HumanKindMedia

Concerned about our global footprint? Help educate a girl

In an unusual and inspiring conversation hosted by Swissnex last week in San Francisco, Mathis Wackernagel, founder of Global Footprint Network, was not talking about increasing food production, reducing carbon emissions, or lowering consumption. He spent most of the evening talking about co-presenter Ann Cotton's work at The Campaign for Female Education (Camfed) in Africa.

Cotton and Wackernagel came together as part of Swissnex's ongoing program for "connecting the dots" between science, higher education, art and innovation for exchange and collaboration between innovators in Switzerland, the US and other countries.

In this conversation, the two described their first meeting at the Skoll World Forum (both have received Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship). After a chance seating arrangement next to Ann, Wackernagel realized a connection between the outcomes Ann was describing and the goals he was looking at for sustainability. Since then they have been looking at ways to work together to educate leaders, countries, communities, and NGO's about this correlation.

Ann Cotton and Camfed have been HumanKind Media favorites since this interview Liz did with Ann and Camfed graduate Fiona Muchembere. Fiona, you may remember, is now a human rights lawyer, and serves as director of Camfed’s alumnae network of 8,000 African women as well as being a big supporter of those girls herself (she sponsors 22).

Wackernagel is a Swiss native and PhD in community and regional planning from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, where he created the Ecological Footprint, a science-based sustainability tool that measures how much of the Earth's resources we use, how much we have and who uses what.

In 2003, he and Susan Burns co-created Global Footprint Network with a mission to work with countries and cities, companies and individuals to monitor current ecological resource balances and to plan for the future, with the ultimate goal of reducing humanity's worldwide use back down to a "one planet" footprint. Check out the link to see when we passed the "one planet" mark (meaning we exceeded the Earth's bio-capacity.) You can assess your own footprint if you haven't already, here, or for eye-opening world footprint data click here.

Global Footprint Network aims to make the Ecological Footprint as prominent a metric as the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to help countries begin to plan for sustainability. By 2015, through its flagship Ten-In-Ten Campaign, they hope to have ten countries managing their ecological wealth in the same way they manage their finances. To date, the list of countries, companies, NGO's and collaborators is growing and the case stories are impressive.

Last month on their 5th anniversary, GFN released their Africa report which examines the possibilities for managing African resources to advance African goals for ending poverty and disease within a sustainable development model. In spite of the fact that individual Africans' resource consumption is extremely small - in many cases not enough to adequately provide for
themselves and their families - rising population is bringing the region close to its ecological limits, according to Global Footprint Network's report.

Using scientific standards for the footprint to measure a country's bio-capacity combined with the UN's Human Development Index as an indicator of socio-economic development, Wackernagel is an evangelist for female education as a way to ensure Africa’s growth and development within the one-planet sustainability window. He says, "For $2 billion a year, just by investing in girls, you could transform all of Africa. This is one of the best investments we could make to achieve human development goals that can persist in the face of, and even help alleviate, resource constraints."

The pair make a compelling argument for the direct impact of female education on Humanity's Ecological Footprint: Girls who receive an education and can make decisions regarding their lives have a higher likelihood of marrying their peers at an appropriate age; they have fewer and more healthy children, are more likely to positively affect the health and education of their children, and contribute to their communities. They also earn significantly higher income than their peers--15 to 20% more per year of high school education.

As an illustration of this, last year Camfed and its alumae organization, Cama, supported more than 408,000 kids in school, had amassed 2,700 partner schools, and developed 380 community health care workers. The over 8,000 alumnae of the organization are sponsoring schooling of over 25,000 African children themselves.

Among the alums are filmmakers and program managers for Camfed in their countries; there are also assemblywomen, physical therapists, doctors, nurses, human rights lawyers, and business owners. In the UN Chronicle Ann says, "For the Millennium Development Goals to become a reality rather than just a broken promise, the rights—and dreams—of rural girls and women must remain at the forefront of policy planning and strategies. The education of girls and young women—with its dividends of poverty alleviation, gender equality, HIV/AIDS reduction—is the single most effective means by which so many of the problems blocking Africa’s development can be overcome."

In March, Goldman Sachs announced their 10,000 Women initiative which includes a partnership with Camfed to provide rural girls with post high school education in business, financial management, and entrepreneurship in a "summer school" program beginning in December.

