Check out the collaborations from January 16, 2010 events at www.crisiscommons.org

Join us to plan this fall’s CrisisCampNYC!

When:  Thursday, September 17, 2009 – 7pm

Where: Grey Dogs Coffee, 33 Carmine Street, NYC

Social Network: http://crisiscampnyc.ning.com/

August 27, 2009
How many computers are needed to register for assistance in disaster?
Source: Mental Meanderings

As the American public becomes increasingly reliant on communication and technology devices for daily activities, it is a natural assumption that they will also use these devices during disasters.  There are numerous examples in disasters where people rely on their cell phones for communication to others both in and out of the disaster area.

During a disaster, traditional means of communication become overwhelmed through the increase in usage according to the FCC.  Even FEMA’s phone registration is overwhelmed during large disasters and FEMA encourages disaster victims to register online.  Given the increase in demand to register people online and that technology corporations wanted to be involved, the DHS Office of Policy hosted a conference call on September 16, 2008 to explore setting up “cyber pods” on Galveston Island following Hurricane Ike.

This article explores just how many computers are needed to get the public registered with FEMA during a disaster.

[To see more of this story click here]

August 19, 2009
USAID partners to Map the Afghanistan Elections,
Invites All to Share Data on Open Platform
Source: USAID

WASHINGTON, DC. – USAID has partnered with Fortius One’s GeoCommons, Google, Development Seed, Relief Star-Tides, and Synergy Strike Force to map election related incidents online — enabling anyone to share information that bolsters the fledgling democracy.

See maps and layers of data uploaded at http://news.geocommons.com /afghanistanelection09.

[To see more of this story click here]

August 11, 2009
Sahana at Camp Roberts RELIEF experiments
Source: Sahana

Sahana just completed a successful week at Camp Roberts in California at an experiment called RELIEF that is sponsored by the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS). RELIEF is a funded research project of NPS’s Field Experimentation Program that looks at technologies and solutions to get information to government about how better to conduct humanitarian relief activities.  Sahana’s invitation to participate in this quarterly series of experiments at Camp Roberts is the result of our participation in Crisis Campthat was held in Washington, DC this past June, where I gave a 5-minute Ignite session presentation on Sahana, and represented the Sahana project throughout the weekend-long Bar Camp.  At Crisis Camp, I met with Linton Wells II from National Defense University and it’s STAR-TIDES project, whose mission it is to examine low-cost approaches to shelter, water, power, integrated cooking (combustion, solar, retained heat), heating/lighting/cooking, sanitation and information and communication technologies.  Lin extended the invitation to Sahana to participate at Camp Roberts as part of their TIDES research, along with a number of other open source or open standard projects.

[To see more of this story click here]

Thanks for @bgreenberg @ajturner @joelogon @noeldickover @HunterWhitney @seangorman for attending today! So much discussion on a million topics, but we did by the end were able to bucket a few priorities.

• Foster the development of CrisisCommons to support the movement
• Help all of our friends hosting future CrisisCamps (CCNYC, CCWest and CCUK)

These two tasks are filled with questions and opportunities which kept the gang talking for over two hours today.

1) Foster the development of CrisisCommons to support the movement

• Creation of a CrisisCommons Charter (via www.crisiscommons.org – WikiCollaboration)
• CrisisCommons construct is suggested to be a two pronged approach – skilled technologists and of course, those who are not
• CrisisCommons themes would include concepts of community, investment vs. charity/donations/probono, neutrality, trusted, aggregation
• CrisisCommon founding principles could include such ideas as “all information must be free,” “open access,” “open source”
• CrisisCommons bottomline: Empowering global citizens to use technology to save lives
• CrisisCommons goverance could include approaches similar to Wikipedia or Creative Commons
• CrisisCommons could be a place, a think tank, where proactive projects (ex. USAID/GeoCommons project) are launched or during crisis when competing parties come together for the common good

Specific Tasks:

• We mean what we say – Creating the  CrisisCommons Charter (@poplifegirl will begin the charter; @ajturner will post to www.crisiscommons.org). This charter will be a living and breathing document, as Noel says, “perpetually in beta.” This will be the place to scope and describe in detail the mission, vision and guiding principles behind the Commons.
• Tell the CrisisCamp story and why there is a need for a Commons – @hunterwhitney will work on pulling the story of CrisisCampDC and its impact since (Camp Roberts, new camps, projects, ect)
• CrisisCamp 411: (1) CCWest – help Kristin Hogan to connect with interested parties (2) @poplifegirl will go to CCNYC organizational meetup on Sept 12 in NYC (3) @ajturner and @poplifegirl will offer to CCUK to work with them to host a CrisisCamp Meetup on September 26 – with an eye to plan a CCUK October 22 or November 28/29. However, would be helpful to have CCUK before the Hackathon.
• Spending the Fall with CrisisCommons: Create movement through all of the existing activities in the fall (CCWest, CCNYC, Crisis Mapping Conference (Cleveland), Africa/Uganda Conference, Camp Roberts and the Hackathon. All events will be between mid-October to the end of November. Action: Meet with the World Bank to provide listing of events
• September 8th CrisisCommons Roundtable: CrisisCommons would like to bring together all of the leaders of the fall events (related to CC or not) with key supports like industry and the World Bank to discuss how to maximize events to provide feedback into the Commons. Proposed to do this meeting on September 8th (around Gov 2.0 Conference)
• September 9th CrisisIgnite Happy Hour: Maximizing the Gov 2.0 Conference and folks in town CrisisCommons could host CrisisIgnite Happy Hour to cultivate further interest in Camps and the development of the Commons. The HH could have 5 Ignite-style presentations.
• CrisisCampDC #1 AfterAction – Hackathon: During the this session is where industry discussed their lessons learned from utilizing technology assets and technical expertise during times of crisis. Ideas included (see this spreadsheet) family/friends connector systems, common terminology/standards (even with industry), Cap Feed Generator, Imagery Tools, Trend Analysis on Incidents and other technical applications. Opportunity: As this project moves forward, the Commons could work with the camps, NGOs and other organizations to identify priority technical resources which the Hackathon could provide to Commons community.
• CrisisCampDC #2 AfterAction – NonTraditional Actors as Sensors: Knight News Challenge The idea was the use of iReporting by non-traditional actors such as humanitarian aid workers and citizens to be able to provide technical ability to report information to a free and open internet, empower local crowd sourcing techniques and technical aggregation tools. Opportunity: The Knight Foundation is hosting their annual News Challenge where members of CrisisCommons could apply to create a project.

A little history about us:

CrisisCommons brings together domain experts, developers, and first responders around improving technology and practice for humanitarian crisis management and disaster relief. CrisisCommons is part of a global movement who is bringing together volunteers, academia, non-profits, companies and government officials to share best practices and lessons learned to advocate for further use of technology and telecommunications to assist citizens and communities during crisis.

Founded in March 2009 through an impromptu Tweetup at the Government 2.0 Camp, a small band of idealists and innovators gathered together to discuss the idea of a creating a common community through a mash-up of citizen volunteers, crisis response organizations, international humanitarian relief, non-profits and the private sector (especially the technology and telecommunications sectors). Within minutes, the CrisisCamp concept was born to unite communities, seek common ground and innovation in the use of technology and mobility during crisis.