Since 2002, the Digital Pioneers programme, operated by the Knowledgeland think tank and made possible by the Ministry of Education, Culture and Sciences, has made a considerable contribution to the development of the digital public domain in the Netherlands. The programme supported 211 pioneer projects with both financial backing and coaching. The maturation of the digital public domain in the Netherlands from niche to mainstream over the last two decades raises the question of what will happen next.

The urgency of this question and the premature discontinuation of the Digital Pioneers programme prompted the organization of the State of Social Media Summit in Amsterdam in October 2010. After eight years of pioneering with new possibilities in the field of technology and society (e.g. governance; immigration and integration; civil society journalism; and arts and culture), the movement was reassessed, and the next phase in the digitalization of civil society was visualized by the community of Digital Pioneers.

The State of Social Media is the product of conversations with pioneers before, during and after the Summit. This comprehensive publication provides insight into what has been accomplished thus far, as well as what needs to be done in order to meet the challenges ahead and reinforce digital civil society in the Netherlands in the near future. The State of Social Media visualizes the next decade of social innovation on the Internet and taps in to the experiences of the first generation of Digital Pioneers.

Copyright: Knowledgeland (2010). Editorial team: Nikki Timmermans and Kimon Moerbeek, with contributions by Paul Keller (Knowledeland). Text editing: Susanna McPhail (UvA Talen). Design: Floor Wesseling. Printing: Rob Stolk.

Download a PDF-version of the publication here. The publication is available under the conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Netherlands licence. Contact Knowledgeland for a hard copy of the publication.

Contact

Knowledgeland/ Stichting Nederland Kennisland

P.O Box 2960, 1000 CZ Amsterdam, Netherlands

E-mail: info@kennisland.nl

• Keynote Juliana Rotich (Ushahidi)
• Keynote Adam Hyde (Floss Manuals)
• Keynote Alan Crabbe (Fundbreak) and panel discussion on the Future of funding social media
• Keynote Anna Maybank (Social Innovation Camp)
• Keynote Sameer Padania (Macroscope)
• Panel discussion on the Future of journalism
• Reaction Hermineke van Bockxmeer (Ministry of Eduction, Culture and Science) on Actifesto
• Reaction Marietje Schaake (Member of the European Parliament, D66) on Actifesto

Also take a look at the pictures we took at the first day of the Summit and the second day of the Summit.

The second day of the Summit, Friday 29 October, promises to be an interesting day. Although some faces show modest forms of an hang-over from last nights party, it does not take a long time until the main stage room of Trouw is full again. In the afternoon the summit’s manifesto (or actually Actifesto) will be constructed during round table discussions and handed over to Marietje Schaake (Euro MP, D66). But first Keynote speakers Anna Maybank on ‘helping making good ideas happen’ and Sameer Padania on innovation in journalism with a related panel discussion.

Creating learning environments for social innovation (Anna Maybank, Social Innovation Camp)

‘Match up software developers and designers with people who have a social problem they want to solve’ is the main mission of Social Innovation Camp in the UK (and elsewhere). Anna Maybank shares her experience and the lessons she learned about bringing together ideas, people and digital tools.

Anna explains that Social Innovation Camp is a 4 month competition aimed at realizing prototypes from interesting ideas. First people with ideas are scouted across the UK. Six ideas are picked to work with. Anna and her team gather eighty people with relevant knowledge or skills to meet and cooperate during one weekend. Their assignment is to come up in less than 48 hours with concrete prototype projects that can solve the problem.

According to Anna there are some essential principles fundamental to working on social innovation along the line of SI camp philosophy. First, it takes a talented person to realize a good idea; a brilliant idea on itself is not enough. So, not only the idea but the talents must be scouted. In doing this one must realize that talented persons might be found on unexpected places. Second, especially in innovation processes building relations is very important since there is no detailed plan. The relation is the basis on which you work. Thirdly, creating connections is of main importance. People must be matched to other people that have the relevant knowledge to help them. And, fourth, the focus lies on venturing and new business models instead of charity. This is the best way to become sustainable and independent.

