Archive for the ‘Innovation & Investments’ Category
Recently the Gov2.0 startup SeeClickFix received $1.5 million investment. It’s not too much because the project generates profit by itself. But the fact of the investments in that initiatives shows us that the project becomes business and funds are investing into it’s growth.
I was told about SeeClickFix last year by Ben Berkowitz. SeeClickFix was created because the guys were fans of the UK-developed platform – FixMyStreet: you can mark the corresponding urban problem on the map (wrong traffic organization or garbage on the streets, ditches on the roads, etc.). You request then goes to the responsible for resolving the issue in the city cervice. When the problem is solved it changes its status to “Closed”.
I was wondering why the authorities should respond to these requests, what’s the general reason, and how are these services being connected by Ben and his team? The answer was very simple: we have everything in electronic form, we just type down the e-mail address of the responsible person and then it’s their issue.
“So you don’t control whether they accept the problem or not?”
Ben: “No, because it’s responsibility of municipal services. And we just helping them to gather information and to lower the negative in relation to their work”.
We have the clone of that project in Russia – streetjournal.org (interview with the author of the project). Is it effective or not? A matter of time and popularity amongst the citizens and city services.
Well, actually, to study the example how SeeClickFix gained the investment I called Ben:
Alena Popova: Why do they invest in SeeClickFix?
Ben Berkowitz: Because they believe in the teams’ ability to scale SeeClickFix internationally and drive civic engagement around the world. continue reading
Let’s continue our story about most outstanding participants in an international forum in Davos — Communication On Top which will take place very soon, on February 16-18. I will represent Russia at the Political communications section on «Why in Russia and the BRIC countries the e-government could stimulate the economic development».
Today my companion is — Roland Binz, member of the the Forum Committee at World Forum «Communication on Top» & Crisis Communications Section Moderator.
Roland Binz is one of the leading and most experienced professionals in crisis communications from Switzerland. He is vice president of the Swiss Crisis Communication Association. Following his studies in law at the University of Berne he worked for 8 years as a court reporter and political editor for a well-known daily newspaper. He was subsequently nominated Public and Press Officer for the Swiss Army within KFOR after the Kosovo war in the year 2000. From 2001 till mid 2009 Binz garnered broad experience in crisis management, corporate communication and public affairs as the corporate spokesperson and Deputy Head of the Press Office at Swiss Federal Railways (SBB).
In June 2009 Roland Binz established his eponymous business consultancy for crisis, litigation and reputation communication (www.rolandbinz.com). He is also co-founder of the international Crisis and Litigation Communicators’ Alliance, a group of prominent consulting firms providing clients with seamless crisis and litigation communications support around the globe.
Crisis Communications section, moderated by Roland Binz at the Forum “Communication on Top”, explores Litigation PR and communicative integrity as the keys to safeguarding your reputation.
The presentation was made by Nick De Mey from Board of Innovation. He does a great job in analyzing and visualizing business models in a range of industries.
Featured in the presentation of the 10 business models that rocked 2010, according to De Mey, are Flattr, Groupon, Spotify and Airbnb, among others.
The presentation is best viewed in full screen.
By the end of the Runet year we’ve gathered a round table where all my excellent colleagues and pleasant people were discussing what happened in 2010.
We were talking that the runet’ audiency increased 2 times, that Russians’ve came into the worldinternet. (in the minds of foreigners there is not only yandex.ru but mail.ru have appeared). We were discussing the domain .рф (.rf) with all it’s shortcomings, I wrote about it recently. (I have the аленапопова.рф domain, though). I even argued with them whether the .рф domain will work or not. If we take into consideration that runet now growth at the expence of 47-58 years old audience – it’s really considerable as .рф. But I do not know, I do not know, we’ll see if I win a bet or not.
With the Vanya Zasursky in the summer we’ve discussed the copyright and Creative Commons License. I remember how I asked the CC representative why he leaves the Russian Federation and he answered that the project didn’t go. But on the basis of free access and licenses to users there is a Pirate Party of the Russian Federation came off.
