I recently had the opportunity to connect with John Brennan, the driving force behind OpenAction.org, which empowers individuals and organizations by helping them tell the world about the positive impact their actions have.  John participated in the Change the Web Challenge from Social Actions in 2009 and received $5,000 for his winning Project: Social Actions Interactive Map.  You ca

I'm blogging live from the "Garage" session.  Apologies in advance if I don't all get it exactly accurately, but will do my best!

There are two topics, so they've split the room into two sides, one on the topic of "Social Engagement for Social Actions", and the other on the topic of "Viral Storytelling for Social Justice - LGBT Advocacy and Equality."  I happened to already be sitting on the Social Actions side, but given the Prop 8 vote yesterday that rejected gay marriage in California, the other group would be timely!  About 2/3 of the room came to the Social Actions side - maybe they see it having more applicability to their particular project.

Congratulations to the 24 Change the Web Finalists! How did the number of finalists grow to 24, you ask? Well, we had a heckuva tie!

Thank you to all those who participated in the Community Vote last week, selecting the Finalists in the Social Actions Change the Web Challenge.

Today is the last day to cast your ballot for your favorite projects!  The N2Y4 Mobile Challenge focuses on innovative mobile applications focused on social benefit.  The Social Actions' Change the Web Challenge showcases many different uses of the Social Actions API, aggregating social actions opportunities from across the Web.  You can view Projects and vote now by visiting the vote pages for N2Y4 Mobile Challenge or Change the Web Challenge.

Thanks for participating and helping select the Top Projects!

As of Monday, April 6, at 11 am PDT, voting is open for both the N2Y4 Mobile Challenge and the Change the Web Challenge.  You can vote for up to 5 of your favorite Projects, to help determine which Projects make it to the last round and are eligible for funding.

Voting closes this Friday, April 10, at 3 pm PDT!

Social Actions has created an open database of 60,000+ actions from 40+ sites -- including GlobalGiving, Change.org, DonorsChoose.org, Kiva.org, NABUUR, TakingITGlobal, Idealist.org, and VolunteerMatch. Through a search engine, Open Actions XML micro-format, an open API, and third-party tools and widgets, you can find and share ways to get involved in the causes you care about.

We justs submitted our project to the Social Actions' Change the web challenge!

Very curious how this idea will mature. We started programming on the open social widget last week and are making ourselves aquinted with the API's we're going to use.

Here is a design process screenshot of the actual widget:

 

And here is a design of the users "Add a donation" section:

You're invited to join in a live and open text chat to discuss how the iPhone can be used for social change. In particular, we'll be exploring and brainstorming iPhone applications that inspire and enable a better world. "iPhones for Good" is part of the Change the Web Conversation Series, a series of open chats that explore specific technology platforms for good, running concurrent with the Change the Web Challenge.

The Change the Web Challenge from Social Actions is now officially open! Change the Web Challenge is about building innovative tools to help people find and share opportunities to take action on the Web sites, blogs, and social networks that we all visit every day. "We want you to dream up a new tool to help people find and share actions.

This post is to everyone I met while representing Social Actions with Peter Deitz at N2Y3. So many of you were kind enough to show support for our project, and I’m writing to share our progress since N2Y3 and to invite you to become a part of what we’re building.

I hope you'll join all of the people contributing to our “$20,009 for 2009” campaign. I also hope you’ll join and subscribe to the Social Actions blog, spread the word about the Change the Web 2009 Challenge, share the reports and news we’re generating about the transformation of online philanthropy, give us your feedback on the search engine and API, and otherwise become an important part of the growing Social Actions community!