March is Non-Profit Technology Month!

Beth Kanter — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 07:55:39 -0600

This month is going to be busy for those who work in the nonprofit technology field.

The NTC (Nonprofit Technology Conference) is the largest gathering of its kind with more than 1,000 technology leaders from the nonprofit world converging, this time in New Orleans in two weeks. The agenda will be packed with lots of sessions and networking opportunities where nonprofit techies will share their knowledge, share best practices, and have lots of fun. This will be my 8th NTC Conference and along with Blogher and Netsquared - one of my favorites.

Why?

I've been working with nonprofits and technology for 15 years and attending the NTC is like a family reunion in a way. These are my people! Although I haven't been as meticulous as Christine in counting the actual numbers, just taking a look around - the NTC has great gender balance - on the panels and participants. Out on the blogosphere, there are many NPtecHers sharing their insights about working with nonprofits.

Here's a sampling:

Amy Sample Ward gives a report from a recent Netsquared Net Tuesday in Portland, Oregon
Michelle Murrain, an open source evangelist and guru, shares a wonderful post about the difficulties of "eating your own dog food."
Beth Dunn reflects on why new bloggers may not initially embrace comments on their blog.
Deborah Elizabeth Finn (one of the people behind LOLNptech) has written a terrific primer for nonprofits on Search Engine Optimization
Judi Sohn outlines her vision for data portability uptopia
Nancy Schwartz talks about how chocolate cake engages like good nonprofit marketing.

NpTecHers are also taking to video blogging. Katrin Verclas recently announced Mobile Active's YouTube Channel and Jayne Cravens, nonprofit virtual volunteering expert, also launched a channel.

Also taking place this month in New Orleans right after the NTC is Penguin Day, a day-long workshop for nonprofit organizations to explore the range of issues and options inovlved in using Free and Open Source Software. At last year's Penguin Day, I took a quick video to get a reading of the gender balance. Very roughly, the percentages for Penguin Day look better than industry standards for both OS and commercial software. The video incorporates some slides from Angela Byron's excellent presentation, "Women in Floss" which also speaks to the dark side of gender issues in FOSS communities. The presentation offers some good pointers to women in how to get involved in FOSS communities.

Netsquared is holding a Mashup Challenge. The goal is to social change with a unique mashup idea. And, you'll get an opportunity to win cash prizes and attend the NetSquared Conference (N2Y3). Use the NetSquared Mashup Challenge Project Submission Form to enter NetSquared Mashup Challenge. But hurry, submissions will be accepted until March 14, 2008 at 5 PM PST.

Beth Kanter, BlogHer CE for Nonprofits and Social Change, writes Beth's Blog.

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March is Non-Profit Technology Month!