Over the weekend I have the privlege to attend AfricaGathering in DC. What I liked most about this conference was its size: very small and intimate. So many conferences are large, made up of niche group, and difficult to really develop strong relationships out of. AfricaGathering really excelled in creating a TED-like format event, focused on everybody’s passions for Africa, that at the end felt like being part of a family. I really enjoyed the day, and can’t wait for future gatherings!

As I thought about how to express my thoughts from the event into words or a summary, I figured the best way is through compiling my Tweets from the event that capture a live stream of consciousness and quotable moments! Enjoy!

Also, check out this image showing the “How It Works” of AfricaGathering (click it for lightbox effect!):

1. 
   marcopuccia Sitting here at #agdc with @jscarantino and @gkofiannan! #socent 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
2. 
   marcopuccia “Life is so much more important when you’re not doing it for yourself” – @jscarantino #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
3. 
   marcopuccia Building communities can go a long ways in breaking barriers and unleashing opportunity @jscarantino #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
4. 
   marcopuccia Africa today, is not Africa of tomorrow – Need long-term horizons when creating programs/platforms @jscarantino #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
5. 
   marcopuccia Poor local distribution systems are largest impediment to getting vaccinations to where they need to go! #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
6. 
   marcopuccia Poor records lead to vaccination waste and overestimation of coverage. Drives cost up, and impact down. #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
7. 
   marcopuccia VaxTrac built on same premise as @ITS_LLC: “Better information, greater social impact!” #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
8. 
   marcopuccia Need accountability systems to make sure vaccines are actually distributed appropriatly -VaxTrac #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
9. 
   marcopuccia Need open-source alternative for fingerprint ID systems…many cross-sector applications! #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
10. 
    marcopuccia Can I say Happy World Malaria day? Not sure what the proper etiquette is… #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie

1. 
   marcopuccia 11.2% – 2008 GDP growth rate in Rwanda /via @kitcody #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
2. 
   marcopuccia Doing business in developing regions often requires ownership or oversight of entire value chain – @kitcody #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
3. 
   marcopuccia “Positive change requires positive people” – @kitcody #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
4. 
   marcopuccia Awesome talk by @kitcody! #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
5. 
   marcopuccia LOL Great Q by @chiefmoamba “Who makes those yellow containers? They must be loaded!” #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
6. 
   marcopuccia Man! Free Blue Sweater books!? I just finished reading literally yesterday! Just my luck lol #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
7. 
   marcopuccia So far, @acumenfund has invested around $45 million in around 40 companies #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
8. 
   marcopuccia Curious about how a social business like Iko Toilet changes consumer behavior… #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
9. 
   marcopuccia #agdc “We’re shifting to African solutions to global problems,” Catherine Casey of @acumenfund /via @ruackerman 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
10. 
    marcopuccia “Human dignity is more important than wealth” -Catherine Casey of @acumenfund #agdc /via @artate 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie

1. 
   marcopuccia I wish I could plug my iPhone into the raw energy and passion at #agdc! lol 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
2. 
   marcopuccia “Africa Rural Connect an experiment in global collaboration to build ideas” @mollymali #agdc /via @ideasforafrica 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
3. 
   marcopuccia Man, we had such an awesome discussion at lunch! I feel honored and inspired to be surrounded by such smart and amazing people! #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
4. 
   marcopuccia Totally digging what @developingjen is saying about the need to integrate metrics into social impact ventures #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
5. 
   marcopuccia Mariemme Jamme (@mjamme) doing a great job as co-host of Africa Gathering #agdc /via @gkofiannan Agreed, she’s awesome! 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
6. 
   marcopuccia “You can’t be credible if you’re not visable” @mjamme #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
7. 
   marcopuccia I love and am so inspired by the raw passion expressed by @mjamme and others #socent #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
8. 
   marcopuccia “Dignity is more important to the human spirit that wealth” #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
9. 
   marcopuccia Africa doesn’t need money. We need a sincere relationship – @Mjamme #agdc /via @gkofiannan 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
10. 
    marcopuccia “People who volunteer time first are 7x more likely to donate” – @eglue #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie

