Folks, I barely made it through the first season. It has been a ton of hard work to play this game, and it has dragged me kicking and screaming from my comfort zone on more than one occasion. I've spent countless hours in research, reading other agents' evidence, doing quests and missions, creating my own personal transformation, combating spam and trying not to feed the trolls. It has definitely been
fun, but it's kind of a peculiar definition of fun. More at
flow,…
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Added by Gene Becker on May 13, 2010 at 2:02am —
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My town's
Climate Change Action Plan includes a broad spectrum of strategies for reducing greenhouse gases. A 2005 audit estimated that the city and community collectively produced the equivalent of over 500,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions. Of this total, 46% were from cars and other vehicles, 30% from commerical and industrial activities, and 11% from residential sources. Out of concern for both the local…
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Added by Gene Becker on May 13, 2010 at 1:31am —
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Early on in the game I highlighted the efforts of Ann Cotton, founder of
CAMFED, whose mission is to provide young African girls with access to education as a route out of poverty and oppression. The EVOKE mission on empowering women gave me the impetus to circle back and take direct action by making a donation to support CAMFED's efforts in Africa. I wonder what the CAMFED team will make of a donation designated "in honor of Alchemy and the EVOKE Network"?
Added by Gene Becker on May 13, 2010 at 12:13am —
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Reading through the Crisis Communication materials, I found the section on managing
risk, hazard and outrage just fascinating. There is a very low correlation between how hazardous an outbreak is, and how emotionally concerned people are about it. However, there is a strong correlation between people's "outrage" level and their willingness to take action. This leads to…
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Added by Gene Becker on May 12, 2010 at 11:50pm —
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Children, many of you are third- and fourth-generation citizens of the Connected World, which we once called the Internet. You, your parents, your grandparents, and possibly even further back, have never known a life without the vast web of connections that infuse the world with digital energy and bind us together as a species. You are natives of an enspirited reality, where every person, place and thing can tell you its name, its story, its composite subsystems and its molecular provenance.…
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Added by Gene Becker on May 12, 2010 at 11:00pm —
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I just made a microloan to
Um-e-Kalsoom Bashir Ahmad's group of Pakistani women carpet weavers, to support the growth of their business. I did this through kiva.org, which made the process incredibly simple even though I had never used it before. However, the current loan for this group is only 10% funded, so it is not certain the loan will be made.
Interestingly, I find myself now inexplicably connected to the lives of a…
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Added by Gene Becker on May 12, 2010 at 8:40pm —
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The
AQUADUCT concept bike was designed by IDEO in response to the "Innovate or Die" design challenge to create and prototype a pedal-powered machine providing an environmental benefit. It offers an integrated solution to two key water security issues in developing nations -- transportation of water from source to point of use, and pedal-powered filtration to remove contaminants.
It's…
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Added by Gene Becker on March 24, 2010 at 11:52pm —
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My friend and colleague Chandrakant Patel of HP Laboratories has been a leader in thermal management and energy efficiency for large scale data centers for nearly 20 years. He has made it his life's work to make IT more energy efficient, and his vision has grown progressively broader over the years. He recognizes that information technologies such as PCs, mobile phones and cloud computing are becoming an increasingly pervasive and vital infrastructure for modern society, and the need to…
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Added by Gene Becker on March 23, 2010 at 6:50am —
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A nice one page list of ideas for actions you can take, created by the
Community Food Security Coalition. Full PDF doc**ent here:
http://www.foodsecurity.org/what_you_can_do.pdf
We Are What We Eat
* Eat locally and regionally grown foods
* Eat organically and sustainably grown foods
* Join a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA)…
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Added by Gene Becker on March 14, 2010 at 7:17pm —
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I'm fortunate to live in the San Francisco Bay Area, one of the most affluent and prosperous regions on the planet. I never imagined I'd find serious food security issues right in my neighborhood, and yet...
The city of
East Palo Alto, CA is less than 3 miles from Stanford…
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Added by Gene Becker on March 14, 2010 at 6:54pm —
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In just the few days since EVOKE began, we've seen many impressive examples of social innovation and the bright, committed people behind them. But I'll bet most of you have never seen a project quite like this one, in the US city of Detroit, Michigan. The project is called "
LOVELAND: Micro Real Estate Concepts++" and its creator is Jerry Paffendorf who I had the chance to meet a few days ago. LOVELAND is part social innovation, part transmedia…
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Added by Gene Becker on March 7, 2010 at 4:19pm —
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Today is March 3rd, 2020 and I have been dancing for five hours in this crazy red rock desert. The quarter moon works its way slowly across the sky, marking our ritual progress. Friends are here too, bodies pulsing rhythmically or beating the drums in frenzied time, their active tattoos weaving bright contrails of color in the darkness. Photos are taken, videos uploaded; evidence for the mission. We are gamers, and we play a long game.
Ten years ago I went into…
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Added by Gene Becker on March 3, 2010 at 9:16am —
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I started a twitter list to help myself learn more about what's happening in Africa, especially around social issues, technology and entrepreneurship. There's a lot to learn... Do you have suggestions for more people to follow, or good lists that already exist?
Added by Gene Becker on February 17, 2010 at 5:43pm —
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Social entrepreneurs come in all shapes and sizes, it seems. So many people are doing amazing work in Africa through young, creative organizations like Kiva, Ushahidi, Maker Faire Africa, and many others. But I found myself drawn to, inspired, and completely charmed by a sixty-year old English woman, Ann Cotton, who has devoted her life to the pursuit of a simple, compelling idea: that educating young women can save the world.
Ann… Continue
Added by Gene Becker on February 15, 2010 at 7:29pm —
3 Comments
Alchemy calls on each of us to bring our expertise and experience to the world in times of crisis, of urgent human need. But so often, the specific skills and knowledge I carry into a situation are nearly useless because they are constructed on assumptions about the capabilities, resources and social infrastructure of my world of…
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Added by Gene Becker on February 10, 2010 at 11:32pm —
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