Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

JULY 10, 2008

The client is quite knowledgeable about their organization, mission, and goals for a project, but often not knowledgeable about technology. The role I play most often currently is providing a clear and understandable avenue between the client and a technology vendor (such as web or database development shop).

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Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

AUGUST 13, 2008

I’m excited about this project – it’s gathering the knowledge and expertise of a great group of folks, and it will provide a free source of information and case studies so that nonprofits can best figure out how to step into the frothy waters of social networks.

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Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

NOVEMBER 16, 2006

I’m reading this book at the same time as I’ve been working on the Nonprofit Open Source Initiative. I’m realizing that all of the justifications for why I am so into open source and free software is right here in this book! It gets chewy, for sure, but it feels like every chew is worth it.

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Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

JUNE 11, 2007

It’s that there is a lack of really good support – responsive, empowering, educational, integrative, and knowledgeable about, and invested in, the sector. " Its not that there is a lack of technology vendors and support. For those of us who’d like to see organizations get better support – how do we do that?

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Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

AUGUST 11, 2008

Changes in the application happen without your knowledge or consent. Disadvantages to cloud computing Depending on the vendor and the application, you are dependent on them to keep the application up and your data intact. Your data is not directly in your hands, but in the hands of a third party.

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Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

MARCH 19, 2007

In any event, I have a lot of other skills and knowledge besides databases and coding: skills and knowledge in teaching, in writing, in working with organizations, in facilitation, in religion and spiritual practices, and in working with people, that I want to use now. Perhaps I’m now more ready to wrestle those.

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Non Profit Quarterly

AUGUST 25, 2022

Tech nonprofit” is an emerging term that refers to a tech startup that is building software or web applications using a nonprofit model for social impact. Fast Forward, a tech nonprofit accelerator, highlighted a few such organizations during their Demo Day 2022 event. Using Tech to Reduce Barriers to Education.

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Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

JUNE 24, 2008

On the Windows side the hardware manufacturers make proprietary drivers for Windows, and very few make drivers for Linux, or open source their drivers so that Linux developers can use them. Most creatives and knowledge workers who are not developers. These things are far from the fault of Linux. Where is Linux not a good idea?

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Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

AUGUST 17, 2007

Home About Me Subscribe Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology Thoughtful and sometimes snarky perspectives on nonprofit technology The search for good web conferencing August 17, 2007 I decided, perhaps rashly, that one way of exposing people to, and training people on, open source software, was by doing web conferencing.

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Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

AUGUST 7, 2007

Truth be told, there is nothing on my LinkedIn or Facebook profiles that isn’t public knowledge, except who my contacts are. But once you put that data out there, and you have contacts who can see it, you’ve lost control of that data – any of your contacts could make that data about you public. 3 KJ 08.09.07

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Tech Soup

AUGUST 28, 2011

As community member and Executive Director of Knowbility Sharron Rush points out , a culture of accessibility requires "open hearts and minds, the ability to listen and look in new ways, the willingness to lay aside basic assumptions, and a true commitment. And it's free, to boot. A Place to Start — and What Lies Ahead.

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Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

JANUARY 20, 2009

is the executive director of NTEN and expert in everything nonprofit tech. is senior consultant for Common Knowledge and covers the sustainable food community. is an open source software guru who writes the some best posts on that topic. Holly Ross. Megan Keane blogs at TechSoup community site. Rachel Weidinger.

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Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

SEPTEMBER 17, 2007

Secondly, I certainly saw that over the five years I was the IT Director at the Coalition for the Homeless that our clients were increasingly interested in initiating and maintaining electronic communications with our case workers. For one thing, feeding people is not what NTEN does. That dog won’t hunt. 2 admin 09.18.07

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Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media

AUGUST 11, 2009

Our intern Jessica Hass is working on a low-tech version that will be in the physical museum and will invite visitors to “vote” for their favorite out of around 20-30 possible replacements. Debra Askanase is a former community organizer and executive director, and the founder and lead consultant at Community Organizer 2.0,

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Non Profit Quarterly

JUNE 14, 2019

Benetech, founded nearly two decades ago, has a mission to take the technology and knowledge Silicon Valley has figured out and move it into the nonprofit sector. Anh Bui, former director of Benetech Labs, told NPQ that Benetech’s methodology is to “build and harness community. We don’t try to solve a single problem.

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Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

FEBRUARY 18, 2008

As the author of a custom CMS (it did have the advantage that it was released as open source, but it never caught on, so it still counts as custom) I know what it is like to put my heart and soul (and time) into a CMS, and want my clients to get what they want. But, that was then, and this is now. But, that was then, and this is now.

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Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

APRIL 7, 2007

How can we talk about technology in social change, while, at the same time, publishing in a format that limits the availability of this knowledge to people privileged enough to pay for it? This goes back to my constant refrain – the means are the ends. These resources and tools thus improve equality of opportunity.

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Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

APRIL 24, 2007

From my perspective, there are four elements to a technology support process with this as a model: Assessment – where is the client – both in terms of technology knowledge, as well as in terms of what they need at the moment? It opens additional doors. 2 cheryl 04.26.07

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NTEN

MAY 5, 2015

Jessica Holliday, NTEN’s Operations Director, learned a lot at the Do Good Data Conference in Chicago last week and chose to share some highlights with us. One of my first jobs in tech 1,000 years ago was as “Text Production Lead” on a music encyclopedia CD-ROM (Google it, kids). I would have saved the world!

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Tech Soup

JUNE 20, 2013

Announcing the Global Open Data Initiative (GODI). A new Global Open Data Initiative has been launched through a partnership with the Web Foundation, Sunlight Foundation, Open Institute and Open Knowledge Foundation. How open data is transforming democracy in Africa – and the challenges it face s.

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Non Profit Quarterly

AUGUST 10, 2022

These “sharing” tech companies are, in the end, profit-seeking endeavors, and as such they reproduce the all-too-familiar negative aspects of capitalism. We are becoming so dependent on Big Tech that we are starting to believe that there are no alternatives to the big monopolistic platforms. 9</sup).

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