Today, in my 29-Day Giving Challenge Day 3, Round 2, I added my support of a Camfed high school student, which I can now see not only as an investment in a girl's future, but in the future of a continent and a planet, too. Not bad.

You can help a woman heal the world by donating here. You can contribute to the important work Global Footprint Network is doing around the globe here.

If you're a new reader, welcome to HumanKind. You can get free updates here. Wonder what we're up to? Click on the links on the upper right, or scroll through the topics and archives on the left. If you're a regular, thanks for your support! Let us know what HumanKind can do to keep the media you'd like to see coming your way. You can e-mail me at chris (at) humankindmedia dot com. And please do share HumanKind with your friends.

Community

Some of our friends have huge extended families, from full compliments of grandparents, aunts and uncles, to swarms of cousins, in-laws and people to whom they know they're related, but don't know exactly how. When a big event comes up for our family, I feel particularly wistful for my kids who have a total of 7 of us family members that we can conjure up to celebrate (and that involves lots of miles and airfare). So, for my son's graduation, I did what I always do. I called upon the "relatives" we've germinated the past 20+ years-- the friends we've made from babies through high school, our neighbors who have watched us grow as a family, the teachers we have loved, and dear friends we made through our kids along the way.

When we were all in a room together last week, celebrating my son for his graduation, I realized what community means, in the deepest way I have ever understood it. It's how we honor our collective past, how we create possibilities for the future, how we send our kids off, how we help each other grow, and how we support one another beyond the family unit.

When I was writing about sustainability, I watched the film, The End of Suburbia, an alarming but informative look at post-oil America, which was an eye-opener for me. After the End of Suburbia I fretted for a few weeks until I noticed what communities do when they need to: Iowa, New Orleans, China, Indonesia. Now, I see strong communities as an even more important link in our survival and evolution.

All along at HumanKind Media, we've been looking at communities--local, international, on-line and on the front lines--for what they offer for healing the world. From the Millennium Villages to the U.S. community Braden's building for a school community in Zimbabwe, from Cami's and Nipun's giving communities, to Dave Egger's pirate supply grassroots education community, I have seen what's possible when people come together around a common bond.

In 1993, John Kretzmann and John McKnight's groundbreaking study of communities, Building Communities from the Inside Out, A Path Toward Finding and Mobilizing a Community's Assets, proposed a move from focusing on a "community" or region's problems (the deficiency model) and focusing instead on developing and using the unique skills, and assets of the community members (the asset-based community model).

I have been appreciating the on-line communities I belong to more because of the assets people bring--the vast burgeoning community of new media bloggers, change makers around the world, our 29-Day Giving Challenge group, and especially our little band of HumanKind Media readers. And, I've also been paying attention more to the communities I am physically, locally part of--a neighborhood, a small unincorporated town, a school district, a community of parents and kids of my kids' ages, a coaching community, a meditation community.

In this recent post, I talked about the human universals--commonalities all of us humans on the planet share. Among the human universals are: collective identity, coalitions, reciprocal exchanges, food sharing and gift giving.

I've been actively imagining the community I could live out my post-oil days in, with a community garden, tutoring centers for kids near every school, multi-media library centers, and local music spots for spontaneous jam sessions and concerts that everyone can walk to. I've been thinking of that asset-based model, where everyone contributes their own unique skills and assets, and the whole is better than the sum of its parts.

I have some plans for the next few months to explore communities around the world that are creating and building new possibilities for a future worth passing on. As you can tell by the delays in my recent posts, I can use all the help I can get. If you have ideas for posts on cool communities, please e-mail me or leave a comment. Stay tuned.

Tuesday Links: Little blogger goes to the big media conference

Well, if you're still with me, thanks for your patience. We have proven that I can't write blogs and attend conferences at the same time.

Last week I was like Charlie at the Chocolate Factory of new media, having attended a Journalism That Matters conference put on by Media Giraffe at UMass and then the very amazing National Conference on Media Reform put on by freepress.org. Now I am suffering from an embarrassment of riches in the arena of people doing great things against what seems to be the impossibility of recapturing the media for the public.

Local place-bloggers, traditional journalists, policy makers, Senators, new media mavens and scholars all came together to represent thousands upon thousands of grass-roots and alternative media proponents around the US. Among revered reporters (Bill Moyers, Dan Rather, and Phil Donahue were speakers) and internet media experts were hip-hop bloggers serving marginalized youth, new media filmmakers, local youth radio supporters and on-line journalists and bloggers like me. We all shared a common intention: representing the voices of all the people--the raucous, cacaphonous, dissenting, diversified public the way that the American forefathers envisioned in the First Amendment--in media.