1. 
   marcopuccia Great presentation by @eglue on leading collaboration into action! Really great! #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
2. 
   marcopuccia Half of the worlds women still give birth without a health worker… #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
3. 
   marcopuccia In parts of Africa, 1 in 7 women die related to child birth… #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
4. 
   marcopuccia Mad props to White Ribbon Alliance for bringing women’s rights and maternal health to national and int’l agendas #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
5. 
   marcopuccia “Think about Africa’s mothers. Think about Africa’s children. Think about Africa’s health workers” #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
6. 
   marcopuccia Man this is awesome! So energized by Sean Coetzee and his company Woodsmoke! @liveafrican #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
7. 
   marcopuccia Show people the real faces behind your African products! Transparency sells! @liveafrican #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
8. 
   marcopuccia “From great need comes great innovation!” – @mikeymckay #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
9. 
   marcopuccia Focusing African ingenuity into high-impact innovation can create disruptive change! #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
10. 
    marcopuccia 9 months is avg life of a computer in rural village in Africa, @mikemckay of Baobab Health. #agdc /via @mollymali 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie

1. 
   marcopuccia Art and design are both important elements in re-branding Africa… #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
2. 
   marcopuccia “Makmende is bigger than Wikipedia” LOL #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
3. 
   marcopuccia “Creativity will fuel an economic revolution” -Design Indaba #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
4. 
   marcopuccia Hmmm, I think I found the source of my next desktop background – Digital African Art @digitalafrican #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
5. 
   marcopuccia Every obstacle is a springboard for creativity – @paulsika #agdc /via @gkofiannan 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
6. 
   marcopuccia What an awesome person, speaker, and photographer @paulsika is! #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
7. 
   marcopuccia “When you think about business, you have to think about more than the product; You have to think about the ecosystem” – @paulsika #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie
8. 
   marcopuccia Thank you @africagathering for an amazing conference! This is the begining of something huge! #agdc 24 Apr 2010 from Tweetie

Just a few weeks ago — Feb 11-15th — I had the great opportunity to join fellow social innovators from around the world at the 2010 StartingBloc Social Innovation Institute in Boston. I absolutely love attending events such as this (including GES, SOCAP, The Feast, and the upcoming SVC/SE Conferences). It’s a rare opportunity for like-minded entrepreneurs, intrapreneuers, and social-change enthusiasts to come together and share passions, ideas, and talents/resources. StartingBloc has done a great job recently in carving out a nice market in the field focused on not only students, but young-professionals in the field as well (serving as the middle-ground between GES and SOCAP).

The Institute was broken down into several components: Speakers, a Social Innovation Competition, and an “Ideas Marketplace” pitch competition.

The Speakers

The lineup of speakers included:

Houston Spencer – an inspirational speaker who I unfortunately missed on the first day due to travel failure, but really enjoyed hearing him speak a few days later about unconventional leadership and staying motivated in the field of social change.

Scott Sherman – One of the most excited and energetic people I’ve ever met whose Transformative Action Institute is spreading to colleges and universities across the world “training a new generation of social entrepreneurs, innovators, visionaries, and problem-solvers for the 21st century.” Scott’s presence alone is enough to get you out of your seat and want to change the world, and I had an awesome opportunity to chat with him on the second morning as we took the bus to Tufts.

Bob Tomasko – A professor at American University that I never had the opportunity to meet while I was there, but who is passionate about social enterprise and corporate social responsibility and integrating this into the curriculum. He has an extensive background consulting for companies like Coca-Cola, Ford, Mariott, and Toyota. I can’t wait to continue talking with Bob once I move back to DC!

Corey Szopinski – A social media guru who shared social media strategies for social change. Corey has been involved with developing interactive marketing initiatives for brands among the likes of Coca-Cola, Anheuser Busch, Volkswagon, Virgin Atlantic, and the Nelson Mandela Foundation. His company, Core Industries, brings “award winning interactive marketing to organizations that are leading the green economy and that focus on the triple bottom line: people planet and profit.”

