Stories are everywhere, and given the chance, what stories do you want to listen to? What stories have you heard today, and what stories have you created today? A story that is worth remembering, and a story that will make a difference.


We’ve heard about a hug can change a life.

And what if, a conversation can change a life?


The idea was borned out of a conversation with a friend. I said we are not having enough conversations. Cat said we are, but people just aren’t listening! Her idea: let’s claim public spaces to have conversations and to listen to conversations of everyday people.


Not long after, Lee told me of a similar project where people held conversations in public spaces and I said, game on, we’re doing it. I sent out an email to 5 of my adventurous friends, and we organised a coffee where we decided on a date and a time.


The week after the coffee, we brought beanbags, camping chairs, a table, tea, coffee, biscuits, some cups and a kettle and claimed a spot on Brisbane Square.


We put up two signs, one said “Free Chats” and the other said, “Feel like doing something random? Come have a chat!” Within minutes, we had two random strangers sitting with us having conversations about their life and as time went on, we had at least 40-50 random strangers ranging from students to tourists, foreigner on a medical visa to a homeless man dropping in, and some stayed for hours.





For the foreigners and for the homeless man, this was some sort of a recognition of their existence. No political drama, no agenda, just people having conversations like all humans should. To connect the dots and brings back the essence of humanity and community. To us, it was stories that we’ve never heard. Genuine, honest accounts of everyday people around us, and experiences that we hear in books and the media.





Quote of the day, for me, came from the homeless man: “Have a chat? What.. have a chat? The only chat I’ve had are people screaming abuse at me”, he said in a cynical voice in his very strong accent. He sat down for about 2 hours and shared with me his experience as a soldier in the Vietnam War which was really eye-opening and saddening all at the same time. This is an Australian who’ve served the country, and now sleeps on the streets in West End, all because of the mental illness he’s suffered after the war and inability to put up with bureaucracy to get aid and the stress of everyday life.


In our daily life, its hard to comprehend how many stories we missed listening to or initiate conversations that have an effect on someone’s life. The quick, “Hey mate, how you going?”, “Good, thanks and yourself?”, “Yeah, alright” has become so much part of a norm we’re losing touch with what humanity means. What, as a society, we stand for.


So, if you’re up for something random, I challenge you to bring some chairs, or picnic rug and some cardboard, claim a public space and listen. Listen to the stories of the people around you, and you will learn about humanity more than you’ll ever have. Sometimes, a person need in their life is to be listened to.


Where to from here? We’re looking at making Free Chats a monthly project, so every end of the month, you’ll find us in the middle of Brisbane, somewhere, having chats with just about anyone and everyone.

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I presented this as a keynote at the recent 12th Asia Pacific Student Services Association (APSSA) Conference at Queensland University of Technology on the 9th of July 2010. The following is a shorten version of the 45 minutes presentation.


The challenge with this presentation was that there wasn’t a common interest amongst the delegates and there were delegates from all kinds of disciplines, in both undergraduate and postgraduate level. Their understanding and engagement with technology was also diverse, so I tried to make it easy to understand, with some easy-to-do, low level case studies and some higher level, more complex systems.


I started by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land we stood on, and paid respect to their elders past, present and future.


My questions for the crowd to think about throughout the whole presentation, and their life were:

Why do you do what you do? (WDYDWYD?)

What changes or improvements are you bringing to yourself, people around you and the world in what you do?

When we talk about technology, many think about the geeky kids who own an iPhone – but that is far from the truth. I don’t have an iPhone! Technology has become ingrained in our daily life without us even realising it – Facebook and mobile phones. However, when it comes to new technology or other digital media, its easy for us to be skeptical about it due to our ignorance of understanding it. So we cringe, shrug and say that were just “technologically challenged” – but in actual fact, its the lack of awareness and understanding. I want to shift your thinking from skepticism and apathy to actually thinking about how can we embrace technology and use it to enhance our life and bring about social good.


Whether you think you can or you can’t, you’re right – why not the former?


Skepticism of technology existed in the past as well [refer to quotes on slides]. I call this the WTF era.


And let’s talk a bit about the future, because we are all, hopefully, moving in that direction. The direction of social justice, equal rights, basic education for all, peace and happiness. I call this the AWESOME era. You will realise that there is a huge gap between the WTF era and the AWESOME era.