Though our constitution is faded, it's still a great set of guidelines for a thriving democracy. I love that so many people care so much to travel to a conference to learn more about how they can contribute to a free press remaining free, and how we can use stories to transform our society towards its full promise.

I heard later that Bill O'Reilly, a main face of Big Media, called our gathering "fringe left lunatics". I've never subscribed to labelling people right and left, blue and red, right and wrong, (or sane or lunatic for that matter) myself, but it's kind of fun to see how threatening a group of 3000+ who want to read and see news that's relevant, varied, and informative can be to the likes of O'Reilly.

In January I wrote a piece about what I was learning about the media and being the change in the media that I'd like to see. I hope we "new media" people can remember that all "media people" are people. I hope we can steer away from the pitfalls that have turned so many of us off to fear-driven, celebrity-filled infotainment as our primary media diet.

I hope we can remember that even mainstream media, for all its flaws, is filled with people like us who deserve respect even if we disagree with them. I hope we as readers and writers can choose against the pundits who are bent on right/wrong, left/right, red/blue, safe/threatened, with/against polarities in their reporting. I hope we demand of our media to hear more sides than one side, more stories about problems and people fixing them, less about what we should be afraid of or hate.

The conferences were filled with people just like you and me trying to make a difference in the world. It was fabulous. I have a long list of stories I hope to share over time if changing the media to change our world is as interesting to you as it is to me. In the meantime, watch this video now or save it for some quality viewing. It's a compelling explanation by Bill Moyers about "communitainment", why we should care about what's happening in the media, and what we should do about it.

Theme Tuesday: Giving Community Links

(Writing to you, late, from rainy Minneapolis) I'm starting to think that when we shift our media to stories about people helping people, giving is naturally invoked in us. Just as our fears, cynicisms, frustrations, and disappointments can be triggered by mega-media and news entertainment, I think our best selves are summoned by the changing-the-world stories, and we become more connected to our generosity.

We've been telling a lot of those stories the past 9 months, so for Theme Link Tuesday, I cavalierly thought I could come up with a "quick" list of cool links to give our 29-Day Challenge participants for ideas for places to spread their money, their time, or just to share with others. But, I can't top the ideas and touching reflections on giving that you'll find if you flip through the blogs and the forum on the 29-Day Giving Challenge community page. It's so fun to be part of a virtual giving community.

In fact, my hopes for the world rest largely on the phenomenon of virtual, web-based communities of smaller physical communities--groups of like-hearted clusters banding across the airwaves with other similar groups to create critical mass in healing the world...like you and me, joining the 29-Day Giving Challengetogether.

Change.org, Care2, Dollar Philanthropy, and, our friends at helpothers.org are just another few giving/changemaking communities I'm aware of. What are some of your favorite on-line giving communities?

It's officially Day 3 of HumanKind Challenge #4, the 29-Day Giving Challenge. People are starting every day, trying to help Cami get to her goal of 2000 participants. It's not too late for you to jump in. Here is where you sign up and here is our group page (please sign up here, too) and I'm posting my updates to the challenge on my page. Please join us. Did I mention it's so fun to be part of a virtual giving community?

If you're a new reader, welcome to HumanKind. You can get free updates here. Wonder what we're up to? Click on the links on the upper right, or scroll through the topics and archives on the left. If you're a regular, thanks for your support! Let us know what HumanKind can do to keep the media you'd like to see coming your way. You can e-mail chris (at) humankindmedia dot com. And please do share HumanKind with your friends.

Day 1 of HumanKind Challenge #4

Hooray, it's June 1, the first day of HumanKind Challenge #4. I'm pondering the little personal idiosyncracy of mine that made me have to start the 29-Day Giving Challenge at the beginning of the month. If I look back at my week, I "gave" my time, my energy, stuff, and love all week long. So did you probably. But, somehow, today, waking up with the intention of being generous, I feel a different lightness and connection, and I feel a little happier. I can't wait to hear how it's going for you. I expect the 29 days will be filled with ups and downs, dids and didn'ts, but most of all a sense of shared community and fun.