You can see more in the video below…
Merry Christmass and Happy New Year!
Politics, like just about everything else, is going mobile. More than a quarter of American adults used their cellphones to learn about or participate in the 2010 U.S. midterm election, according to a survey from the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project.
The survey, which polled 2,257 adults from November 3 to November 24, found that the people who use their phones for politics are most often between the ages of 18 and 29 and more likely to own high-tech electronics and use social networking sites than other voters. The percentage of Republican and Democratic voters in this group is similar to that of the general population.
The survey counted communicating about voting, sharing and reading election news, and contributing money to campaigns as political participation. Fourteen percent of respondents said that they used their cellphones to tell others that they had voted; 6% said they used them to let others know about conditions at local voting stations; 10% sent text messages about the election; 3% used their cells to shoot and share photos or videos related to the election; 12% kept up with election news using their phones; and 4% used their mobiles to monitor results.
Only 1% used their mobile devices to either contribute money by text message or to download an app that provided updates from a candidate or group about election news, respectively.
Interestingly, 21% of those who used their cellphones to learn about or participate in the election said that they didn’t vote, although that figure is substantially less than the national average of 38%.
Today TechCrunch has posted a video interview with AlenaPopova by MikeButcher on TechCrunch Moscow:
Alena Popova, is a former TV journalist who got into Web 2.0 a while back and is now a specialist in “Government 2.0″. She is also a venture investor in a social shopping startup in Russia and startup adviser.
We chatted about the startup scene and Russia’s Skolovo project to create a Silicon Valley in Russia. She’s also working on generating greater awareness of e-government in Russia and helped establish the project Duma 2.0 in Moscow. At the recent TechCrunch Moscow event I talked to her about empowering ordinary citizens in Russia through Government 2.0 platforms – especially important in a developing economy like Russia’s where officialdom can often disappoint – and the startup scene in Russia.
via TechCrunch.com
We are glad to announce you our new project — StartupAfisha
StartupAfisha – online key-project, performing a function of a single entry point for all entrepreneurs, investors, and the organizers of a start-up activities in Russia. It is a guide to all communities and leaders of innovation. Weekly newsletter of StartupAfisha provides an opportunity to receive comprehensive information about all the start-up events in every region of Russia.
Alexandra Markova is our bright IT-future in the Valley speaks to the Saad Khan the head of one well-known fund in the Vallay — CMEA Capital. They are speaking about what projects should be invested in, what are criterias for project success and what is digital media as an area for investment. CMEA is 1.2 billion fund.
By the way, about a great project, which I studied later: conversion of images from the mass-media into a commercially interactive: do you like the shoes in the picture then click and buy.
Watch a lot of useful information from the CMEA Capital expert and the beautiful Sasha Markova in the interview next:
Anastasia Prisyazhnaya — a young, active and purposeful lady. She organizes IT-meetings based on the Silicon Valley philosophy. She carefully selects every speaker, then “torments” them on the subject of speech to be no more than 5 minutes. Before my speech Nastia called me 5 times with the words that I have to attend the training session to practice my 5-minute-speech, or people will fall asleep. I promised her that I’ll make everything up. Everything succeeded and Nastia was very pleased.
Nastia went to the U.S. And then returned back to Russia with a great desire of creating the working projects there.
Anastasia Prisyazhnaya & Esther Dyson about MeetUp in Moscow:
Alexey Ermolin is an active 22-year old innovator, a happy young father and an effective promoter of the mass of useful initiatives. This year, he was he took a summer school of startups in Kreatovo, then went with the winners of the project to Silicon Valley, he was visiting the Embassy and embossing visas for young entrepreneurs from the regions. I remember that great ideas were implemented in Kreatovo: exchange of the projects based on the principles of the London Stock Exchange, gladiatorial games (crash test).
Alex is now taking charge of the development of an interesting project. His favorite words are «quality» and «a lot».
You can see more in a video about that below.