On May 27 and 28th, the third NetSquared will take place in San Jose California. The idea behind NetSquared is to explore the use of the Web and emerging technologies to foster social change.

Our mission is to spur responsible adoption of social web tools by social benefit organizations. There's a whole new generation of online tools available – tools that make it easier than ever before to collaborate, share information and mobilize support. These tools include blogs, wikis, RSS feeds, podcasting, and more. Some people describe them as "Web 2.0"; we call them the social web, because their power comes from the relationships they enable.

I have been asked to present on Drupal as it relates to social change and the non-profit community. My background is heavily rooted in the non-profit world, having worked for various arts based non-profit companies. I also studied arts, technology, theatre, and non-profit management at Virginia Tech. My presentation will occur on the 27th between 4:45 and 5:45 pm.

I look for "useful to not-for-profit" tools, sites, and resources. Recently a new site called nonprofitlist.org has been developed. The site is broken up into each of the 50 states and you have a choice of clicking on a state like Florida or using the list below the map.

Our goal is to map all of the non profit organization in the United States.

NPSL on MSNBC. Cool.

The first time I ever set up a local install of Drupal was a copy of 4.7.4. I remember aspects of setting things up being a little convoluted. 5.x had not gone into full release--I believe it was in RC 1. So there was no installer and it proved to be an interesting challenge. With the advent of 5.x, things have become much simpler. I'm going to describe how to set up a local install of Drupal 5.x on a Mac--the process is similar on other platforms--and can be used on the beta of 6 if you want to mess around with the newest version of Drupal.

I was asked by a good friend if I could merge the NPSL Offside Links and the Deli.cio.us NPSL links feeds into a single feed on nonprofitcommons.com in a block on the left side of the site. I took care of it this evening, and it is actually a piece of cake to do. These steps work in Drupal 5.x.

There are often misconceptions behind open source. There is the idea that if you don't shell out big bucks for software, that it can't be any good.

This is what I hear...

1. Open source is garbage, there isn't a company to back it up
2. Open source is hard to load onto your computer
3. Open source can make your computer crash or worse

Choose any one of the three and it could be correct, however the well built open source software is often better quality than the commercial counterpart and it is certainly less expensive.

For example, if you compare the feature set of Open Office to Microsoft Office Suite, you may be surprised at how well they compare. At my place of work, only about a third of the staff uses the Office suite. Most use Office instead. Part of this, certainly, has to do with working at a very geeky place, but part of it has to do with thriftiness.

About six months ago, my brother tagged me in a "Virtual Cocktail Party" where the participants disclose five little known details about themselves. Mine were:

1. I worked in a wine shop
2. I fell into technology by accident
3. I met my wife online on LambdaMOO
4. I love to cook
5. I am a cancer survivor

Tomorrow is the seventh anniversary of my completing chemotherapy. In the period between late April and late June I had pretty much been through the wringer.

1. I had surgery through my abdomen
2. I had a groshong® catheter implanted in my chest with a tube down just above my heart
3. Through the catheter I took Bleomycin, Etopiside, and Platinol in a grueling regimen that had me lose my hair.

The experience was profound and life changing. You will often hear from survivors that, in retrospect, the experience was one of the most positive experiences they have ever had. I share that sentiment. I learned a great deal about myself and others around me. My relationships became deeper. My sense of self changed.

To bring this into the realm of NPT, while I sat in the chair at the oncologists office, at home at a table on my back patio, and at the dinner table I quietly coded on a laptop, called programmers, and put together WritersRegister.

So, tonight I raise a beer and toast the people who helped heal me.

Thanks. I mean it.

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In my intersection with other nonprofits through the NPSL group and on the TechSoup site I am expanding my focus to deal with emerging technologies in general and how they can be utilized by the nonprofit community as a whole. My background is in the arts, so expect to continue to see some bias for that industry but my personal experiences over the last two years have shifted my sense of self toward social justice (although being Canadian probably has something to do with that too.)

So, while the focus has been shifting over the last six months, expect it to be more apparent--including the updated header.

Taxonomy is the scientific practice of categorizing things.  For example, taxonomy is use to classify organisms.  The Dewey Decimal System was created in the 1800's and is a taxonomy.  The Library of Congress has a taxonomy.

When you get right down to it, a taxonomy is a preset tagging system.  In Dewey, if a book is on Technology it falls within "600".  In the Library of congress, the same volume would fall within "T".  These tags create:

• structure
• hierarchy
• standards

They also tend to be:

• specific to one use
• non-adaptive

Folk Taxonomy or Folxonomy allows users to create tags which means that you can have a virtually infinite set.  Systems that use folxonomy include Drupal, Joomla, Flickr, YouTube, Revver, and Google Video. 

Aggregators are tools that allow you to access the RSS (Real Simple Syndication) feeds from different sites.  You can tell that a site has a feed if you see this icon on the page.  Aggregators allow you to mix the feeds from many sites into a single place.  In other words, no need to surf when an aggregator can deliver the content to your desktop.

Some of my favourite aggregators include:

1. Drupal has its own built in aggregator.  I'm including it because of the overall utility of Drupal as a content management tool
2. Netvibes is a truly fabulous aggregation site allowing for all kinds of mixing and matching of information
3. NewsLife is an OSX 10.4 only aggregator that tries to simplify the interface and make reading feeds more intuitive.
4. Bloglines is a great aggregator/organizer of feeds.
5. Feeddemon is a desktop application that costs a little money (about $30), but is one of the most powerful and sophisticated readers out there.

If you spend much time reading news sites, blogs, and wikis and want to save some time, a reader is an invaluable tool.