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Geeks Without Bounds
Geeks Without Bounds (informally known as GWOB) is a humanitarian organization of technologists, first responders, policymakers, and volunteers that work towards improving access to communication and technology. With a focus on working with communities that have limited infrastructure due to violence, negligence, or catastrophe, they organize hackathons for humanitarian technology, and help prototype projects intended to turn into long-term initiatives through their Accelerator for Humanitarian Projects. Origins Geeks Without Bounds was initially announced on August 19, 2010 at Gnomedex 10 in Seattle, Washington, and formally launched on October 10, 2010. by Johnny "Diggz" Higgins, and Willow Brugh as a fiscally sponsored program of The School Factory. In 2012, GWOB became a separate entity, fiscally sponsored by The School Factory. Organizational structure Geeks Without Bounds is a non-profit organization, and is primarily volunteer driven. Operational activities are co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Governmental Organization
A government or state agency, sometimes an appointed commission, is a permanent or semi-permanent organization in the machinery of government that is responsible for the oversight and administration of specific functions, such as an administration. There is a notable variety of agency types. Although usage differs, a government agency is normally distinct both from a department or ministry, and other types of public body established by government. The functions of an agency are normally executive in character since different types of organizations (''such as commissions'') are most often constituted in an advisory role—this distinction is often blurred in practice however, it is not allowed. A government agency may be established by either a national government or a state government within a federal system. Agencies can be established by legislation or by executive powers. The autonomy, independence, and accountability of government agencies also vary widely. History Early exa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crisis Camp
A crisis camp is a BarCamp gathering of IT professionals, software developers, and computer programmers to aid in the relief efforts of a major crisis such as those caused by earthquakes, floods, or hurricanes. Projects that crisis camps often work on include setting up social networks for people to locate missing friends and relatives, creating maps of affected areas, and creating inventories of needed items such as food and clothing. Previous efforts of crisis camps reveal common themes such as the use of mobility, the use of the Internet as a common coordination platform, the requirement of volunteers, and the need for alternative community communication access areas. This initiative is reported to have a unique format that features free or nominal attendance fees as well as agenda that are created in real time by the participants. This format has also been referred to as "unconference", which reject one-size-fits-all presentations in favor of innovative gathering with no pred ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Information Technology Organizations Based In North America
Information is an abstract concept that refers to that which has the power to inform. At the most fundamental level information pertains to the interpretation of that which may be sensed. Any natural process that is not completely random, and any observable pattern in any medium can be said to convey some amount of information. Whereas digital signals and other data use discrete signs to convey information, other phenomena and artifacts such as analog signals, poems, pictures, music or other sounds, and currents convey information in a more continuous form. Information is not knowledge itself, but the meaning that may be derived from a representation through interpretation. Information is often processed iteratively: Data available at one step are processed into information to be interpreted and processed at the next step. For example, in written text each symbol or letter conveys information relevant to the word it is part of, each word conveys information relevant ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kofi Annan
Kofi Atta Annan (; 8 April 193818 August 2018) was a Ghanaian diplomat who served as the seventh secretary-general of the United Nations from 1997 to 2006. Annan and the UN were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize. He was the founder and chairman of the Kofi Annan Foundation, as well as chairman of The Elders, an international organisation founded by Nelson Mandela. Annan studied economics at Macalester College, international relations at the Graduate Institute Geneva, and management at MIT. Annan joined the UN in 1962, working for the World Health Organization's Geneva office. He went on to work in several capacities at the UN Headquarters including serving as the Under-Secretary-General for peacekeeping between March 1992 and December 1996. He was appointed secretary-general on 13 December 1996 by the Security Council, and later confirmed by the General Assembly, making him the first office holder to be elected from the UN staff itself. He was re-elected for a s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peace Corps
