From the category archives:

Africa

Words, Images and Music

February 22, 2010

For a couple years now, I have been mulling over a project that combines photography and word, collected widely and presented in publishable form (kind of like this). This project has always taken a back seat to current realities, although a few people have heard the concept. At the core, it plays on the power [...]

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Novogratz on Indespensable People

February 20, 2010

Jacqueline Novogratz on how to recognize a linchpin from Seth Godin on Vimeo.
90 seconds I can agree with.
B
       

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Launch Week: Skoll Associate Fellows

February 12, 2010

Many times over the past couple years have I answered the questions: why an MBA, why Oxford?
Today’s launch of the Skoll Associate Fellows program indicates why I chose to come here. Recognizing that there was a large and and passionate social entrepreneurship community, far beyond just the Skoll Skollars, the Skoll Centre has kicked off [...]

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Yesterday I Totally Microwaved a Lecture

January 29, 2010

The inventors of the microwave thought their device would be used for cooking whole meals from scratch. It never really was, but users found out that it reheated food pretty well, saving the appliance from the graveyard of failed inventions.
Yesterday, rendered immobile by back pain, I Skyped in to listen to a 3 hour lecture [...]

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6 Great Development Blogs

January 18, 2010

No longer living in Ethiopia or Senegal, I’m not as tuned into the workings of on-the-ground development. Thankfully we have some good folks who keep us in the loop and help us learn more. Here are my favorites.
Blood and Milk. Alanna Shaikh writes all over the place, but her own Blood and Milk blog is [...]

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Phone Power

January 3, 2010

A powerful, reoccuring theme for me recently recently has been the growing importance of mobile technology. This is as profound a shift in many parts of the developing world as it is in the richer nations. Mobile adoption in Sub-Saharan Africa is ocurring at staggering rates. The International Telecommunications Union puts out a report each [...]

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Shot of the Day: Celebration

December 23, 2009

Whether your cause for celebration is getting home through the chaos of bad weather, seeing friends and family again, or a necessary change of pace, I wish everyone all the best over the holidays.
I’ll be taking a break from Cashewman for a few days, but feel free to have a read through last year’s Christmas [...]

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Shot of the Day: Through the Looking Glass

December 19, 2009

Fascination is always endearing.
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(Atia and friend in Senegal, 2006)
       

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Shot of the Day: The Rice Machine

December 11, 2009

Technology development and teting can be messy. But usually pretty fun stuff. Here we were trying to build a portable rice dehuller to process local rice in smaller villages, back in 2006 in Senegal. I was working with EnterpriseWorks, an organization that is particularly good at this type of thing. The idea was that entrepreneurs [...]

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Click advocacy: What is your click worth?

December 6, 2009

(Yep, this’ll take a few minutes to read. I promise it’ll probably be worth it. But if you don’t feel like it, here’s the 3 sentence summary: 1 Click-related advocacy has reduced engagement barriers farther than ever before. 2 This is good if it brings people onto an engagement ladder, or bad if it let’s [...]

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