Whatever we do with technology and our life right now, will ultimately fill in the gaps – such as gaps in digital divide, gaps in literacy, gaps in knowledge, gaps in bureaucracy and gaps in financial status. With the advancement of technology, we are connecting, collaborating, innovating and filling in the gap faster and better than we have been. This is highly due to:

improved internet connection – faster, more reliable, always ‘on’ and everywhere

mobile phone – every family ALL around the world owns one

mobile internet – continues to rise at a rapid rate

video and audio streaming – allow access to information in quicker ways; knowledge and literacy gaps

virtual universe – SecondLife, allowing marginalised communities access services they can’t due to personal or medical reasons in real life

Let’s look at some of these innovations and change happening:


FrontlineSMS
An open source software that enables you to have two way communications between a mobile and centralised computer. It was built by Ken Banks where he got the inspiration while working in a national park in South Africa. It was the easiest way they could communicate with the local communities.


FrontlineSMS:Medic
Josh Nesbit was working in Namitete, Malawi at a local hospital with 2 doctors that provide services to over 250,000 people within 100 miles. The only way to do this was to decentralise the medical system, and they recruited 500 volunteers who travels miles each day to check on patients and cycle back to the hospital. He went back to America, and bought 100 phones, taught the volunteers how to use them and installed FrontlineSMS. Later, he started FrontlineSMS:Medic, a team committed to supporting community health workers (CHWs) in the developing world using appropriate mobile technology.


He did not build the software. He used what Ken Banks has made, and changed it to make it relevant for what he needs it for.


JumbaFund
Maybe some of you guys think, well, I don’t know anything about coding so that’s definitely not for me. Let’s look at a guy who has used digital media for good. KevJumba is one of YouTube’s most subscribed channel – with over 96 million views on his videos and over 1 million subscribers.


He started JumbaFund, as a side project that is more about his daily life like playing pranks on his flatmates and making fun of his dad. All money made from the channel via Google Ads are directed to a charity nominated by his readers. There is nothing complicated, or technical about what he does – he just record videos! The channel has over 250,000 subscribers and has raised (I think) at least $10,000 for charity.


Supercool School
Supercool School was founded based on the principle of making education relevant and “real-world” for the students. You search for a school (e.g. start up school or cooking classes) and sign up to the school if you’re interested. You attend scheduled classes and you can also request for classes. Classes are real-time and live, and also recorded in case you missed any of them. Best thing is, when sign on, you also create a profile, allowing you to connect with other like-minded people in the school, collaborate and build a community basically.


What’s exciting is, you can literally build a university from a laptop with an internet connection. Invite a group of people to sit in front of the laptop and there you have a class.


To Mama With Love
I met Stacey Monk while I was at the Non-Profit Technology Conference in Atlanta. She is an incredible woman and someone I have HUGE respect for. When I got back to Australia, I got a tweet from her explaining a Project X she was organising and asked me to be a part of it. I said yes with no questions!


Her first email sent to 70 people in her contacts from ALL around the world, very clearly outlined 3 things she wanted from everyone:

An introduction

What can you do / strengths / expertise?

A good time to catch up

Within 72 hours, emails were flying everywhere and immediately, teams of designers, strategist, implementers, bloggers, website programmers and content creators. She delegated and leveraged, and To Mama With Love was born. Everyone were volunteers, reducing cost of the fundraising campaign to $0.


One Laptop Per Child
So how about digital divide? The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) is probably one of the most successful program in closing the gap. It’s a non-profit, producing low-cost, rugged, low-power, connected laptop with open source softwares and content designed for education and collaboration.


Watch the video and it explains everything.




All these people are doing amazing things with technology – and most of them aren’t even techy geeks. They have a vision, and they build upon what’s already out there. KevJumba and Josh Nesbit definitely aren’t techy geeks at all. Working with technology and digital media is not difficult – it takes time to fiddle around and it will change the way you do things. If it doesn’t, it means that you do not need that piece of technology.