The Peace Corps is an independent agency and program of the United States government that trains and deploys volunteers to provide international development assistance. It was established in March 1961 by an executive order of President John F. Kennedy Executive Order 10924 and authorized by Congress the following September by the Peace Corps Act. Kennedy first publicly proposed the Peace Corps during his 1960 presidential campaign as a means to improve America's global image and leadership in the Cold War; he cited the Soviet Union's deployment of skilled citizens "abroad in the service of world communism" and argued the U.S. must do the same to advance values such as democracy and liberty. The Peace Corps was formally established within three months of Kennedy's presidency, garnering both bipartisan congressional support and popular support, particularly among recent university graduates. The official goal of the Peace Corps is to assist developing countries by providing skil ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
NetDay
NetDay (1995–2004) was an event established in 1995 that "called on high-tech companies to commit resources to schools, libraries, and clinics worldwide so that they could connect to the Internet". It was developed by John Gage (then-chief science officer at Sun Microsystems) and activist Michael Kaufman. They approached Delaine Eastin, California's State Superintendent of Public Instruction, to put together the first event in California. The first official NetDay was held in 1996. In 2005, NetDay merged with'' Project Tomorrow'' (''tomorrow.org''), a California nonprofit involved with math and science education. The organization is continuing to work with schools to improve the use of technology in education. Overview NetDay was established to take place over the course of one Saturday, whereby designated schools would receive full connection to the Internet. Activities were coordinated at the website ''netday.org''. The HTML Writers Guild (quoting the NetDay FAQ) defined the d ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Inveneo
Inveneo is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization based in San Francisco with focus on Information and Communication Technologies for organizations supporting underserved communities in the developing world, mostly in Africa. The organization has developed an ultra low-powered computer, called the Inveneo Computing Station, as well as a VoIP-enabled unit called the Inveneo Communication Station, and a hub server, all of which are designed to run on a 12-volt power supply. The Inveneo Computing and Communication Stations were originally based on a reference design ION A603 mini PC by First International Computer and run AMD Geode CPU. In addition to ultra low-power computers and servers, Inveneo has also created long-distance wireless (WiFi) Local-Area Networking ( LAN) gear and its own open-source operating systems for its desktop and server products (based on Ubuntu). The organization focuses on finding, training, and certifying local partners who can install, service, and suppor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
ICVolunteers
ICVolunteers ( ICVolontaires / ICVoluntarios) is an international non-profit organization (federation) active in the field of communications, in particular cybervolunteerism, languages and conference support. ICVolunteers works with volunteers to implement social and educational programs to help populations and local communities to develop. Through volunteer effort, it cooperates with organizations in the humanitarian, social, environmental and medical fields to implement projects and conferences at local, national and international levels. In addition, ICVolunteers promotes volunteerism and its recognition, by enhancing civic commitment and involvement, and by providing leadership and links between organizations, individuals, and communities. With its headquarters in Geneva ( Switzerland), ICVolunteers has offices and permanent representation in a number of other countries, including France, South Africa, Mali, Spain, Brazil and Canada. Work of ICVolunteers began was in 1997. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Humanitarian Aid
Humanitarian aid is material and logistic assistance to people who need help. It is usually short-term help until the long-term help by the government and other institutions replaces it. Among the people in need are the homeless, refugees, and victims of natural disasters, wars, and famines. Humanitarian relief efforts are provided for humanitarian purposes and include natural disasters and man-made disasters. The primary objective of humanitarian aid is to save lives, alleviate suffering, and maintain human dignity. It may, therefore, be distinguished from development aid, which seeks to address the underlying socioeconomic factors which may have led to a crisis or emergency. There is a debate on linking humanitarian aid and development efforts, which was reinforced by the World Humanitarian Summit in 2016. However, the conflation is viewed critically by practitioners. Humanitarian aid is seen as "a fundamental expression of the universal value of solidarity between people and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hackathon
A hackathon (also known as a hack day, hackfest, datathon or codefest; a portmanteau of hacking and marathon) is an event where people engage in rapid and collaborative engineering over a relatively short period of time such as 24 or 48 hours. They are often run using agile software development practices, such as sprint-like design wherein computer programmers and others involved in software development, including graphic designers, interface designers, product managers, project managers, domain experts, and others collaborate intensively on engineering projects, such as software engineering. The goal of a hackathon is to create functioning software or hardware by the end of the event. Hackathons tend to have a specific focus, which can include the programming language used, the operating system, an application, an API, or the subject and the demographic group of the programmers. In other cases, there is no restriction on the type of software being created or the design of the ne ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