One of the interesting projects that has been realized the last period is Mypolice. This is an online solution to give positive or critical feedback about the services of the police. Student Sarah came up with the idea after a unsatisfactory experience that made her realize that giving feedback to the police is not an easy thing to do. Currently the project provides her with a part-time job and she works on several pilot programs.

All in all, Social Innovation Camp is the answer to a question that remains relevant these days: If the web is actually helping people solving problems, how do we get more people doing this kind of stuff? Anna’ story has, at least in part, shown how.

Watch the video of Anna Maybank’s keynote

Photo: Anna Maybank.

New journalism (Sameer Padania, Macroscope)

Sameer starts his talk by posing a question: ”Where does authenticity and authority come from in a multi-dimensional, multi-facetted field of information production?”. To find answers regarding the role of new journalism in this rapidly changing field it is essential that the context is reassessed. The field is radically different than a few years ago. Sameer explains how an experience with a group of African journalists during the G8 in Scotland confronted him with the urgent tensions in the field. The established media were in principle interested in the content of the journalists but did not trust their ‘professionalism’ and demanded editing for the English market by English professionals. According to Sameer this illustrates the ‘old’ paradigm of centralized hierarchical media organization. On the other hand he experienced in his own recent endeavors that just publishing raw direct footage is not necessarily the best way to go either. Someone needs to categorize the information and put it to a purpose.

Sameer learned by experience that actors who are active in journalism need to categorize themselves and the other players in the field in a new way. In doing so they will be confronted with issues of business models, legislation, technology and so on. Moreover, it is necessary to understand the interconnectedness of all major players in the field such as Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, legislators etc. They determine for a big part the way in which journalists are able to do their work.

The opportunity for journalists in the future lies in the fact that there is a desire for a sort of craft how to put information together and determine were it comes from; a chain of custody, of trust.  The long-term issue is how social media and mainstream media can find each other, and to what extent the traditional media can adapt to their new roles.

Sameer concludes with emphasizing that bottom-up initiatives in developing countries are great but still not resilient enough. They are still too fragile since they are often run by individuals, the technology is fragile and there are the political issues. “We should rethink the practice and legislation to extend protection and resilience of these initiatives. We should strive to create more diversity and pluralism and create a better mirror of the world.”

Watch the video of Sameer Padania’s keynote

Photo: Sameer Padania.

Panel discussion on new journalism

To bring the discussion a bit further some other speakers join Sameer at the stage. Juliana Rotich (Ushahidi), Maurits Martijn (Vrij Nederland) and Hermineke van Bockxmeer (Ministery of Education, Culture and Science). Paul Keller (Kennisland) moderates the discussion.

Maurits Martijn, journalist for the weekly magazine Vrij Nederland, recognizes that print media faces quite some challenges. However, he learned that at his organization they were able to engage readers to think about the necessary transition.

Hermineke van Bockxmeer states that there have been several attempts to innovate the media field from the side of the ministery. The Digital Pioneer program is one of the examples. But it is still work in progress and it is not entirely clear were the process is heading.

The redefinition of media is embodied by examples such as spot.us and demotix.com says Juliana Rotich. They show that journalists and media have to engage and cannot provide the news from a position of ‘take it or leave it’. News is created with the audience, consulting the audience. “It is not about scoops anymore. Mainstream media should focus on the back-story and the follow-up. They should curate the information and give sense to what is going on in the world”. Sameer adds that journalists do not necessarily have to present clear-cut pieces. They can also pose questions to the audience about an unfinished story. Moreover, they can operate much more transparent and share their sources or research process with the audience.

Wikileaks is introduced as interesting case. On the one hand Wikileaks positions itself above the mainstream media. But it needs traditional media as well. What are the roles taken here?

It is recognized by the panelists that although Wikileaks is an independent source it needs the attention of mainstream media to present their message to a wider audience. The loads of documents need to be analyzed, the story needs to be explained and presented in an accessible way. Exactly there resides the challenge and necessity of journalistic activity. The added value of Wikileaks is that they function as a broker between people who have relevant (sensitive!) information and journalists. Altogether, initiatives such as Wikileaks illustrate the possibility of a radical philosophical twist: radical transparency.

