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Aspiration 2014 Holiday Newsletter
Hey friends,
This fall, we have seen more sticky notes on walls than leaves falling from autumn trees. So on behalf of every idea written on fluorescent paper, thank you for your support, collaboration, and participation in helping technology work in service of social justice efforts. Take a moment to see where we have been and what is to come.
What is up at the SF Nonprofit Tech Center
Since moving into our new home in January, we have opened up our San Francisco Nonprofit Technology Center to all kinds of collaborative meet-ups, nonprofit trainings, and coffee drinking contests with capacity builders and justice-oriented techies. We have been fortunate to have some pretty awesome happenings in-house lately.
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We collaborated with EPIK in a Maker Party to help parents and kids learn code through Minecraft on September 27.
- Dirk from FabRiders hosted a training on data strategies for activist campaigns on November 21.
- Come to our SF Tech Center Holiday Party on Wednesday, December 17 at 5:30pm!
Want to drop by to enjoy our coffee, Wi-Fi, or training spaces and meeting rooms? Get in touch and let us know.
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Meet the newest member of the band
Last month, we brought our long-time friend and ally, Ruth Miller, on to the team. Ruth has generously facilitated and shared knowledge at many Aspiration events around the state. She brings her background in city planning, along with skills in data-driven research, graphic design, and technology practices to our organization.
As the Lead Technology Strategist, she will play a vital role in our tech process documentation and human rights technology work.
Reflections from CA Tech Fest Richmond
We started autumn on an incredibly high note when over 100 social justice and nonprofit folks met in Richmond for our fifth California Nonprofit Technology Festival on September 25 and 26. Recap on the collaborative energy from CA Tech Fest by reading coverage from local Richmond news organizations, as well as notes and photos from the event.
Read up on the Tactics of Collaboration
We are fortunate to have a board of directors that actively contributes to and amplifies the work we do. Steve Wright, our board member, recently published an awesome piece titled "The Tactics of Collaboration", in which he explores ways to create effective collaboration between humans.
"Participatory events require vulnerability. Engaging fully in a participatory event requires that those with status risk their social currency by engaging in conversation as equals."
Read blog
Check out the 2014 Aspiration t-shirt
After many trips to the drawing board, we were lucky to have Ruth join us just in time to design this year's Aspiration t-shirt. We excitedly debuted it in November at the Dev Summit in Oakland!
- Read about the design process and tools that Ruth used to create the graphic.
- Want to wear our colors? Get in touch and tell us your size and address.
- Special thanks to Jack, Taisha, and Laura for contributing ideas in the early stages of tee-development.
On the horizon and in the rear view mirror
On the horizon:
- We are co-organizing the TA Bridge Follow The Money Workshop in Berlin in January with a range of great collaborators.
- We are excited to once again help lead Ushahidi's Team meeting in Nairobi in February.
- When spring is in the air, we will be headed to Valencia, Spain to facilitate the Tor Developer Meeting and Iran Cyber Dialogues as part
of the larger Circumvention Technology Festival.
In the rearview mirror:
- The afterglow from the Nonprofit Software Development Summit on November 17-19 is still fresh in our minds. Thanks to everyone who co-created another set of inspiring days focused on building open tools to support social justice causes. Check out session notes on our Wiki.
- We are just back from Amsterdam, where Gunner facilitated
Greenpeace's 2014 Programme Leaders Meeting.
- In the spirit of all things Open Web, the whole Aspiration team headed to London for the Mozilla Festival on October 24-26 to hang out with 1600 of the most collaborative, creative denizens of the open internet and collaborative learning.
- We helped tie off another year of Code for America Fellows at the 2014 Fellows Closing Retreat.
- We headed to Bogotá to facilitate The Access Initiative's
Global Gathering, where practitioners discussed using technology for
environmental and natural resource accountability.
- The Shuttleworth Fellows Gatherings have become a twice-a-year staple on our calendar, and the latest meeting in Malta was inspiring as Fellows working on a range of innovative open projects around the world shared updates and offered inputs on each other's efforts.
- The Responsible Data Forum Resource Sprint in Budapest capped a year of groundbreaking work by the Engine Room towards developing and documenting best practices for how nonprofits and activists should think about the data they collect, analyze, and store.
- We also had the privilege of facilitating the first-ever Ethics of Data conference at Stanford where a diverse range of stakeholders both discussed the ethical challenges posed by data-centric work in civil society context and co-designed tools and resources to address the same.
- We headed to Istanbul to help the Internet Society host another
Collaborative Leadership Exchange.
Say hello
We hope you stay warm as you wrap up your year-end goals and holiday gifts. Keep us posted as you plan for an awesome 2015, and as always, feel free to drop by our Nonprofit Technology Center in San Francisco to say hello.
all the best,
Javier and the whole Aspiration team
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