Tom Szaky – An entrepreneur I’ve been hearing a lot of lately — the co-founder of TerraCycle — talked “trash” at StartingBloc. It was actually very interesting hearing him talk about some of the legal challenges TerraCycle has faced in reusing a product like an old Coke bottle as a container for another re-branded product because Coke owns the patent on the shape of the bottle! He shared some interesting insight between “little guy” vs. “big guy” battles that can come with entrepreneurship and the need for legal protections that can support innovation and keep “big guy” companies from holding-up startups in court. Plus, TerraCycle is a very interesting case study of a social startup!

Jeff Chapin – Probably has the coolest job in the world as a “Social Impact Designer” for IDEO. Jeff provided awesome insight into the product design process, particularly BOP-focused design. He shared some projects he’s worked on with IDEO around the world, and I think inspired a lot of to either pursue design-focused careers or at least focus more attention on design approaches to problem solving.

Patrick Meier – A member of the Ushahidi team, Patrick shared an awesome overview of Ushahidi and its involvement in the recovery effort of Haiti. It was really amazing seeing pictures and video “behind the scenes” of the massive volunteer effort of people tracking down information across the web and mapping it on the database. Text messages, tweets, news reports were all dissected to get accurate information to rescue teams on-the-ground. I think everybody in the room was just in awe and inspired by the massive undertaking and work that Ushahidi and the teams of volunteers managed to do in the wake of one of the largest crises of our lifetime (so far).

Dan Pallotta – Author of the book Uncharitable, Dan talked about how the way that we measure and perceive how nonprofits should run dramatically impacts their effectiveness. High overhead and compensation packages are not necessarily bad or signs of corruption — especially when you compare them head-to-head with the budgets and salaries of private-sector companies. We need to move beyond these misconceptions of the social sector and provide them with the tools they need to maximize impact. This involves developing more results-oriented metrics that do not punish charities for running more like businesses. This is something that I’m very interested in and hope to talk more with Dan about.

Colette Stanzler – Building off the need for more results-oriented metrics, Colette shared how her organization — Root Cause — approaches building a social impact market that blends the nonprofit, private, and public sectors through cross-sector partnerships and collaboration. A major part of their work is focused on measuring social impact, identifying successful programs, and spreading and scaling those programs effectively through cross-sector partnerships.

Cheryl Kiser – Cheryl shared her experience as a consultant for businesses’ CSR and sustainability initiatives. She is just now settling into her new role as Managing Director of The Lewis Initiative at Babson College.

Ryan Allis – Co-Founder of iContact, Ryan is actually very much engaged in the concept of social entrepreneurship and CSR. Ryan shared how his company has integrated a 1% Time/Product/Equity/Payroll model for its CSR initiatives. Ryan is somebody to keep your eyes on as an emerging player in the social enterprise space. I’m looking forward to seeing where he goes down the road.

Mindy Lubber – Mindy’s work as the President of Ceres is focused on integrating sustainability into the capital markets, encouraging and helping companies outline and publish sustainability initiatives (and ideally metrics as well). Having recently returned from the World Economic Forum in Davos, she told us how sustainability is becoming a more serious and central issue for business leaders — leading top business executives to attend her session at Davos.

Mitchell Wade – Concluding the Institute, Mitchell left us all with a quote that really resonated: The only change that really matters is that which happens after you leave. This is something that’s so important for us to remember as we build organizations or programs around the world focused on sustainability. From the very beginning we need to be focused on training others to build and grow the organization on their own! It seems like common sense, but you’d be surprised by how often this principle is forgotten.

Social Innovation Competition

One of the conference features was an event called the Social Innovation Competition. It was definitely an innovative way to help fund the institute — using the collaborative power of the fellows to serve as a consultancy to a corporate sponsor. I’m not sure how much I can talk about publicly about the client and the strategy we put together, but we put together a cross between a communications strategy and sustainability initiative for a major US corporation with offices around the world. My team had a blast working on the project, and actually made it to the final round!

