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We’ve been excited to see the popularity of our J!Salesforce integration tool between Joomla and Salesforce.com (also available to all our Non-Profit Soapbox organizations!). Some folks have been interested in seeing some videos to better understand what the tool can provide to Joomla Web sites. Well, I made a little video tour of the administrator interface and the front-end search form builder to help provide a visual overview. Grab some popcorn and enjoy the show. J!Salesforce Search Functionality Video TourJ!Salesforce Administrator Video TourOur SnowmageddonCleanUp.com Web site has been an extremely useful way for greater DC area residents to post their snow-related problems and solutions. Now it’s time to focus our energies! If you’re from a school, church, or synagogue in the greater DC area, post any help you need this weekend for snow clean up, and we’ll crowdsource the community to help you in your efforts! All you need to do is follow these simple steps:
We’ll take these reports and highlight them on Twitter, Facebook, and the Web site! Let’s clean up our schools, churches, and synagogues one snow shovel at a time! It seems we’ve caught lighting in a bottle here at PICnet. During the course of the past two days, we’ve been honored to have our SnowmageddonCleanUp.com Web site covered in a diverse and wide array of media outlets. We’re hoping that this outreach will help the DC residents learn about this site and extend a helping hand to their neighbors. Here’s a few of our favorite hits thus far.
Snowmageddon Site Crowdsources Blizzard CleanupAfter our launch of the Snowmageddon Clean Up Web site on late Tuesday night, we’ve been picking up a lot of great reaction from the community. Our biggest hit so far: the Washington Post has partnered with PICnet to heavily extend the exposure of our efforts. Check out our site embedded on the Washington Post!
Wow. Thursday was a whirlwind. We worked closely with the Washington Post’s digital media team to make editorial and graphical changes to the site in order to prep for the wave of traffic from their online circulation. Additionally, the great logo that Christopher Doorley made for the site needed to have a little update: announcing the partnership between the Washington Post and PICnet. Thanks to Ross Nover for his stellar design skills to help update the site’s header and additional illustrations. It’s been wonderful working alongside the Washington Post team to help spread the word far and wide. We’re excited to see the continued efforts of the Greater DC community to help each other out of this snow mess. What started out as a test site for an open source software package I was playing around with at PICnet has now become a rallying point for DC residents to help each other dig out of Snowmageddon 2010. Call it the crowdsourcing of shovels.
Since the site, www.snowmageddoncleanup.com was flipped live on Tuesday night, more than 7,000 visitors have come to learn how they can lend a hand in the DC clean up process. Now, with a Facebook fan page and the 72 Hour Snowmageddon Clean Up Challenge, the site has begun to pick up a lot of traction. The site’s goal is simple: connect those in need with those that have resources. Got a car that needs to be dug out? Post it. Got a pair of strong arms that needs a workout after three days of sitting on the couch (most of DC was closed)? Post it. Powered by Ushahidi, we’re excited to see how this site, launched with two hours of work, can be used as a model for other emergency or crisis situations that can be utilized by government agencies and NGOs. While we don’t have enough hands at PICnet DC to clean up the city ourselves, a little bit of crowdsourcing, applied in the right way, just might help us dig out of this mess faster…because snow is only fun when it doesn’t get in the way of trying to get food. At PICnet, we’re always looking for new talent, and right now we’re on a mission: adding another stellar Project Manager to our team to help deliver the high-quality service our non-profit, association, and congressional clients expect. We’re specifically looking for fun individuals from our non-profit sector with experience in the Web development process (Joomla experience is a huge plus). Our Non-Profit Soapbox platform is a Joomla-based content management system used by non-profits and socially responsible businesses to easily manage their Web communications. We’re looking to keep up with demand by adding the right project management talent to our team. Think you’ve got what it takes? Read on… Conference dates: September 30-October 1 One of the most exciting trips I’ve been able to make this year was earlier this fall when I traveled around the world to Mongolia for their Joomla!Day. There was a great mix of attendees in addition to the usual Joomla! Enthusiasts; including B. Dolgor, the head of the cabinet secretariat for the Mongolian federal government; USAID Mongolia; Mr. T. Altansukh, leader of the Mongolian translation team; and university students. I was pleased to give one of the keynotes again at this conference and emphasized the impressive achievement of the Joomla! community in Mongolia translating the entire project into Mongolian. I also celebrated the successful adoption of Joomla! across all federal agencies with B. Dolgor. After sharing information from the Joomla! leadership team on the future of project, we highlighted the community’s potential to make an impact on the global Joomla! community now that they had overcome their biggest obstacle: language barriers. Next steps for Mongolian Joomla! Community users is to help small businesses through this powerful open-source software, as well as to increase transparency in the federal government. Joomla! Can be an empowering tool that leads to a new way of life – and that’s something we can all be proud to be part of. Read more about the conference here. Check out a video interview of me in Mongolia!
There are few events where I get such a great opportunity to meet key individuals in the community, and learn as much hands-on information, and this year’s Dev Summit came through once again. The event was held in Oakland, Calif. from Nov. 18-20, attended by non-profit software developers, evangelists, and technology users. I was fortunate to speak with Nate Aune from Jazkarta and share stories about building successful businesses around open-source software and the non-profit sector. I also had a chance to engage in discussions with Michelle Murrain of OpenIssues, who shared her thoughts on the open-source CMS landscape for the non-profit sector. Ron Severdia, a member of the Joomla! leadership team, also spoke to the group about design principles and the upcoming Joomla 1.6 user interface. There were so many more great folks there that I want to give shout outs to, but there is so little time to say thanks to all of them! Aside from hearing from some of these great people, I spoke on a number of key topics, including open-source CMSs, utilizing cloud services, the Joomla! project, and open-source business models that could support our sector. I was most impressed by the terrific feedback and engagement in the open-source business models session, where participants helped share lessons learned and best practices in achieving success while also building sound business models. You can visit the event wiki to see all the great notes taken during the sessions. This has been an incredible year at PICnet. I mean, if you’re going to take a wild ride, what better way to start it off than by having the US economy nearly collapse? I’ve been humbled by the dedicated work of our PICnetters, clients, and partners that made it possible for PICnet to weather these tough storms. So before we all take off to our Thanksgiving gatherings with friends and family, filling ourselves with turkey or tofu, I wanted to take an opportunity to share my thanks to those that have helped keep the PICnet flag flying high in 2009. Read more » The Brazilian technology community is bubbling with amazing energy, and I had a great opportunity to see it first-hand this past weekend. On Saturday, I was asked to speak at Intercon 2009, an annual gathering of Web technologists in Brazil. I’m excited to report back that the Brazilian community (especially those in the Joomla world) are heavily engaged in our open source technology ecology. My presentation focused on open source content management systems (CMS) with two perspectives: that of a company looking to invest in CMS software, and that of a business looking to build a solid business model based on providing services around open source CMS software. I provided a little snapshot of PICnet’s history, moving from a pure consulting firm to one providing our flagship Non-Profit Soapbox product, while sharing some lessons learned and paths to success.
Many thanks go to our friends at iMasters, who put on this great conference, and who were gracious hosts during my stay in Sao Paulo. I’m looking forward to next year’s event! |
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