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Public Lab
The Public Laboratory for Open Technology and Science (Public Lab) is a non-profit organization that facilitates collaborative, open source environmental research in a model known as Community Science. It supports communities facing environmental justice issues in a do it yourself approach to environmental monitoring and advocacy. Public Lab grew out of a grassroots effort to take aerial photographs of the BP Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010. Since then, they have launched a range of projects, including an open source spectrometer, multi-spectral camera, and low-cost microscope. Balloon Mapping The aerial photography technique Public Lab is best known for involves lifting cameras above an area using tethered helium-filled weather balloons. Open source environmental monitoring Public Lab's community develops open source hardware Open-source hardware (OSH) consists of physical artifacts of technology designed and offered by the open-design movement. Both fre ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Citizen Science
Citizen science (CS) (similar to community science, crowd science, crowd-sourced science, civic science, participatory monitoring, or volunteer monitoring) is scientific research conducted with participation from the public (who are sometimes referred to as amateur/nonprofessional scientists). There are variations in the exact definition of citizen science, with different individuals and organizations having their own specific interpretations of what citizen science encompasses. Citizen science is used in a wide range of areas of study, with most citizen science research publications being in the fields of biology and conservation. There are different applications and functions of citizen science in research projects. Citizen science can be used as a methodology where public volunteers help in collecting and classifying data, improving the scientific community's capacity. Citizen science can also involve more direct involvement from the public, with communities initiating proj ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Environmental Justice
Environmental justice is a social movement to address the unfair exposure of poor and marginalized communities to harms from hazardous waste, resource extraction, and other land uses.Schlosberg, David. (2007) ''Defining Environmental Justice: Theories, Movements, and Nature''. Oxford University Press. The movement has generated hundreds of studies showing that exposure to environmental harms is inequitably distributed. The global environmental justice movement arises from place-based environmental conflicts in which local environmental defenders frequently confront multi-national corporations in resource extraction or other industries. Local outcomes of these conflicts are increasingly influenced by trans-national environmental justice networks. The movement began in the United States in the 1980s and was heavily influenced by the American civil rights movement. The original conception of environmental justice in the 1980s focused on harms to marginalised racial groups ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Catherine Bracy
Catherine Bracy is a CEO and co-founder of TechEquity, a tax and housing policy advocacy organization whose backers include the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative. Early life and education Bracy studied communication at Boston College, graduating in 2002. She wanted to be a journalist, but decided against it after completing an internship at NBC in Boston. Career Bracy worked as Administrative Director of Harvard University's Berkman Center for Internet & Society from 2002 to 2010. She joined the University of Texas at Austin, earning a master's degree in public policy in 2011. She worked for the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, managing the ''News Challenge'', an innovation competition for journalists. Bracy worked for the Obama administration in 2011 and 2012, heading up the technology field office in San Francisco.She helped to design the technology policy of Barack Obama. In 2013 she joined Code for America, looking after international programs. She served as Senior Di ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Open Source
Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open-source model is a decentralized software development model that encourages open collaboration. A main principle of open-source software development is peer production, with products such as source code, blueprints, and documentation freely available to the public. The open-source movement in software began as a response to the limitations of proprietary code. The model is used for projects such as in open-source appropriate technology, and open-source drug discovery. Open source promotes universal access via an open-source or free license to a product's design or blueprint, and universal redistribution of that design or blueprint. Before the phrase ''open source'' became widely adopted, developers and producers have used a variety of other terms. ''Open source'' gained ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Environmental Justice
Environmental justice is a social movement to address the unfair exposure of poor and marginalized communities to harms from hazardous waste, resource extraction, and other land uses.Schlosberg, David. (2007) ''Defining Environmental Justice: Theories, Movements, and Nature''. Oxford University Press. The movement has generated hundreds of studies showing that exposure to environmental harms is inequitably distributed. The global environmental justice movement arises from place-based environmental conflicts in which local environmental defenders frequently confront multi-national corporations in resource extraction or other industries. Local outcomes of these conflicts are increasingly influenced by trans-national environmental justice networks. The movement began in the United States in the 1980s and was heavily influenced by the American civil rights movement. The original conception of environmental justice in the 1980s focused on harms to marginalised racial groups ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Do It Yourself