You will realise that I left a gap there [refer to slides], because we are definitely not there yet. We are not at the AWESOME era yet – not even that close but we are very well on our way. We are on the right track. My challenge for you is to fill in that gap. Whatever you do from today onwards, think about why do you do what you do (or about to do) and what value, what improvements and what changes are you bringing to yourself, people around you and the world. You’re from different disciplines (so are most people I described in the case studies), but ultimately, you all still live in the same world. Your contribution in filling that gap is vital.


It went really, really well. I can safely say that 90% of all the conference feedback forms ranked the presentation as one of the favourites or most liked. *Phew*


Action call:
Start a plan or an idea: www.PlanBig.com.au
Pressure the gov’t to provide basic education to 72 million children without it: www.Join1Goal.org
I am working with a group of innovative people building Digital For Good, a project looking at digital technology as a force of good.

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At the end of last year, I got an email from Sarah Moran about a competition on Facebook organised by V Australia. When I clicked on it, the app asked me if I allow them to access my Facebook info and not wanting to risk it without reading much into their privacy terms, I decided to ditch the idea. A while later, Sarah Moran called me and convinced me to join it. So I did!

Basically, I needed as many people to vote for me as possible – the top 10 most votes get a free return flight to either Johannesburg, LA, Phuket or Fiji. Now, the first person I asked pretty much turned me down due to the access to their information on Facebook. I was kinda turned off by it but after much thinking, I thought, I really needed to do something if I really want this. As a social change agent, isn’t this how campaigns and fundraisers usually work?

So I sent a group email on Facebook to 20 of my “friends” and within a day, I got 18 votes which put me at number 4. I then sent out another group message to another 20, then 20 more, slowly to 40 and just before the competition closes, I was at number 11, so I sent out an appeal to about 50 of my friends. Within an hour, I was up in number 4 and won the free trip!

I then got informed by Amy Ward that the 2010 Non-Profit Technology Conference was happening in Atlanta, and I thought, “Great! I could use my free trip for that”. And through Amy also, I found out about the scholarship program – so I managed to score a scholarship! I then did a search on the web and found out about Global Engagement Summit, which I applied and got in – all expenses paid for! Two days before I left LA, I twitted, “Spending two days in LA. What should I do?”.

A friend of mine replied, and linked me to a friend of his who worked in Disneyland. After exchanging a few emails, he asked me to meet him out the front of Disneyland, near the kernel at 10.30am and that, I did! He got me free admissions to Disneyland and California Adventure Park which was freaking awesome!

At the Non-Profit Conference, I also got to meet Stacey Monk through Edward Harran. Two weeks after I arrived back in Australia, I got an email from Stacey inviting me to be a part of To Mama With Love and I jumped at the opportunity. In a week, I saw her put the campaign together and in 3 weeks, leveraged her community to make everything happen! She emailed to 60 people and everyone put up their hand to either help with coding the website, work on the social media strategy, launch plan or to organise their own projects that ultimately feed into the campaign. In the end, the whole campaign was rolled out at no cost at all.

Humans evolved to share and work together – its ingrained in us. Facebook status updates is a great example of that, however when it comes to making use of our community’s assets, we fail miserably at that.

The internet has made us trust strangers more easily, and this was a big part of Rachel Botsman‘s presentation at TEDxSydney yesterday. I didn’t know this guy who gave me the free tickets to Disneyland apart from his name and what he does. I know with this, it brings up the darker side of the internet – online safety and cyberbullying but I’ll talk about that some other day.

Technology has allow us to work together (through partnerships and collaborations) more easily than we have ever been. It has also increased interconnectedness and we are seeing a shift already. We are moving from networks of centralised groups to a more dissolved, decentralised networks of individuals and groups of highly skilled and talented people. The internet is becoming social and this is good news for change makers.

In the old fashioned volunteerism, there are volunteer application forms, bureaucracy and red tapes a volunteer have to crawl through, before he/she gets either selected to be a volunteer or gets a no-no. This system cultivate a culture where you are ‘not good enough’ to do the job regardless of how much passion and interest you have. A decentralised community means that everyone is recognised as a talent and brings something to the table. It embodies the whole phrase, “YOU can change the world”.

When Stacey sent out an email to 60 of her contacts, she introduced the project, got us to introduce ourselves and gave 3 easy steps for people to contribute. You can help code and build the website with the team, work in the social media strategy team or help create video and other contents.



