Here's a sampling of updates from the 21 N2Y3 Featured Projects' blogs:

Why a Little Drama Never Hurts
Ask Your Lawmaker talks briefly with DNC chairman Howard Dean about Hillary Clinton's cutting short the roll call during the Democratic Convention.

Obama vs. McCain: By the Bills
OpenCongree will be analyzing the bills that Obama and MCain have sponsored in the current session of Congress, and posting links to their coverage on the Congress Gossip Blog.

Ushahidi Co-Founder Featured on TED.com
Watch a presentation by Ory Okolloh, co-founder of Ushahidi, at TEDGlobal2007.

Next Stop for Social Actions: Google Headquarters in NYC
The folks at Social Actions will be giving a Google Tech Talk on September 16, 2008.

You can find a list of all of the 21 Projects' web sites, blog feeds, Twitter feeds, news feeds and Facebook groups in the post, Follow the Net2 Mashup Challenge Featured Projects' Development Online.

Okay, time for an update to let you know what we've been doing at Ushahidi with the winnings from the NetSquared Challenge.

Ory and I are madly dashing around Kenya, meeting with local NGOs and users to determine what we need to build into Ushahidi's Engine (version 2). We helped sponsor the local Barcamp Nairobi, which was a huge hit and brought us even more developers.

We wanted to say a big thank you to everyone who attended the NetSquared conference and for NetSquared for making this whole thing possible. David, Ory, Juliana and myself are absolutely stunned and ecstatic about what this win will let us do.

More than the financial support, we were moved by the validation we got from the community through this prize. Sometimes you can think you're a little crazy, tilting at windmills on your way to changing the world, so this means a lot.

When moved to build Ushahidi earlier this year, I wrote:

Sorry for the delay folks, there's so much here at N2Y3 it can be a little distracting.

I've cut-and pasted my notes from the session, which aren't pretty, but they get the job done. If you have questions about my notes, or want me to clarify something, let me know.

I can be reached via director at knowledge as power dot org, and you can find my work at Knowledge As Power where we help individuals become effective citizens in the legislative process.

Last weekend three US-based members of the Ushahidi project team were able to get together for two full days of planning for the upcoming Net2 conference. (Photo proof exhibited... Erik, David and Juliana)