"Do it yourself" ("DIY") is the method of building, modifying, or repairing things by oneself without the direct aid of professionals or certified experts. Academic research has described DIY as behaviors where "individuals use raw and semi-raw materials and parts to produce, transform, or reconstruct material possessions, including those drawn from the natural environment (e.g., landscaping)". DIY behavior can be triggered by various motivations previously categorized as marketplace motivations (economic benefits, lack of product availability, lack of product quality, need for customization), and identity enhancement (craftsmanship, empowerment, community seeking, uniqueness). The term "do-it-yourself" has been associated with consumers since at least 1912 primarily in the domain of home improvement and maintenance activities. The phrase "do it yourself" had come into common usage (in standard English) by the 1950s, in reference to the emergence of a trend of people undert ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Free Software Foundation
The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is a 501(c)#501(c)(3), 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded by Richard Stallman on October 4, 1985, to support the free software movement, with the organization's preference for software being distributed under copyleft ("share alike") terms, such as with its own GNU General Public License. The FSF was incorporated in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, US, where it is also based. From its founding until the mid-1990s, FSF's funds were mostly used to employ software developers to write free software for the GNU Project. Since the mid-1990s, the FSF's employees and volunteers have mostly worked on legal and structural issues for the free software movement and the free software community. Consistent with its goals, the FSF aims to use only free software on its own computers. History The Free Software Foundation was founded in 1985 as a Nonprofit corporation, non-profit corporation supporting free software development. It continued existi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
BP Oil Spill
The ''Deepwater Horizon'' oil spill (also referred to as the "BP oil spill") was an industrial disaster that began on 20 April 2010 off of the coast of the United States in the Gulf of Mexico on the BP-operated Macondo Prospect, considered to be the largest marine oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry and estimated to be 8 to 31 percent larger in volume than the previous largest, the Ixtoc I oil spill, also in the Gulf of Mexico. The United States federal government estimated the total discharge at . After several failed efforts to contain the flow, the well was declared sealed on 19 September 2010. Reports in early 2012 indicated that the well site was still leaking. The ''Deepwater Horizon'' oil spill is regarded as one of the largest environmental disasters in world history. A massive response ensued to protect beaches, wetlands and estuaries from the spreading oil utilizing skimmer ships, floating booms, controlled burns and of oil dispersant. Due to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vice (magazine)
''Vice'' (stylized in all caps) is a Canadian-American magazine focused on lifestyle, arts, culture, and news/politics. Founded in 1994 in Montreal as an alternative punk magazine, the founders later launched the youth media company Vice Media, which consists of divisions including the printed magazine as well as a website, broadcast news unit, a film production company, a record label, and a publishing imprint. As of February 2015, the magazine's editor-in-chief is Ellis Jones. History Founded by Suroosh Alvi, Gavin McInnes, and Shane Smith (the latter two being childhood friends), the magazine was launched in 1994 as the ''Voice of Montreal'' with government funding. The intention of the founders was to provide work and a community service. When the editors later sought to dissolve their commitments with the original publisher, Alix Laurent, they bought him out and changed the name to ''Vice'' in 1996. Richard Szalwinski, a Canadian software millionaire, acquired the magazi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Economist
''The Economist'' is a British weekly newspaper printed in demitab format and published digitally. It focuses on current affairs, international business, politics, technology, and culture. Based in London, the newspaper is owned by The Economist Group, with its core editorial offices in the United States, as well as across major cities in continental Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. In 2019, its average global print circulation was over 909,476; this, combined with its digital presence, runs to over 1.6 million. Across its social media platforms, it reaches an audience of 35 million, as of 2016. The newspaper has a prominent focus on data journalism and interpretive analysis over original reporting, to both criticism and acclaim. Founded in 1843, ''The Economist'' was first circulated by Scottish economist James Wilson to muster support for abolishing the British Corn Laws (1815–1846), a system of import tariffs. Over time, the newspaper's coverage expanded further into ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Open-source Hardware
Open-source hardware (OSH) consists of physical artifacts of technology designed and offered by the open-design movement. Both free and open-source software (FOSS) and open-source hardware are created by this open-source culture movement and apply a like concept to a variety of components. It is sometimes, thus, referred to as FOSH (free and open-source hardware). The term usually means that information about the hardware is easily discerned so that others can make it – coupling it closely to the maker movement. Hardware design (i.e. mechanical drawings, schematics, bills of material, PCB layout data, HDL source code and integrated circuit layout data), in addition to the software that drives the hardware, are all released under free/libre terms. The original sharer gains feedback and potentially improvements on the design from the FOSH community. There is now significant evidence that such sharing can drive a high return on investment for the scientific community. It is n ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
