At our last camp, volunteers experienced what it was like to hit the ground running on the first day of a disaster. They pooled together to see where it was best to help the people of Chile and every volunteer hour counted towards something valuable.
The next CrisisCampTO will be on Sat Mar 13 from 10:00am to 4:00pm at Camaraderie, 102 Adelaide St E.
Please register at http://crisiscampto5.eventbrite.com if you can help for the day.
Today we worked with Ushahidi: a crowdsourced information mapping tool. We are creating a slideshare and video content to help other volunteers learn how to contribute.
There is a need for Spanish translation. Email heatherleson AT gmail DOT com if you can help and I will link you up.
If you have a computer and some time, you can help.
- Ushahidi needs information on anything to do with builidings collapse, medical emergencies, vital communications, food distribution and water distribution. If you find any viable information please add this to Ushihidi.
Ushahidi is a way of mapping incidents occurring related to the crisis, which helps to determine where help is needed, etc. Crisis Campers can find reports of incidents online through twitter, facebook, etc, and submit them to Ushahidi. You can submit reports here: http://chilequake.ushahidi.com/reports/submit
Blog post from Ushahidi: http://blog.ushahidi.com/index.php/2010/02/27/volunteers-respond-with-ushahidi-chile/
Video on Vimeo on How-To use Ushahidi: http://vimeo.com/ushahidi
Information necessary to submit an Ushahidi Online Report:
- Report Title
- Description
- Date and Time
- Categories
- - (Pick one: emergency, threat, vital lines, response, other, persons news)–> these may be different for Chile
- Optional Information
- - (First Name, Last Name, Email)
- Location
- Refine location name (make a name for the location)
- News source link
- Video link
- Upload photos
CrisisCamp volunteers are working throughout the night on Open Source mapping, tweak the tweet, and Ushahidi. To learn more, check out our main wiki page
CBC interviews CrisisCamp Toronto
Daniel Schwarz of CBC joined us for our whole session today help us film and create content. We are really honoured for their constant support to share our story. CBC News Day has invited me to join them tomorrow at 11:30am. We will be talking about CrisisCamp, projects we’ve worked on and how you can help.
Update: The CBC NewsDay interview was postponed.
CrisisCamp Toronto will focus on preliminary research for the earthquake in Chile. We originally planned to CrisisCommons long term planning research.
Location:
Camaraderie
102 Adelaide St E
2nd fl
Toronto, Ontario M5C 1K9
Canada
How to reach us today:
*come to the venue
*email heatherlesonAT gmail.com
Status report and plans for today:
At the moment, satellite imagery is not available yet. Teams are preparing work and plans for volunteers.
Hashtags: #Earthquake #Chile #Terremoto #terremotochile #tsunami
Live Feeds
- U-Stream: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/tv-de-chile
- Trendsmap: http://trendsmap.com/
- http://crisischile.canalblog.com/
- http://terremotochile.com/
There is a CrisisCamp conference call at 11am. Today we will be doing research with Ushahidi, twitter, news feeds, and begin organizing.
More details
From home you can help with twitter and media monitoring.
If you are working virtually, you can join us online (IRC channel). My tag is TOheather.
The next CrisisCampTO will be Sat Feb 27 10am to 4pm at Camaraderie (102 Adelaide St E)
Please register at http://bit.ly/asPyX6.
Looking forward to seeing you for another productive day!
We’re presenting about CrisisCommons and CrisisCamp (Haiti) at Podcamp this weekend:
Session title: Crowdsourcing Volunteer Technical Communities with CrisisCommons
When: Saturday, February 20, 2010 2pm
Where: PODCAMP Ryerson University, RCC 204 at 2pm
Who: Brian, Rachel, Jeff and Heather will be presenting, but volunteers can help too : )
How?
We would love any CrisisCamper to join us for the session. Please bring a laptop. If you can join, please contact heatherleson AT gmail DOT com and I’ll fill you in on the plan. We will get questions and have been assigned a large room to showcase this great project that you have all made happen in Toronto. (Thank you). You deserve to stand up and say: you are part of a movement of folks trying to use our skills differently.
Summary of the presentation:
How can you use your technology and social media skills to help NGOs during emergencies?
All you need is a computer and Internet access. CrisisCommons.org is a Volunteer Technical Community (VTC) made up of a growing group of technical, project manager, emergency planner and social media knowledge workers. After the earthquake in Haiti, cities around North America and the UK started CrisisCamp (Haiti) in their locations to volunteer their time to “help the helpers”. They are using social media tools to crowdsource collaboration on various projects from software development to opensource mapping to social media translation – work that is new and evolving every minute.
Heather, Brian, Rachel and others from CrisisCommons (Toronto) will be addressing the question how can technology and knowledge workers volunteer their skills with one click of a mouse.
The CNW press release for Podcamp.
More next week about the coming CrisisCommons and CrisisCamp (Haiti) plans.
For those of you who weren’t able to see the CBC item from our first CrisisCamp Toronto… here’s the YouTube version.
Today was another successful day for CrisisCampTO. Though today’s event was smaller, it sure was mighty. Thank you to everyone who came out today.
Also, we are grateful for the support from our sponsors:
Thank you!
It has been almost a month since the first CrisisCamps assembled following the devastating earthquake in Haiti. Since the first five cities gathered on January 16, camps were held in more than 20 more cities.
Hundreds of volunteers have given up their nights and weekends to work on more than 40 different projects performing tasks ranging from hardcore development, to data collection, to graphic design, to research, to outreach, to story telling, to translation, to project management, to blogging, to… the list is endless.
In the past month, Crisis Camps have produced websites, applications, data sets, and countless other hacks that made information more easily available to those who need it. Databases were tied to maps and made available to the people providing relief on the ground in Haiti. Computers and telephones became translation tools, people finders, and the route to empty hospital beds. All through the work of hundreds of people, thousands of miles apart. For a complete list of projects , click here.
Working closely with the United Nations, the World Bank, and other groups providing aid, Crisis Camps everywhere have used the internet to create a powerful community with a positive purpose. Using every sort of collaborative and social media tool (open source projects, shared workspaces, Wikis, blogs, skype, chat, twitter, facebook, etc.) this group has pioneered a new kind of aid organization, working hard to provide tools and information vital the mission of helping Haiti recover.
With four camps happening today in the U.S. and Canada, and more planned in coming weeks, it appears that the Crisis Camp movement is showing no signs of slowing down. These cities have contributed so far… (apologies if I missed any).
- Atlanta
- Austin
- Baton Rouge
- Bogata, Columbia
- Boston
- Brooklyn
- Calgary
- Chicago
- Boulder/Denver
- Kansas City
- London
- Los Angeles
- Ottawa
- Miami
- Montreal
- New Orleans
- New York City
- Northern California
- Pittsburgh
- Portland
- Rochester
- Santa Barbara
- Seattle
- Silicon Valley
- Toronto
- Washington DC
The Bulletin is a bi-weekly publication produced by the University of Toronto, featuring articles about the university, its students, and other happenings on campus. This week’s featured an article on the first Crisis Camp Toronto meeting, which happened at U of T’s downtown campus. You can view the whole publication here. The Crisis Camp article is on page 6, or see below…
The location for this weekends CrisisCamp gathering has been confirmed. We’ll be meeting on Saturday at the Camaraderie offices at 102 Adelaide St E, 2nd floor (Between Church and Jarvis). As previously stated, we’re still looking for volunteers for all kinds of technical projects, so if you’re a developer, a coder, a blogger, a tweeter, please join us! Please confirm your attendance at here
