Mashups, Open APIs, and the Future of Collaboration in the Nonprofit Tech Sector
If a conference can inspire new ideas, clarify one’s mission, and connect the people who can put those new ideas into action, then it rocks! That was my experience yesterday at the Nonprofit Technology Conference in New Orleans.
After a lackluster performance by David Pogue (I realize that 75% of the conference attendees disagree with me on this point), my day got rolling with an awesome presentation by Brian Reich of EchoDitto (author of Media Rules). Few people can sum up the unique qualities of 30+ niche social networks and then contextualize these distinctions for the nonprofit sector. Reich’s presentation did just that and got the wheels turning in my head.
In the afternoon, I headed over to “APIs for Beginners”, presented by Kurt Voelker (Forum One Communications), Tompkins Spann (Convio), and Jeremy Carbaugh (Sunlight Foundation). This is where my mind really started churning.
I was in the second row, a real keener, thinking about the big elephant in the room: collaboration.
API’s allow for the integration and mashing of data, services and hardware. Data in the broadest sense can include the actions that constituents take in support of nonprofits, independent projects, and specific outcomes.
It’s no leap to imagine APIs that allow for seamless, on the fly, coalition building among nonprofits and social action platforms. Merge (temporarily) the constituent databases of three leading nonprofits, present an opportunity to take action in support of the common mission these nonprofits share, and carry out those actions by drawing on the toolset of two or more social action platforms.
That would be making the most of APIs for social change work.
The problem, as Jeremy Carbaugh pointed out in response to a question I posed, is the culture that nonprofits work within. We tend to think about technology in terms of advancing specific programs at specific nonprofits instead of delivering on the promises we have made to fulfill our mission.
Let’s take some time to examine the culture in which we do our work. Let’s bring programmers to the table before we spec out our programmatic work (hat tip to Tompkins Spann) and rule out the possibility of working toward our mission in full partnership with the nonprofits that also work in our area.
My “Mashup of 29+ Social Action Platforms” could be a first step toward this vision. I’m trying to create a meta-level “cloud” of all social action opportunities that individuals can take in support of nonprofits, independent projects, and specific outcomes. This “cloud” draws from 16 social action platforms, and offers real opportunities for individuals to engage with social issues. Often these opportunities are created by individuals themselves.
The “cloud,” once turned into “a search engine for social change,” ‘’a map of social change,” or “a recommendation engine for social change” will result in an integration of the nonprofit sector in ways we can’t fully imagine.
Through “A Mashup of 29+ Social Action Platforms,” social action platforms like Change.org, SixDegrees, DonorsChoose, ZaZengo, and others are showing that opening data to 3rd party developers can result in more opportunities for engagement and (I hate to borrow from Milton Friedman) “lift all boats.”
On the fly technology-enabled coalition building is the future of nonprofit tech. Getting there won’t be easy. Thank you to the presenters I met yesterday for sparking these reflections.
PS – The enthusiasm for my work that Idealist.org founder Ami Dar offered toward the end of last night, during the Calder Strategies launch party, served as extra affirmation that I’m on the right track. Thanks Ami! I’ll make sure Idealist.org knows about the open-API of social action opportunities as soon as it’s ready. In the meantime, people can test drive the mashup here.
PPS – If you like what I’m up to, please cast a vote for “A Mashup of 29+ Social Action Platforms” in the NetSquared Mashup Challenge. (Voting ends on Monday, March 24 at 5PM PST)