If you're on the fence about joining us, I'm invoking Mother Teresa here to give you encouragement:

"If you can't feed 100 people, then just feed one."

and

“We cannot do great things on this Earth, only small things with great love.”

If I needed a reason or a "goal" to do a giving challenge (which, apparently I did), my goal would be to help Cami, the amazing person who started this, meet her goal. She's looking for 2000 people to do the 29-Day Giving Challenge by the end of July. My goal is to help her by encouraging as many people as I can to join with me. I'm #349, and there are already several after me. Wouldn't it be cool if you all joined, and then invited 3 or 4 friends to join (who invited their friends?). More than 2,000, or 20,000 would be good. Not impossible. (You know my stance on "impossible".)

I guess the reason I waited until June 1 was so I could invite my HumanKind readers and my friends to join me. Now you've all received your invitation. I hope you'll jump in. Some of you already have signed up, I see, and I applaud those of you who started right away (thanks, Audrey) without that artificial June 1 hang-up I had.

Liz says informs me that signing up is a two-step process. If you've signed up at the 29-Day Giving Challenge community, but not the HumanKind Challenge #4 group yet, you have to click on our little "globe-in-the-hands" logo on the main page (on the lower right) or on the group page and "join" the group. You'll read our daily updates there, and can share some of your experiences, too, once you're in the giving-your-comments mood. If your browser is different and you don't know what the heck I'm talking about, e-mail me and I'll try to explain it differently.

I woke up pretty excited about my ideas for my first day of giving. You can read my recap on the 29-Day page. I'll just say that already before noon, I'm filled with that special kind of gratitude for the world that comes from doing a small thing for someone else.

Coming up on Tuesday Links: a myriad of links and ideas for your 29-Day Challenge. Stay tuned.

If you're a new reader, welcome to HumanKind. You can get free updates here. Wonder what we're up to? Click on the links on the upper right, or scroll through the topics and archives on the left. If you're a regular, thanks for your support! Let us know what HumanKind can do to keep the media you'd like to see coming your way. You can e-mail chris (at) humankindmedia dot com. And please do share HumanKind with your friends.

Lamed Vovniks redux

To reform a world, to reform a nation, no wise man will undertake; and all but foolish men know, that the only solid, though a far slower reformation, is what each begins and perfects on himself. ---Thomas Carlisle

Some bloggers get a little obsessed with their blog stats--how many people visit, how many subscribers actually read the blog, percentages of newcomers, length of visit, and on and on. I'm hoping that over the next several years mine keep going up, but I'm happy with slow, solid growth and trying not to be too affected by the sky-high days and the low trough days. I do watch the stats to see which links people visit and I really enjoy the wild searches that lead to HumanKind Media. In fact, if you're a regular reader that found me from an accidental search, I'd love to hear about it (begging for comments, again.)

I am intrigued by a mystery, though, and the most mysterious and wondrous of all the stats for HumanKind Media are the "lamed vovnik" hits. Way back in the fall I wrote a rambling piece about the Jewish legend of the Lamed Vovniks, the 36 Just Men (just, meaning righteous or good). You can read the whole post here In it, I performed a complex set of steps toward reasoning that, if the Jewish scholars hundreds of years ago thought there were 36 wise men (translated to "humans" by me), we should be at millions or billions of wise humans by now (using math, genetics, and Jewish scholarship, none of which I'm proficient in).

It was my way of saying we all have the potential for goodness and contribution to changing the inequities in the world, and that the prognosis for doing so was getting better every day. "Unabashed optimism" could have been the tagline for the post.

Anyway, it's historically the most visited page on the site--several times a week. It's a complete mystery. Maybe there are more Jewish scholars out there than I could imagine. Maybe somewhere in the world every day, a few people just google "wise men" and up pop the vovniks, or maybe the word "vovnik" means something in every language in the world, and I'm just lucky I put that word in a title.

Since I have this regular Lamed Vovnik reminder in the stats, I've begun looking around for vovniks in my daily travels. We've written about some of the more famous, obvious candidates: Paul Farmer, Jeffrey Sachs, Mohammed Yunus. I think Randy Pausch, the Last Lecture professor, certainly has my vote, and I'd put my Sweet Husband Jeff on the list because he knows just what to do (which is normally nothing) when I'm off balance (or schizoid) and because he has the wisdom to enjoy life to its fullest while I'm over-thinking it sometimes. My friend and meditation teacher, Pam, is one of the wisest humans I've ever met, and, of course, I'd put the Dalai Lama and Jimmy Carter on the list--and all the older, wiser leaders working tirelessly and patiently for peace and understanding around the world.