Ideas Marketplace

This aspect of the conference allowed anybody to give a 1-minute pitch about their project or something they were passionate about. It was an awesome opportunity to hear everybody talk about their passions and interests! Three finalists were selected to give a longer pitch. Among the finalists were Maria Springer (Kito International) and Leticia Jauregui (CREA).

Final Thoughts

There is a lot of room for StartingBloc to grow as a network of social innovators and as an Institute. It would be nice to see more speakers at a TED-style pace (quick and to the point) as well as more workshops (a la GES).

Where StartingBloc really shines is in attracting an awesome group of fellows that have been vetted through the application process, and developing a strong life-long network connecting like-minded individuals and organizations. This is what attracted me to StartingBloc and was by-far my greatest take-away. As I return to Washington, DC in just a few weeks, I plan on being as active and engaged with this network as possibly by volunteering and helping organize events. Already in the last couple of weeks, I’ve had amazing phone calls and conversations with several fellows. They inspire me with every conversation, and I hope that I can bring some value to their work and their lives. That said, I really look forward to having a continued relationship with the StartingBloc community!

Unfortunately I got an e-mail recently from James at Dvelo.org telling me that due to SEC regulations on delivering returns on investments in the manner that they had attempted required complicated registration as a “brokerage”. Hopefully we can get a new interview with James explaining the situation, and how they have responded!

00:00 – 00:51 :: Introduction
00:51 – 01:24 :: Could You Provide A Quick Pitch of Dvelo.org?
01:24 – 02:25 :: How Does Dvelo.org Differ From Kiva?
02:25 – 04:53 :: What Inspired Dvelo.org?
04:53 – 07:06 :: Tell Us A Little About Your Pilot Launch!
07:06 – 08:13 :: Could You Tell Us More About Your Microfinance Partners?
08:13 – 09:10 :: Speaking of Due Diligence, How Do You Rate MFIs?
09:10 – 09:44 :: What Does the Future of Dvelo.org Look Like?

I had an opportunity to chat with James Beshara, founder of Dvelo.org — a new Kiva-style microfinance website designed to connect micro-lenders like you or I to poor communities around the world. Dvelo stands out on two key fronts:

1. They are a for-profit entity and seek to return interest to lenders — thus motivating self-interest to do good! And,
2. Rather than investing in particular entrepreneurs, Dvelo is community-focused. They’ve left the door open for opportunities to expand into micro-insurance, education, and healthcare!

My thanks to James and Dvelo.org for taking the time to provide a little insight into their business!

This video is available on the following platforms (please share and embed!)

• Vimeo
• YouTube
• blip.tv
• iTunes

Ken Banks posted this video on his site showing the agricultural applications of FrontlineSMS — a technology that allows NGOs in the field to interact across the SMS (text messaging) platform.

Find more videos like this on FrontlineSMS

Here’s your Daily Brief for November 4th through November 5th:

Nokia Launches 5 New BoP Mobile Phones – Nokia has been one of the most successful companies in the world when it comes to tackling BoP markets. They just announced the upcoming launch of Nokia Life Tools, a “service which gives consumers in small towns and rural areas the ability to get a range of livelihood and life-improvement services on their mobile phones,” in Indonesia after a successful pilot in India. Supporting the growth of this new service, Nokia announced 5 new phones specifically targeted at BoP consumers that will support the software.

This Ain’t a Phone, It’s An Arms Race – As mentioned in yesterday’s DB, competition is brewing among mobile phone companies in Africa.

The Informal Sector: Opportunity or Problem? (via CIPE) – One of the challenges facing developing economies is what to do with the informal sector. This post by CIPE offers some nice insight. I didn’t know that informal business accounts for 35-50% of GDP in many developing countries!