In the quickly changing field the relations are not yet set. In this field were the possibility of radical transparency increases parallel to an enormous growth of data available, news organizations have to reposition themselves and find out how they can provide added value.

View the video of the panel discussion on journalism

Round tables and State of Social Media Actifesto

This last day of the summit is ended with the presentation of the Actifesto. During the day Digital Pioneers and other visitors sat around seven thematic round tables and spoke about the future of the digital civil society. What is to be done in the coming period? Marietje Schaake, member of the Euro Parliament, is present to receive the Actifesto in person. Also Hermineke van Bockxmeer, representing the ministery of Education, Culture and Science, gives a reaction and reflects briefly on the Digital Pioneers Program.

View the video of the short speech by Hermineke van Bockxmeer

Photo: round tables.

The Actifesto

Read them here. Schaake: “I think the potential of your Actifesto is fantastic and I hope that we can work together to make this potential flourish and to make sure that we build trust that is genuine, more transparency, more openness and more collaboration”.

View the video of the Actifesto and Marietje Schaakes reaction

Photo: Marietje Schaake.

Report written by Kimon Moerbeek (Kennisland), photos by Kennisland.

Kick off!

Thursday morning the 28th. of October. The TROUW building in Amsterdam starts to get crowded although it’s quite early. During this summit, initiated by the organizers of the Digital Pionieers program, social entrepreneurs active in the field of new media meet to exchange concrete ideas and visions for the near future.

Photo: participants Summit.

Chair Linda Vermaat, herself a Digital Pioneer (Digitale Koelkast) invites project leader Nikki Timmermans to the stage to open the summit for a full room. She explains how the successful Digital Pioneers program will come to an end after eight years and this summit is organized for the community of pioneers to meet up and figure out how to empower each other in the future. Timmermans: “The digital revolution has just begun, we hope to support your further plans with this summit!”

View Nikki Timmermans’ presentation slides

Watch the video of Nikki Timmermans’ presentation

Before the first keynote speaker, Juliana Rotich, enters the stage Marcel van der Drift explains the concept of ‘Don’t do it yourself’, which is an approach to match people actively for to help each other. Marcel and his colleagues will be doing just that during the two days of the summit. Their tagline: ‘A shared problem is a solved problem’.

Photo: Linda Vermaat, Marcel van der Drift and Arnoud van den Heuvel (left).

Lessons learned from an African open source program (Juliana Rotich, Ushahidi)

Juliana Rotich, originally from Kenia and schooled as IT-professional in the US, presents her successful initiative Ushahidi. Ushahidi is a tool and platform to crowdsource and visualize data in crisis situations and as such it is an alternative to traditional centralized media. The idea emerged after the violence in the aftermath of the elections in Kenia. Not surpsingly the name ‘Ushahidi’ means ‘testimony’ in Swahili.

Apart from the relevance of Ushahidi as a concept Juliana shares an inspiring story about pioneering entrepreneurship of people with a vision who just start doing something and figure it out along the way. Being shocked by the conflicts and the related media coverage she teamed up with some enthusiastic bloggers and experts in Kenia to invent what became Ushahidi. The organization was ad hoc and leaderless and all participants had full time jobs. They were forced to make quick and kind of brutal decisions since they lacked the luxury of time or money. However, based upon her experience Juliana states that inviting the community to help results in solutions. What is more, they came to the conclusion that the software is important, but more important is the knowledge and the commitment from the crowds. Along that line of thought offline meeting of people is essential. The three golden rules: stop/collaborate/listen.

Photo: Juliana Rotich.

Business opportunism instead of a plan (Adam Hyde, FLOSS Manuals)

Adam Hyde stopped by the Summit on his way from Berlin to Barcelona in a driving publishing house (more on that below). Adam initiated FLOSS Manuals a site that provides free manuals for free. What is more, a main goal was to present the manuals attractively. Check here whether or not he succeeded.