But, if I knew you, I might put you on the list for saying something to someone who needed just what you said last week, or for being quiet when it was the right time to be quiet. Or, if you reached out and helped a stranger, or if you're thinking about voting this year for your love for the world rather than your fear of the future, I'd put you on the list for your courage--that's got to be a Lamed Vovnik trait. I might put someone on the list for tutoring children, or drilling water for villages that have none. I'd put anyone on the list who had learned to forgive, or let go of a bias. If you've felt that longing to make a difference, and haven't turned away at what seems like the impossibility of it all, you're on the list for sure.

I do think we're all Lamed Vovniks. Every Lamed Vovnik search hit I see in the stats makes me wonder--is it you? What's the wise and just-ness in you up to these days? Do you see yourself as a Lamed Vovnik, a just , good, wise person? I hope so. Imagine the possibilities.

Got any candidates you'd add to the list? Send me a comment! (2nd begging for comments in one post--new record!)

----

Tomorrow, June 1, is the first day of the HumanKind Challenge #4, 29-Day Giving Challenge. Everyone is invited to participate. Invite your friends, too. What could be more fun than practicing generosity together for a month? Here's the post with the details, and here's our group page (where I'll post my daily updates and hope you will, too) on the 29-Day Giving Challenge community page. For those of you still absorbing your possible Lamed Vovnik status, it's a great place to start.

If you're a new reader, welcome to HumanKind. You can get free updates here. Wonder what we're up to? Click on the links on the upper right, or scroll through the topics and archives on the left. If you're a regular, thanks for your support! Let us know what HumanKind can do to keep the media you'd like to see coming your way. You can e-mail chris (at) humankindmedia dot com. And please do share HumanKind with your friends.

Theme Tuesday: Friends we haven't met yet

New Plan: Theme Link Tuesday. When I was stuck last week, I let go of my fixation on themes for series of blog posts. Now, I can throw caution to the wind, and just write about anything, I told myself. Well, I could, but that much freedom might cause paralysis--too many choices every day. I've had about 8 different things rumbling around in my head for the several weeks after Pangea Day, that I've just wanted to share without creating a big essay. Oddly enough :--), they all seem to have a theme. So the new plan is themes on Tuesdays, where if you like the theme, you can follow the links.

I love the new abundance of stories and news with a different narrative than what I found troubling in the mainstream media. I picked the name HumanKind Media for this blog because I was dismayed at the amount of "us vs.them" and "right vs. wrong" stories in the media. I thought a "humankind" perspective helps tell a different story every time, whether it's a city council meeting someone's writing about or a national election, education or travelling to Mars.

In his decades of work as an anthropologist, Donald Brown has been researching and documenting human universals, the traits that every human on the planet has in common. In this talk on Pangea Day he talks about what he's learned during his years of studying humans.

In his list of human universals are weapons, and agression in males, but also disapproval of violence. He found we all form collective identities (I vote for HumanKind), we all look for mediation of conflict and all disapprove of stinginess. All humans share food. We all share the same facial expressions for the same emotions. Just tripping through the list is a reminder of how little difference there is from me and my 5 billion+ other fellow humans I haven't met. Also, good to remember when you're mad at your boss, disagreeing with someone's beliefs, or stuck in traffic.

Here are some of the wonderful, artistic, beautifully conceived places online you can visit to get a reminder of all those friends you haven't met. What's possible in a world where we look more to our similarities than our differences? Is there someone in your life to tell a different story about?

onBeing Listen to someone's story

one sentence Write your sentence, hit skip (unless you want to publish your sentence), and read the other sentences

6 Billion Others Pick your language first (you can skip the intro if you're in a hurry), wait for a load, and hear what some of the 6 Billion others have to say

We Feel Fine Click on the "Open We Feel Fine" at the top, let it load, then click the dots (or you can select "murmurs" on the left and see what happens.)

If you're a new reader, welcome to HumanKind. You can get free updates here. Wonder what we're up to? Click on the links on the upper right, or scroll through the topics and archives on the left. If you're a regular, thanks for your support! Let us know what HumanKind can do to keep the media you'd like to see coming your way. You can e-mail chris (at) humankindmedia dot com. And please do share HumanKind with your friends.