Unreasonable Institute Featured in BusinessWeek! – Being unreasonable seems to catch people’s attention! It’s REALLY REALLY hard for any kind of startup to get serious press (especially before they’ve done anything), so this is an awesome feat!

Just for fun:

I saw this video in a blog post on corporate culture and HAD to share it!

A couple of weeks ago I had the pleasure of meeting Ben Lyon while I was in DC. Ben is an extremely sharp entrepreneur that has taken the FrontlineSMS platform to develop a system whereby SMS, mobile banking, and microfinance can be fused together to, among other things, greatly expand the reach of microfinance to the poorest of the poor largely by lowering the costs of implementing a loan.

This is video from the Africa Gathering conference is London just a few weeks ago, just after the official rebranding from CreditSMS to FrontlineSMS:Credit:

Ben Lyon from Africa Gathering on Vimeo.

Here’s your Daily Brief for October 26th:

M-commerce and its Impact on Africa (via Africa Business Source) – Mobile banking is one of the fastest growing industries right now, catching the attention of many — with multiple firms vying to be the industry leader. This article by Alex Twinomugisha is one of the best intros to mobile banking I’ve read. In it, he discusses how mobile banking is changing the economic framework in Africa:

The mobile phone eliminates two of the main challenges to e-commerce in Africa: it provides both a widely available electronic network and a payment mechanism…Already, mobile based “market places” are springing up as in Google’s Google trader in Uganda which is an SMS based market place.

He also notes several other key roles in which mobile banking is playing a key role, including bill-payment and fundraising capabilities.

New SMS Services in Uganda from Grameen, Google & MTN (via WhiteAfrican) – After reading the previous article, I did a little digging into the Google Trader program and found this post by Eric Hersman. His post announced the introduction of a suite of mobile tools released by the Grameen Foundation’s AppLab using Google SMS Search delivering the following services:

• Farmer’s Friend: a searchable database with both agricultural advice and targeted weather forecasts
• Health Tips: provides sexual and reproductive health information
• Clinic Finder: helps locate nearby health clinics and their services
• Google Trader: matches buyers and sellers of agricultural produce and commodities as well as other products. Local buyers and sellers, such as small-holder farmers, are able to broaden their trading networks and reduce their transaction costs. (known locally as “Akatale SMS”)

This is a great video explaining many of the services and the growing significance of mobile technology in Ghana, but really across sub-Saharan Africa and the developing world as a whole:

The following is a guest post by Temi Agama, Founder and CEO of Text2Fly

25 Sept 2009, Abuja

Leading commentators have predicted that Africa will be a hot bed of mobile innovation. A new mobile service that lets you check Nigerian flight schedules using plain old Sms proves just that.

Sms is a difficult medium for an application that would normally require lists of cities and other prompts to guide the user. But Text2Fly makes it easy by letting users enter what appears to be an English language sentence for example, “From lagos to abuja on thurdsay at 3pm”.

It doesn’t get much simpler than that.

Timi Agama, the founder and CEO says “Text2Fly is so simple even your mother can use it. And your flight schedules arrive on your phone in seconds”.
This approach to delivering an application by Sms is patented and brand new. In theory it can be applied to searching for train times in London or bus schedules in New York.

Nigeria is the largest economy in West Africa and, with over 5 million domestic seats sold annually, has the most vibrant aviation sector.

However the “simple” task of finding flight schedules in Nigeria is much more difficult than it needs to be. Some people send their driver to get flight schedules from the airline ticketing office, but in a busy city like Lagos a short trip can take an hour in each direction. Others look in newspapers, but the papers only show the current day’s flights while Text2Fly lets you search a week ahead. Besides, not all papers carry the Nigerian flight schedules. A further option is to search online, but then you have to go to the web site of every single airline in a country where Internet access is very slow.

Text2Fly is like having a travel agent in your pocket. So if you’d like a little less hassle when you travel, visit text2fly.com.ng today to find out more.

Text2Fly is a product of Anthill Digital Limited, a Nigerian provider of innovative web-based solutions.