (face-to-face meetings, network coordination, developers, partner stipends, communications costs, etc.)
- Expertise: People and organizations who understand, and have experience, in:
- Web 2.0 techies/developers
- Users of Web 2.0 in Africa
- Developing and maintaining virtual communities with online and offline communications
Key Milestones:
- July-August: Selection of twenty key partners
- September 1, 2007 – Launch of “Kabissa 2.0” site and tools
- September-October 2007 – First meeting of key partners to launch network
Project Summary:
Through this project, we will develop a strong network of African technology activists and advocates who can effectively take advantage of the many possibilities Web 2.0 has to offer. We will recruit twenty key partners throughout the continent who are very motivated to serve as "Web 2.0 ambassadors" for their local communities where they already work as well as to the larger Kabissa community of civil society organizations throughout Africa.
Together with our partners, we will develop a shared understanding of how Web 2.0 technologies work, their application to the Kabissa community, and how they can be used by different types of African civil society organizations working in different environments. Kabissa will support these partners in applying these lessons to their own organizations, but also to the larger community, creating a viral spread of tech-activism throughout African civil society.
Kabissa - Space for Change in Africa was founded on the belief that technology is a revolutionary force for change in Africa.
Comments
Nice Project
Its awesome and sound like a good project.
What a fantastic project,
What a fantastic project, congrats.
Awesome
This sounds like an awesome project. Does anyone have an update on its success?
Good article, was pleasant
Good article, was pleasant to me.
It is written well, it is visible that the Author knows this theme.
What a fantastic project,
What a fantastic project, congrats.
Africa is the continent less
Africa is the continent less developed when it comes to informatics and internet. By training the residents into these two fields there can be created many working places by large companies looking to extend their business.
___
Mary-Anne, link building division.
ALL THE BEST!!
This project is a great idea, since you can't really help someone without having a good knowledge of his problems. I believe that the web 2.0 ambassadors will facilitate the communication of the RIGHT information, coming from the RIGHT people.
I love this amazing organization!
Kabissa, You've got my support forever!
Ghislain
good luck!
We should support and vote for this project as it would eventually create a huge impact on Africa’s development and its people’s future. However, this endeavor needs a huge amount for funding. And that’s not easy to find these days. I know a network wherein this project can be promoted and find support from sponsors. (They do not offer lending services) They will help you get the budget to start with…
Check out www.micro-capital.com.
Good luck!
Rio
I love the Kabissa initiative
The Kabissa initiative is a most valuable one. There are hardly other organisations that seek to emancipate the mind of the African the way Kabissa does. All my support to Kabissa
Alo Fonkeng
TK Foundation, Limbe, Cameroon
A vote & good luck
Kim, Tobias, I just cast one of my votes for Kabissa and wish you the best of luck!
I also hope that as Kabissa expands its efforts on behalf of ICT for African organizations, and as the localization movement in Africa matures, that we can work together to help Web 2.0 speak more of the languages of Africa.
In the meantime, thanks for your ongoing support!
Don Osborn
Bisharat.net
PanAfriL10n.org
Top ten!
I'm proud to give this project one of my ten votes for the NetSquared Technology Innovation Fund.
--ivan (Anti-Genocide Community proposal)
Adding Content to Access
Since a large part of the population in Africa is dependent on farming, which currently is often low tech, low input, low yields, low income, high risk. Farmers often lack information about markets (e.g. prices, demand, quality requirements) and on how to improve their way of managing crops and produce. May I point you to Farmer 2 Farmer Learning, a project I nominated, as an example of contents that could be used in your project for the development of services that could be of use to large part of the African people. By requesting fees from these farmers you may even improve the sustainability of your initiative, at least at the local level. Please feel free to contact me if/when you find Farmer 2 Farmer Learning interesting for your project.
Friendly greetings
Don Jansen
Grassroots-level Change
I really like how this isn't a top-down approach to change in Africa. If you can actually have it work from the ground up, using your connections to those 900+ African organizations, this will be successful.
I hope that you're able to get the grants you need, this is a worthy project and affects such a great area.
Dressing up the proposal
Since Kim is knee deep in NTEN Nonprofit Technology Conference activities today, I updated the proposal to reflect Kim's simplified "Resource needs" that focus on social capital. I also dressed up the proposal somewhat by adding some formatting, a few nice images reflecting the important work of the grassroots groups we serve in Africa, and adding more substance to the project summary that appears on the project summary page.
As the resident Web 2.0 geek at Kabissa let me just also add that I am thoroughly excited to see this proposal up here and the "web 2.0 hype enabled" direction that it represents for us and the African civil society organizations in our network.
I can't wait to see what happens.
Best wishes,
Tobias
--
Kabissa - Space for Change in Africa
http:/www.kabissa.org
Social capital
I love how this project engages in and furthers the social capital and social power in the communities you serve. Instead of setting yourself up as the gatekeeper of social change, you're empowering the people -- who stand to benefit from greater democracy -- with greater access to democracy in self-organizing.
That said, you might want to look for a little more social capital than financial capital from the NetSquared community. Your budget may be perfectly reasonable, but it outstrips any grant I think you'll be able to get here. More fruitful may be to focus on the people and organizations with which you can collaborate to further the social web that you're building. In terms of financial support, maybe you could pick one particular aspect of the project that NetSquared could fund, and then seek out individuals at the conference who can help make that vision a reality.
A strong proposal, and I REALLY appreciate the approach of the organization -- I just think it might need a slightly narrower focus for the purposes of this fund.
--ivan (quixotic1.com/Genocide Intervention Network)
Re: Social Capital
Thank for the feedback Ivan! I love the idea of incorporating social capital more explicitly into this proposal. As you pointed out, this whole idea is really about capitalizing on the social capital in the Kabissa network, so of course we should be focusing more on social capital in our resource needs. Updating the proposal now....
Thanks,
Kim
True Grassroots
Agreed on more African and International Input
A few leaders and friends from Omidyar Network came to this process too late but have been watching from the sidelines and looking for ways to bring these new technologies to their communities. Please keep the information flowing and reach out to those leaders who have taken the time to lead new initiatives in Africa and elsewhere; be a mentor or find a great way to build bridges and new partnerships.
Contact me
Contact me. The only promise I can make is that I will try to help. We do have humanitarian projects unfolding in Africa (as well as significant past experience there) and I would entertain the idea of our outreach bramching this digital divide a bit more as well. We do have access to some educational resources that might well be integrated into your project. Long story short... BRING ON SOME IDEAS AND LET'S TALK.
Randy Roberson - Disaster Logistics
rroberson@disasterlogistics.org
www.disasterlogistics.org