This means that all the people that you are connected to, whether directly or indirectly is an asset to you and your work. We are more connected than we are ever before, and there is a phenomenal amount of potential in this hyperconnection. We have more resources, talents and skills than we think we do. Make your passion, interest, skills and yourself known and take the time to understand and know the people around you.

You have the resources, talents and skills. All that’s lacking now is your big bold ideas and your willingness to put the idea out there for people to scrutinise and more importantly, for people to join your cause. Build meaningful partnerships and collaborations with these people and you are bound to do great things. It is at the intersections of all these partnerships and collaborations that social innovation is at its best.

Think big, start small. You don’t have to be perfect or great at it, sometimes, you just have to share your idea and story, and things happen quite magically.

1. Invest in your social asset – this is your treasure box and your magic wand to do anything.
2. Share what you know, what you have and what you can give. Make it known and make sharing a big part of your life. You will get at least the same amount in return.
3. Understand your community – this includes your family, friends and acquaintances, and everyone around you.
4. Be bold. Either make your idea known or make your passion to social change known.

Some links to that I mentioned during the presentation:
Animoto – an awesome website to create professional looking videos and slideshows.
Plan Big – Plan Big is a great place for you to post your idea and get people to give you constructive feedback

Click here for more resources.

Check out ToMamaWithLove and create a heartspace for someone you love and together, we can help build a home for 50 determined kids in Tanzania.

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Nathaniel recently did a recap of his prediction for social entrepreneurship 2009. I have written about measuring social impact, and one of the other predictions he had is the development of mobile technology.

There has been a number of predictions about mobile internet lately. The IDC predicted that mobile internet users will increase by up to over 1 billion by next year.

IDC predicts that, for the first time, there will be over 1 billion mobile devices accessing the Internet by year-end, gaining quickly on the 1.3 billion PCs accessing the Internet (the former are growing at 2.5 times the rate of the latter).

The introduction of smart phones, especially the iPhone definitely had a great impact on the figure, but I think the most exciting is the rapid improvement of the Android, and a prediction that there will be a Google phone by 2010, which I am sure will fuel the figure.

More Internet Users by 2010
I am super excited at all these figures, because I am sure that the cost of accessing the internet will decrease, especially in Australia where internet download is capped – which I found ridiculous when I first moved here from Malaysia, where internet is limitless. Smart phones will also become more affordable, and this means that for the first time, marginalised communities will be able to access the internet quite easily. I was presenting at Making Links recently, and David Mejia-Canales presented on InfoXchange’s Wired Community @ Collingwood project, where they installed computer and internet, and trained the multicultural community to use the internet. The challenges of the project is not only the financial costs involved, but the training proccess.

Installing broadband in a house is not cheap – you’ll have to pay for the phone line and the internet line, both of which can be quite expensive if its used and paid by only one person. With mobile internet, you do not have to know how to operate a computer, and I am quite certain that learning to access mobile web is a lot easier than via PC.

Marginalised Communities
One of the challenge of internet is reaching marginalised communities as most of these people do not have access to a PC, however, findings also suggest that most of them have at least a mobile phone. The Bridging the Digital Divide, a research undertaken by the Inspire Foundation and ORYGEN Youth Health found that the internet and mobile phones play a much greater role than expected in the lives of young people who are socially, culturally or economically marginalised, and it challenges the concept of the “digital divide” which suggests that marginalised young people’s use of technology is limited.

I guess my next point isn’t exactly “marginalised” communities, but “stigmatised” issues. Being able to access internet on the mobile phones mean that young people can access internet in private and whilst the skeptics will say that this is dangerous, my point of view is that young people will be able to access more information, especially those which typically is stigmatised in the community, such as mental health issues, LGBT, diseases and drug use. However, for this to happen, service delivery websites need to ensure that their websites is mobile compatible, which sadly, most isn’t!

Internet as a setting
I think all these highlights my point from previous posts that the internet is becoming more and more of a setting where people converge, meet and connect. It is beyond just tools, and I really hope that more and more organisations recognise this and builds platforms that allow this to happen. The potential of it is there, the challenge is for people to recognise that and do something about it.

Nathaniel also links to a few other services or ventures that have used the mobile phones for good, and the one that I’ve been waiting for since March is the Extraordinaries. It’s a really good example of how a venture draws power from the connectedness that technology has allow us. The connection is there, we just need to recognise it and learn how to use it wisely.