Working on FLOSS Manuals led him to new opportunities. Since the manuals had to be written he started to think on ways to write publications in collaboration. And today Adam is busy to promote a spin-off of his FLOSS manuals adventure: Book Sprint, a concept to write books very fast (a few days) in collaboration, and Book Mobile, a mobile book binding machine in a VW-Van, hence his tour with the driving publishing house.

Altogether, the story of Adam, in his own words, is one of business opportunism instead of business planning. Starting with his manual site he ended up being an accidental innovator in the publishing field. His Key ingredients: Don’t plan, learn to tell stories, know your audience and make friends! “We don’t have a core business”.

Watch the video of Adam Hydes keynote

Photo: Adam Hyde.

Clinics: role up your sleeves and work it!

After the first keynote speakers it is time to get into some practical issues. Participants of the summit leave the main stage for the cellars of the TROUW building to share their experiences on topics such as business models, community building, Creative Commons & copyright, crowdsourcing, fundraising, mobile and open source.

At the table for business models expert Machiel Emmering actively confronts people with the necessity of a viable business model. He invites them to present their ideas in a schematic form that consists of the elements: proposition, the market, the organization and the financials.

Anna Chojnacka of the crowd source platform 1%club hosts the table on community building. She explains that you have to set the standard immediately when you go online, which means that it is best to have a community on forehand and online it can grow. On top of that she emphasizes the importance of a personal tone, transparency and participation.

Photo: Anna Chojnacka leading the round table on communities.

At the copyright table legal experts of the Rechtswinkel state that too often social media start-ups are ignorant with regard to legal issues. They should investigate this thoroughly while designing their concept or business model otherwise it might be too late.

The conversation on mobile, hosted by James Burke and Juha van Hetzelfde (Urbanode), discussed among others to what extent apps can make a difference in public space. What could be the extra value of influencing elements around you with an app? What if everybody wants to influence particular things at the same time? It seems as if the search on these issues has just begun.

The clinic that dealt with Crowdsourcing was quite crowded and hosted by keynote speaker Juliana Rotisch and Jesse Limmen (magneetfestival). It was decided that crowd sourcing is an excellent way to organize volunteers. However, to keep a particular platform viable a relatively small committed group is essential (as with Wikipedia). To organize crowd souring it is of main importance to think about the incentives to attract participants.

Keynotespeker Alan Crabbe and Roy Cremers of the Amsterdam city art fund (AFK) hosted the clinic about the closely related issue of Crowdfunding. According to their experience There are a few golden rules: be sure there is a clear end result, make an interesting small film, take an existing fan base or network as point of departure, provide your ‘crowd’ with a specific incentive to participate.

Crowdfunding in Australia (Alan Crabbe, Fundbreak)

It might be the future of funding: an online platform that enables professional creatives to sell their projects and ideas to the public. Fundbreak in Australia exists to do exactly that.

Co-founder Alan Crabbe explains how their platform integrates several forms of social media such as networking, bookmarking, video, slideshows and blogging to provide the professionals with the possibility to exhibit their projects. As such Fundbreak not only generates funding but might function as a marketing tool as well.

At Fundbreak they learned that projects that are able to present themselves in an attractive way (such as a dancer that wanted to have a flight ticket financed) have a good chance to succeed in collecting the necessary funds. It also helps if there is an existing fanbase and if goals seem realistic and achievable. An interesting finding is that a system of investments does not work and supporters need some sort of tangible or intangible incentive.

For the near future Alan sees a variety of opportunities for crowdfunding to grow as self-evident way of funding in society with concepts such as group buying and sharing, the emergence of niche networks, but also as a way to organize corporate responsibility and provide solutions for all kinds of social issues in communities.

Watch the video of Alan Crabbe’s keynote

Photo: Alan Crabbe.

Panel discussion on funding in the future

The first day of the summit ends with a panel discussion on funding. Participants are Roy Cremers (AFK, Amsterdam arts fund), KLaas Kuitenbrouwer (Virtueel Platform), Anna Chojnaka (1% club) and Alan Crabbe (Fundbreak).

