N2Y3 Mash Up Challenge
Net Squared last week announced the 21 finalists in its Net Squared Mashup Challenge, the central concept challenging people to develop projects towards social change based on web do-goodery and general data tinkering.
Finalists compete for a prize pool of US$100,000 towards development and realization of pitched concepts next month in San Jose, California.
Here’s a handful of the shortlisted ideas that I’m backing:
KnowMore.org Firefox Extension: Development towards creating an encyclopedia of “responsibility profiles” for largescale corporates. Webizens concerned with ethical shopping will automatically be alerted to areas of corporate shiftiness when they direct their url to the company-in-question’s site, the extension essentially becoming an automated web monitor for corporate social responsibility. Information is to be developed around categories of Worker’s Rights, Human Rights and Political Influence.
Your Mapper: A broad, socially-minded tweak and application of current Louisville, Kentucky-specific interactive mapping tool Metro Mapper, Your Mapper is intended to provide a platform for the geographical mapping of public information previously relegated to the dormant filing cabinets of local government bureaucracy. Overlays would include public data and display information pertaining to: restaurant health reviews, pollution sources, building permits, and the like.
Freecycle Cellular Development: Freecycle is an already functioning web community site that promotes barter and non-monetary exchange of goods and services in 85 countries internationally; an altruistic, non-cashed up e-bay, if you will. Their submission here is to develop said service so that business and exchange moves and integrates functionality more to a cell phone-based system.
Ushahidi: A site set up to provide information and eyewitness account of acts of aggression and violence during the post election crisis in Kenya (December 2007), by the motivation that much crime, intimidation and social unrest was (and still is) being largely under-reported by various official or media sources. The submission here involves extended development of the site, including the creation of a digital archive for events reported; the ability to track visually via timeline cycles of aggression and cool-off behaviours.
Sound perspective-broadening? Check out all the finalists here.
