Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

MAY 16, 2010

Miradi is a joint venture between Benetech and the Conservation Measures Partnership (CMP), a consortium of global environmental organizations committed to improving the practice of conservation. The program guides users through a series of step-by-step interview wizards, based on the Open Standards for the Practice of Conservation.

Norway 133

Norway Conservancy Sweden Software 133

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JUNE 28, 2013

That support includes the sharing of best practices in accessible book production, model agreements for readers with disabilities, and open source access technology for reading the books.

Library 225

Library Government United States Accessibility 225

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

FEBRUARY 3, 2014

Inspired by socially responsible and mission-driven clients, last year she shifted her focus to practicing in the nonprofit sector and served as Pro Bono Counsel at the Wikimedia Foundation. She spent more than 15 years at major international law firms, including Jones Day and Dechert LLP.

Team 167

Team Los Angeles Chicago San Francisco 167

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

AUGUST 26, 2013

Practical and creative innovators, like Benetech, need space to operate to ensure those benefits reach those people who are often most in need of new solutions, but are often least able to afford them.

Internet 142

Internet Copyright Law Open Source 142

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JANUARY 4, 2009

We believe that digital Braille displays combined with Bookshare really make Braille much more practical. It helps blind people all over the world, as this recent sample of Hindi Braille demonstrates. We're very proud at Bookshare.org about our support of Braille.

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Sample Library Demonstration Celebrate 100

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JANUARY 30, 2013

“Born Accessible” at TOC If you are interested in learning more about the future of online book publishing, don’t miss the session entitled Born Accessible: An up-to-the-minute update on the tools, standards, techniques and developments that support ‘Inclusive Publishing’ practices.

Accessibility 171

Accessibility eBook New York City Social 171

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

MAY 22, 2013

The need to get practical, to find a business model that provides massive financial return to investors, means that many great ideas get put back on the shelf when the inventors realize that they aren’t a fit for the venture capital model.

Syria 196

Syria Guatemala Open Source Lecture 196

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

NOVEMBER 3, 2011

I joined the NYCLU team, where we worked on data collected by the New York Police Department about their “stop and frisk” practices. This particular weekend we divided into teams and tackled projects from the New York chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU), MiX Market, and UN Global Pulse.

New York City 133

New York City New York San Francisco Analysis 133

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

SEPTEMBER 24, 2008

It might come as no surprise that Rami is attuned to discriminatory practices and willing to stand up for himself. So, it seems to be just one airline's discriminatory practice in its zeal. It wasn't easy for him: he had to sue them because they wouldn't hire him even though he was highly qualified.

China 104

China Local Course Children 104

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

OCTOBER 15, 2012

For example, through our DIAGRAM Center , we are now advancing tools and best practices to tackle the next big challenge in book accessibility: making the increasing numbers of pictures and graphics accessible.

Library 164

Library Student eBook Accessibility 164

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

MAY 6, 2010

At the same time, we should be able to gather enough data to find out whether certain practices contribute to better outcomes. It's difficult in looking at real world environments and finding direct and sole causation from a given intervention.

Conservancy 124

Conservancy Measure Effective Washington 124

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JANUARY 17, 2014

To address this need, we’ve been operating the DIAGRAM Center , a research and development hub working to set standards, generate best practices, and design tools to ensure that images found in digital content are accessible to everyone. One of our goals is to lower the cost of making an image accessible by at least a factor of ten.

Copyright 196

Copyright Law Accessibility Library 196

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

APRIL 30, 2012

Social entrepreneurship is a new field whose actors will all benefit from a systematic search for best practices for developing, sustaining, and scaling innovative and effective responses to social needs.

Award 154

Award Lecture Social Student 154

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

FEBRUARY 15, 2010

The big vendors of medical gear that sell into the developed world have no practical interest in deploying products at a third, a fifth or a tenth of their current price points. But, what happens after doctors in Africa rave about how successful this or that invention are in their hospital? And that's where things break down.

Global 178

Global Technology Marketing Kenya 178

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

MAY 17, 2013

And there’s more: Martín is the author of books on economics, development, municipal government, education and even poetry! You can learn more about him by watching the short film I mentioned above, one of the Sundance Institute and the Skoll Foundation’s “Stories of Change.”

Paraguay 142

Paraguay Award Africa Conservancy 142

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JULY 9, 2018

My point is that copyright exceptions enable the ebook to deliver far more social benefit than would be practical in an earlier era. My particular expertise is in using the disability copyright exception (also known as the Chafee Amendment or Section 121 of the Copyright Act in the U.S.) The ebook has overcome these barriers.

Accessibility 135

Accessibility eBook People Copyright 135

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JULY 5, 2008

is the first public release of this software that was created as a joint venture between Benetech and CMP, a consortium of global conservation organizations committed to improving the practice of conservation. Miradi 2.0 Miradi was beta tested by over 600 users in over 80 countries prior to the 2.0 public release. Read the Miradi 2.0

Conservancy 100

Conservancy Press Software Environment 100

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

MARCH 28, 2014

Moreover, if you could accelerate shifts away from unsafe cooking practices, you might have a terrific return on social investment. If it worked, would it lead to behavior change that would save lives? We didn’t know, but it wouldn’t be that difficult to try out. Worth some thought: I’ll stick that idea into the Benetech Labs hopper !

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Ideas Kenya Brain Software 223

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

MARCH 18, 2012

Teach good programming practice and provide general programming and tech support (everything beyond basic IT stuff) to the rest of the team, who are experts in statistics and social science with varying degrees of techiness.