Feeling Stuck: 3 things a coach might tell me

You may have noticed, I'm a little stuck. It's been over a week since my last post (and I usually have a rule against that). In fact, I notice I have several rules about blogging, which may be why I'm stuck right now. I don't know what you do when you're in this state, but I have a tendency to spend a lot of time pondering WHY I'm stuck.

I have my reasons. First I had a rule when I started about "themes." We started with blogs about ending poverty, then helping women, peace, and making a world fit for children. Then, sustainable living. Part of me could keep writing about sustainability forever. It's like peace. Once you pull on the string, you realize it's connected to everything else.

But, another part of me is having trouble deciding which of all the millions of other topics and ideas out there that are changing the world and trying to fit them into themes and connections, and threads, and what, I wonder do you, my audience, want to see?...You see, here I go spinning again.

If I had a coach right now... but wait, I am a coach. I think it's a common misconception that coaches, counselors, psychologists, and other life helpers can get themselves out of sticky spots more easily. I'm a human (a member of a global citizenry, remember) and for some reason, I can't help but get stuck sometimes, even though I should know what to do.

If I were my coach right now, I'd move me off of the "why, "what if", "oh, no" merry-go-round and I'd focus on 3 things:

1. Tell the truth about "what is". When in a breakdown, the first step is to notice you're in a breakdown. For me "what is" would look something like this: I really want to keep telling stories about all the cool organizations, people, and ideas that are changing the world and I feel overwhelmed at the writing, the publicizing, the trying to build community, and the possibility of failure, (which as a coach, I don't really believe in, but am still programmed to worry about), and I don't know what to do next. Whew. What a relief to get that out!

2. Ask what can be done now? Once I get this far, I'm usually okay again. There's always something that can be done now. The impossible takes a little longer, but it's still just a series of steps. For today, what can be done now is already done. I have stopped wondering why I was stuck and just wrote about being stuck. Also, one of the "things that can be done now" in any stuck place is to LET GO. This is my favorite possibility in the "what can be done now" category. Today, I am officially letting go of the themes.

3. Look for support, ask for help!. Asking for help is usually the step most of us don't like to take in the 3-part breakdown fix. But, sometimes just thinking about who could help, asking one person do to something small, or even asking the universe to come in and straighten things out can have a magical ability to help me take a few steps. Sometimes just having someone listen (or read, in my case) is enough.

But since you're here, if you'd like to help me, there are a few things I would ask for. Drop me a note in the comments or e-mail me and let me know: Do you know a story that would be perfect for 10 % more media about possibility? Would you like to suggest or write a story as a guest? What would you like to see more of (now that we're letting go of themes, we can go nuts)? I admit that I have the "small blog" envy of the big blogs who get lots of comments every day. I'm sure someday I won't be able to handle all the comments, but in the meantime just write and say "Hi". Please.

On the HumanKind action front, if you know anyone in Chicago, I'm still working on ways to work out my Wish for Will and welcome your ideas. And, soon, I hope you regular readers will help design HumanKind Challenge #4, for a BigCarrot submission. Okay, now I feel more excited than stuck.

WE FEEL FINE!
And, now that I'm feeling a little more free and excited, and a little less bound by self-imposed constraints, I can tell you about something cool that happened when I posted this blog. Jonathan Harris, artist/genius and speaker at Pangea Day, with Sepandar Kamvar, has been capturing feelings on the web since 2005 at We Feel Fine. So if you had been watching within a few hours of publication of this post, my feelings of stuck-ness, overwhelm, envy, free, and excited showed up on little dots and murmurs on We Feel Fine. Check it out.

After a minute or two watching the Madness or reading the Murmurs, I feel like I'm okay again. I was just having some feelings ;-). You can read more about We feel Fine here. I loved Jonathan's short explanation of We Feel Fine at Pangea Day here.

Here is what Jonathan and Spandar say about their cool project: "We Feel Fine is an artwork authored by everyone. It will grow and change as we grow and change, reflecting what's on our blogs, what's in our hearts, what's in our minds. We hope it makes the world seem a little smaller, and we hope it helps people see beauty in the everyday ups and downs of life."

Ups and downs--I can relate to that. Thanks for listening.