Photo credit: shapeshift

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When thinking about invention, technology and social change, we cannot go past William Kamkwamba, a Malawian boy who invented a windmill even though he never completed school due to his family’s financial constraint.

The Will
I believe that every successful social innovation begins with a will to change the world – a dream so big no one around you don’t think its possible.

William has always been fascinated by electricity, and after having to stop school, with no knowledge to read a book, let alone understand the theories, he relied on his determination to study the books he borrowed from the library. From his little understanding, he let his instinct and the pictures in the books guide him to build a windmill that will change his family, and his community’s life forever.

New Invention from Old Inventions
He scrambled through the junks and found some scraped metals, tractor parts and a bicycle frame. Using his limited knowledge, he built the first windmill in his village.

His invention, albeit an old invention in many developed countries was a milestone for people in his village, because it means, for the first time, they are able to power electrical appliances, charge mobile phones and pump clean drinking water for free – necessities to many in the first world countries, but a luxury to them.

More than Electricity
Being able to power other electrical appliances mean the family can be connected to the outside world via technologies such as mobile phones. However, the invention has enabled more than just connection to other parts of the world. It was an invention that has enabled them to access technology they have never been able to before, in a sustainable, affordable and green way. The value lies in the large-scale of social change the invention brought to the community.

The next step for them is to replicate his model for every house in the village and hopefully having access to clean water and electricity, these people can generate their own income and understand the power of innovation.

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Thinking Internet Beyond a Web of Connected Computers
About thirteen years ago, youth suicide in Australia was one of the highest in developed countries. At this time, there was something known as the “internet” coming, and Jack Heath, at that time a speech writer for then Prime Minister Paul Keating, was in a meeting with Microsoft and heard about it and knew there was more to internet than just a web of connected computers.

After his own experience with his cousin’s suicide and acknowledging that youth suicide was and still is the leading cause of death amongst young people, and mental health issues remain a stigma and public health concern that has not received much public attention, Jack set out to do something about it.

So with an idea in mind and a trust in technology, Jack sets out what he wanted to do – come up with a website that to reduce the escalating youth suicide rate.

Balance Between Evidence-Based and Innovation
I am one of the lucky few who can testify that meeting Jack and having a coffee with him is an inspiring event.

Jack was smart, right from the start – he knew that there needs to be a balance between evidence-based and being innovative, and a leader in the field. He set up the Inspire Foundation, a non-profit that utilises information communication technology to improve the mental health and wellbeing of young people. It runs two programs – ActNow and Reach Out.

Reach Out became the first online program that addresses youth suicide and is probably one of the first that uses a youth advisory board to ensure that the program remains relevant for young people.

Reach Out also came out with the first, award-winning serious game, Reach Out Central, that combines gaming and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to help young people develop skills for life.

Recognising Internet as a Setting
Recognising the internet as a setting where young people converge, exchange ideas, develop resources and have conversation, and acknowledging the potential of young people, Inspire made a move towards user generated content, inviting young people in the organisation’s work in social change.

ActNow raises the awareness of social issues and connects young people with opportunities in their community, and develop resources to help young people take action they are interested in.

Between the Lines is a community for young people aged 18 – 25 that enables them to make informed decisions and reduce problematic drug & alcohol use.

Inspire has since grown to America and Ireland. Inspire has also launched a Teacher’s Network, providing resources to help teachers use Reach Out in their classroom and Reach Out Pro, providing access and advice for health care professionals on a range of technologies and online resources that can be used to enhance the effectiveness of psychosocial support and mental health care provided to young people.

Inspire’s Success
Inspire’s main factor of success is recognising the potential of technology. We are at the Intelligent or some say, Connected Age where we are more connected than ever before. Technology is becoming smaller, cheaper, more mobile and easier to access. It has help us to reach even the hardest to reach communities, the challenge is now to think outside the box and combining the knowledge of community development and technology to address social needs.

Ashoka: Innovators for the Public are hosting Tech 4 Society, a conference exploring technology, invention and social change, in Hyderabad, India, in February 2009. Find out more about the conference here. This blog post is an entry in their competition to find the official blogger to travel to and cover the event.

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