Analysis 150

Analysis Statistics Chart Language 150

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

AUGUST 12, 2007

There were several projects that I saw immediate applications to practice, and a couple that could directly help Bookshare.org users. I also got to visit with different grad students and professors doing assistive technology research, and was quite impressed. These kinds of visits are really energizing.

Washington 100

Washington University Student Seattle 100

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JUNE 25, 2014

Moreover, since the nature of technology is such that it comes instrumented for measurement, this approach also supports the development of best practices in the delivery of social outcomes, which is essential in order to create meaningful, lasting change.

Paraguay 144

Paraguay Problem Application Global 144

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

MAY 28, 2008

For a person without high functioning legs, a wheelchair is not that practical in the community. Around the town are quite a number of Worth Trust enterprises. One of the enterprises we stopped by made the hand-tricycles I saw all over the region. Instead, there were a lot of tricycles with the crank mounted where it can be turned by hand.

Picture 100

Picture Fun Job Professional 100

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JANUARY 24, 2011

Right now I’m spending more time on a new project concept at Benetech around helping local government address practical issues around climate change. Although the topic was on learning disabilities, one of the funders present had a strong interest in environmental ideas.

Rhode Island 145

Rhode Island Learning Roles Course 145

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

OCTOBER 15, 2009

The program allows environmentalists to design conservation plans that bring together best practices in environmental management. Miradi (Miradi 3.0 is now available for download) allows environmentalists to figure out which environmental strategies actually work. Dozens of environmental organizations in 100 countries currently use Miradi.

Bahamas 100

Bahamas Mongolia Thailand Conservancy 100

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

MAY 7, 2012

Because of the high minimum, the amount of time to take care of the donors is much more practical than if there were 100 or 1,000 donors. That way, there's more of a connection with the innovations being powered by the Fund, both the successful ones and the unsuccessful ones.

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Fund Social Liberia Money 154

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JUNE 12, 2014

Before this case, I’m not aware that there had been an explicit discussion of the legality of the practice of granting individuals with disabilities access to images in alternate formats. In particular, we’re excited about the promise that the appeal court’s ruling holds for the expansion of our efforts to improve access to images.

Accessibility 205

Accessibility Copyright Law Library 205

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

FEBRUARY 10, 2012

To help stamp out such practices in another country that’s been devastated by them feels more than meaningful – it feels imperative. Aside from these valuable lessons for my future in this field, the use of principled and scientific data analysis in securing long-overdue justice for police brutality has personal significance to me.

Guatemala 137

Guatemala International Project Statistics 137

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

APRIL 7, 2011

And when it’s not, or when it’s less good than today’s standard of practice, people who make decisions believing that it is predictive or comprehensive will be in real danger of failing to meet their obligations to the people they serve.

Picture 140

Picture Data Disaster Map 140

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JUNE 28, 2006

Having the chance to talk to an expert like Jenny helped me understand the development environment, which cell phone capabilities are widespread in China as well as practical differences in the issues that would be facing us in a country like China.

China 100

China Phone Literacy Ideas 100

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

FEBRUARY 4, 2012

Melodrama aside, many people have asked me how practical an electric car with a range of roughly 100 miles is. But, the gentle speed of turtle mode conserved the last kiloJoules of electrical energy and we glided to a stop in front of the charging station at my house. We'd made it! And for me, it's turned out great.

San Francisco 157

San Francisco Virginia San Jose Test 157

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

MAY 2, 2012

Our lower cost model made it practical to invert the power structure. Instead of us deciding what people with disabilities should read, we let our readers decide which books should be scanned and shared under an exception in the U.S. copyright law. As a result, we quickly became the largest online library for people with print disabilities.

Celebrate 145

Celebrate Google Literacy Library 145

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

SEPTEMBER 4, 2014

It could be that we don’t quite have the product right, or we need to see a technical advance that will make it practical, or simply that there are other, more attractive enterprises to build at that point. It’s not unusual for a Labs project to be put on the shelf at some point in our pipeline.

Technology 163

Technology Profit Application Method 163

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

NOVEMBER 9, 2009

This practice was especially awarded at the ESR conference. I just got back form the Economic Self-Reliance Conference at Brigham Young University in Utah. When I attend conferences to give a keynote, I usually try to stick around for more of the conference and listen in to the other presenters.

Conference 100

Conference Social Utah Open Source 100

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

FEBRUARY 20, 2011

The free and open source software, which is a joint venture between Benetech and the Conservation Measures Partnership (CMP) , guides users through a series of step-by-step interview wizards, based on the Open Standards for the Practice of Conservation.

Guam 124

Guam Conservancy Software Help 124

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

DECEMBER 5, 2009

Everything is negotiable under license, except in practice, they don’t want to negotiate about access -- because there’s not enough money involved. They claim exceptions aren’t needed, because IP owners are happy to help. Except, that’s the status quo. And access doesn’t happen. Because of money. Actually, lack of money.

Copyright 158

Copyright Comment Proposal Accessibility 158

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

NOVEMBER 25, 2013

Our Martus Field Team has trained hundreds of human rights groups and individuals, in over 40 countries, on Martus use and human rights documentation best practices. In many cases, Martus also helped users turn those first-hand accounts into evidence of abuse in order to advance their causes.

Burma 168

Burma Analysis Guatemala Law 168

Beneblog: Technology Meets Society

JUNE 8, 2010

Oppose the Stakeholders’ Platform unless it is changed to be as good or better than today’s status quo practices, which I think is unlikely. Be open to negotiating on the US-JR if it’s stipulated that it is a step on the road to a treaty (a “yes-and” strategy). Until the EU-JR is released, wait and see.

Accessibility 133

Accessibility Global Copyright Law 133