BigCarrot takes the prize...and does something cool with it

J. Kent Pepper's been enthralled with inducement prizes ever since the NY Times printed a story 10 years ago about Robert Zubrin's proposal for a $20 Billion Mars Prize. After that he watched as prizes for science and technology, the X prize, the military's DARPA Grand Challenge, and the Westinghouse prize, inspired scientists and middle schoolers alike to create amazing advances in many fields.

In J. Kent Pepper's opinion, prizes are the most efficient means to innovation, calling upon a large public to compete and create with freedom, under the inducement of a prize. (For a fabulous trip through a huge array of such space and technology prizes, look at SpacePrize) A cool history of prizes on the Big Carrot FAQ page attributes developments as far back as the 1700's from the food canning process and the parking meter (sigh) to NetFlix's $1M ongoing prize for a 10% improvement in their movie recommendation algorithm to prize-type challenges.

But until now, prizes have largely remained the domain of billionaires, deep-pocketed corporations, and the government.

In 2006, it dawned Pepper that, using the internet, communities of people could collaborate on their own prizes--creating together the desired solutions to challenges faced by the community, creating the design requirements, and collaborating and advocating for the funding--to inspire innovations that serve the community. He spent some time designing a process, getting a patent, and developing Big Carrot, a big-hearted open-source Inducement Prize Generator IPG (I made that up). He calls it the "democratization of innovation". I call it amazing and exciting--the prospect of pulling people together around your community or the globe to participate in solving the challenges we face. With a prize at the end!

His wildly successful beta-test of the Big Carrot concept, the not-Mac Challenge, awarded prize winner, Ben Spink, with $8600, money raised largely by 172 Mac users who were looking for an opensource integration program that normally costs users $99/year for upgrades.

Though the not-Mac challenge met a need of the Mac community, other challenges range from the small to national to global. BigCarrot now has prizes for everything from an Automotive X Prize, in the Environment category, for a super-efficient car that people will want to buy, to a prize in the Computers category to get Linus Torvald (father of Linux) a cameo on the Simpsons.

Pepper is a marketing professional by day who has participated in campaigns for Yahoo, Sun, Lexus and HP among others. He told me that he was influenced early in his marketing career by the work of Tibor Kalman, the famed designer who in the 90's pioneered the combining of marketing with a global awareness/multicultural emphasis in his founding of Beneton's "Colors" magazine.

When I asked him, "Why BigCarrot?", he gave me my very favorite answer: "To change the world." He talked about the possibilities of his current pet project, the Greywater Recycling Challenge which he hopes to see take off among on-line environmental communities. BigCarrot, he says, is a chance to facilitate "the evening out of the playing field for innovation" and gives individuals and communities the opportunity to proactively advocate for and create solutions that are most relevant to them. As he's talking, I'm imagining communities all over who might someday have simple greywater recycling programs, just because BigCarrot had a prize.(I like this idea more than parking meters.)

The possibilities for innovation are endless with this model. If anyone could be as excited about BigCarrot as J. Kent Pepper, it was me after that phone call.

And, the best news: Beginning today, BigCarrot is inviting bloggers and their communities to build their own challenges. Kent is encouraging all of us to rally our readers and communities to pick a topic, waiving the prize origination fee and offering to contribute the first $250 to the prize. The site hosts forums for discussions about potential or current prizes, too, another chance to interact with your readers--a win/win/win.

Would you be willing to contribute a little to see some geniuses tackle a problem that you or your community cares about? Please share this with your friends, your blogger friends, the geniuses in your life, and your communities. This is a Good Idea.

In fact, this gives me an idea for HumanKind Challenge #4. If you're a HumanKind reader, and have ideas for our own HumanKind Challenge #4 ala BigCarrot, email me and we can collaborate on a prize proposal. Stay tuned. This will be fun.

Pangea Day: stories told by the world for the world

What could be better for changing the world than meeting each other through stories? Hooray! Saturday's Pangea Day! Finally. A chance for all you global citizens to connect courtesy of a TED wish. Participate somehow!

See when it's happening where you are, find a venue near you, call some friends over to watch on the internet , or take your phone with you and watch. They've left no room for excuses for not meeting the world on May 10. Hope you can partake. I'll be watching from home between birthday preparations for the 15-year old. If you're watching from home, too, let me know and we can make it a HumanKind party, celebrating wonderful media for connecting us global citizens.