Aug 28, 2023

Public Good Technology Five-Minute Roundup — September 2023

Greetings,

Happy September! 🍂 This month, we are thrilled to officially be launching our Accelerating Makers community-based learning series centered on decentralized technologies (DWeb).

As technologies such as blockchains, the Fediverse, NFTs, and tokens gain popularity around the world, we thought it was a good time to conduct a deep research dive into these tools in order to better understand how they might support civil society. Around the world, people and nonprofits are searching for alternatives to Web2 or Big Tech tools that might help them better maintain privacy, security, transparency, and accessibility when serving vulnerable communities.

Accelerating Makers aims to elevate the voices of the people behind such technologies — the Makers — and connect them with the people interested in or already utilizing them — the integrators. Through a series of online events, community engagement channels, and publications (including this newsletter!), we aim to create the conditions for collaboration and knowledge-sharing about the DWeb among makers and civil society integrators.

We hope you’ll join us in the Accelerating Makers community, or perhaps at an event in the upcoming months. Here goes the five-minute roundup!

Best wishes,

Billy Bicket, on behalf of the Public Good App House team

Maker Events

DWeb and Civil Society: An Introduction for Makers

Discover the essentials of the decentralized web, the workings of blockchains, and the ethical development of DApps in this engaging webinar led by Gloria Kimbwala. Gloria is a renowned tech industry leader with expertise in Web3 technologies and their applications for fundraising, regenerative cryptoeconomics, decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs), and inclusive financial structures.

🗓️ Wednesday, September 6, 12:00 p.m. EDT
🎫 Register now.

Demystifying Blockchain and Decentralization: A Q&A Session

Join us for a Q&A session with Gloria Kimbwala about the real-world applications of blockchain, decentralization, cryptocurrencies, and DApps within civil society.

🗓️ Wednesday, September 13, 12:00 p.m. EDT
🎫 Register now.

DWeb for Good: Real-World Examples of Innovation

Discover how innovative civil society organizations are using the decentralized web for impact through real-world case studies in areas of fundraising, governance, humanitarian aid, traceability, and impact tokenization. Learn about fundraising through crypto donation programs and donor stewardship using NFTs, transparent voting systems, reporting impact outcomes using tokens, and more. This presentation will feature Shannon Ewing, a Web3 expert, leader, and consultant who serves on the board of stewards at ETHDenver, the largest Web3 hackathon in the world.

🗓️ Wednesday, September 20, 12:00 p.m. EDT
🎫 Register now.

Public Good Tech Ecosystem Events

Good Tech Fest: building digital resilience in the social sector

This free virtual event is a partnership between Splunk and AWS for Nonprofits on October 4, offering a dozen workshops across three main tracks (Cyber Security, Data Science, Building Data Capacity) as well as an exciting plenary session.

If you are at a social impact organization, education institution, or philanthropy that is interested in how to best leverage data and technology to further your mission, protect your data, use AI ethically, or ensure that you aren’t increasing the vulnerability of those you work with, then this event is for you.

🗓️ October 4
🎫 Register now.

European Blockchain Convention: The most influential blockchain event in Europe

This two-day event in Barcelona will host over 5,000 attendees and 300 speakers. Experience an unforgettable event featuring three stages, a buzzing exhibition area, startup competitions, parties, and so much more.

🗓️ October 24
🎫 Register now.

Funding and Grant Opportunities

💰 2023 Digital Infrastructure Insights Fund RFP
The Digital Infrastructure Insights Fund is a multifunder initiative by Ford Foundation, Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Omidyar Network, Schmidt Futures, and Open Collective, sustaining a platform for researchers and practitioners to better understand how open digital infrastructure is built and deployed. They are creating a body of research and implementation insights that advance their goal to ensure a public commons of technology, sustainably developed and maintained, for the benefit of everyone. Grants range $50k – $125k for 6-to 12-month projects. Apply by September 30.

💰Funding the Commons Match Fund
The Funding the Commons Match Fund seeks projects that develop, explore, or celebrate public goods in diverse fields such as art, science, technology, and design. Curated projects will receive support of the Funding the Commons community and access to its network of practitioners, researchers, and creators, all striving for a world where public goods are celebrated and prioritized. Eligibility details: Funding the Commons Match Fund

💰100 Builders Match Fund for Open Source AI and Crypto
The funding pool is for $20k to support "open source projects at the frontier of AI and crypto. Details: 100 Builders Match Fund for Open Source AI and Crypto

💰UC Hastings Law School: Startup Legal Garage
Free legal advice to give your startup a kick-start! These grants are worth up to $30,000. The program focuses on supporting women, minorities, and veteran founders. Applications are open on a rolling basis.

Community Spotlight

Pia%20Mancini%20headshot

Introducing Pia Mancini

Pia Mancini is a democracy activist, political scientist, technologist, and the co-founder and CEO at Open Collective and Chair of DemocracyEarth Foundation. Working in politics in her home country of Argentina for many years, Pia learned how technology can be used to inspire public debate, enable voter engagement, and ultimately upgrade modern democracy. Now, she is passionate about using technology to unlock the movement of money to people and communities who need it, no strings attached, while letting them decide for themselves how to spend this money.

On August 23, Pia presented Making Your Community Project Sustainable as part of the Accelerating Makers project, where she dove deep into how Open Collective works as a technology platform enabling fundraising and money management as well as a fiscal host (The Open Collective Foundation) lending out its nonprofit status to groups that might not have access to the legal or infrastructural tools necessary to carry out their missions.

Learn more about Pia’s work or reach out to connect through her website.

We Need Your DWeb Expertise

TechSoup is seeking passionate individuals who have been actively involved in the use or development of DWeb projects for social good. If you have firsthand experience or expertise in this field and would like to share your valuable insights, we would like to include your perspective in our research.

Please follow this link to schedule a 30-minute interview. We promise it’ll be fun!

News and Other Cool Links

💥Announcing the Civic AI Observatory: A space for civil society to learn about AI calmly together (https://medium.com/@jamestplunkett/announcing-the-civic-ai-observatory-2c43b21cbf0e)

💥Web3 Work research report: The DAO contributor's perspective: Findings from our ethnography with DAO contributors and Web3 workers (https://otherinternet.substack.com/p/web3-work-research-report

Support for Nonprofit Developers

If your project is a registered nonprofit, you’re eligible for TechSoup’s discount and donation program. These are among the 100+ products:

That’s all we’ve got for now! If you have something that should be in our next newsletter, let us know at MakerLabs@TechSoup.org

See you soon,

The Public Good App House Team

Accelerating Makers is supported by an award from the Filecoin Foundation for the Decentralized Web.