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An extension of my thoughts from a comment here.

Ushahidi, at its core, is a simple map. While it's been marketed as a tool for information dissemination in times of emergency and crisis, it could also do very well in a city's normal operation. Why not turn its slogan of "Crowdsourced crisis information" into "Crowdsourced information"? Think about all of the things and all of the useful data a nicely sized city has that could be improved with a map—bus locations, closed roads, future events, city-sponsored events, power outages, park closures, public art installations, and so on. I know that if I had a map nicely listing all of these things in a nice, filterable interface, my life would be a lot easier. If you think about it, Ushahidi is the perfect platform for all of these things. Its mobile infrastructure would allow for citizens to text in an accident, a road closure, or so on and have it instantly appear on the map. The SMS alert capabilities would let you get a text message if something happens within a certain radius of, say, your work or neighborhood. Think of the possibilities that could open up if governments embraced the crowd!

Postscript: I'm going to try for a proof of concept with this for my city, Austin. Stay tuned!

Views: 36

Comment by Sarah Shaw Tatoun on April 20, 2010 at 8:21pm
That sounds really interesting, Nathaniel. I can imagine lots of people with niche interests of one sort or another eagerly updating this real-time.
Comment by Nathaniel Fruchter on April 21, 2010 at 1:06am
Added the map!
Comment by Michele Baron on April 21, 2010 at 1:47am
Crowdsourced information and your map might contribute a lot to movements in the local area. Since you brought up the possibilities of having government embrace the crowd, have you thought about running a collateral test posting of your map with local police/emergency coordinators (and/or maybe news teams) to get their feedback and suggestions as it develops? Thank you for your post.
Comment by Nathaniel Fruchter on April 21, 2010 at 3:03am
I don't doubt that the local police and emergency have much more sophisticated systems than this. However, I might get some others' opinions on it—maybe not from emergency services, but from other citizens.

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