The initiative of the Amsterdam arts fund voordekunst.nl illustrates that crowd funding is considered a serious option to support artistic activity in the near future, even according to traditional funding institutions. The concept is that the fund executes a quality check en provides the first 30% of the finances; the rest is up to the crowds.

The emergence of these forms of crowdfunding seems very welcome in the contemporary financial and political reality. However it confronts us with questions as well. For example, as Klaas Kuitenbrouwer brought up, in the case of the Amsterdam fund, if only ‘popular’ projects will be realized, how can one legitimize that public resources are spent?

And what does it mean for the quality of arts if, as with Fundbreak, there is not necessarily a particular artistic norm to be successful? Will art become entirely dependent on populism?

Alan states that the innovativeness is precisely in the fact that the ‘taste’ of government is circumvented; artistic work is democratized. Roy adds to that that he believes ‘niche’-projects are just as able to sell themselves online as more popular ones. Anna concludes on this issue that running a crowd funding platform does not mean that you leave everything to the crowd. At her organization, the 1%club (a platform for development projects), they work with gatekeepers who preselect viable projects (just as the Amsterdam fund does).

Altogether, the concept of crowd funding promises a change in the mentality about funding. Micro patronage becomes possible and networks can emerge around particular cultural production or social issues. The discussion was concluded with the question whether or not crowd funding will be a local or more global phenomenon in the sense of what kind of projects people will support. Most members of the panel thought that local initiatives remain very important because this is the level that people can identify with.

Find the video of the panel discussion on funding here (27′51)

Photo: panel discussion with Roy Cremers and Klaas Kuitenbrouwer.

Wrap up and winner Open Car data

Before Pioneers and other guests of the summit go for a drink, dinner or prepare for the party later in the evening there is one important announcement to make: the winner of the Open Car Data experiment, Casper! During the day an exciting competition took place around the Trouw-building. One of the Pioneers built an Emission Profiles application and launched a competition. For this competition summit visitors were invited to drive one lap in a VW polo equipped with Opencardata Technology and competed who can emit the least amount of CO2 during the lap. The results were spectacular, read them here.

Photo: Stef Kolman (middle), Casper and Linda Vermaat.

And we call it a day. But not before a little dancing with local heroes ‘Jungle by Night’ and DJ crew ‘De Poolhonden’.

Photo: Jungle by Night.

Report written by Kimon Moerbeek (Kennisland), photos by Kennisland.

1. Raise awareness of the value of our personal data online

2. Towards the online visualization of quality in arts and culture instead of numbers and figures

3. Redefine and set the stage for civil society: an act for open data to enfoster transparency and mutual trust between citizens and government

4. Strengthen civil society journalism by curating, verifying, generating trust and engage the audience through social media

5. Focus on a bottom-up approach and active collaboration between new and existing organizations working with migration and integration

6. Find space for pioneers in education to prepare the field for the future

7. Creating a tipping point: Boasting awareness and action for a sustainable world, using social media as a tool to engage a worldwide audience

Find the video of the presentation and Marietje Schaake’s reaction here:

Actifesto- State of Social Media Summit from Kennisland on Vimeo.

Photo: Marietje Schaake by Kennisland

Photo by Kennisland.

Already want some first previews?

See the photos we made during Day 1 and the photos made during Day 2. If you made photos yourself, please also tag them with sosm, so everybody can find them.

Someone made a Twapperkeeper archive with #sosm. If you are curious what’s been said on Twitter during the Summit, you can read the Twapperkeeper archive #sosm over here. You can set the start and end date at 28 and 29 October 2010. This archive is origanally created for tags on science of social media. Which is also quit interesting!

The Dutch press published a few articles (in Dutch), here’s a list:
- Dutch Cowboys, 26 October 2010, ‘Social Media pioniers komen samen’
- Trouw, 28 October, p.9.: ‘Meld losse stoeptegel op internet’
- BNR nieuwsradio, 28 October 6.30-6.40 hrs: interview with Umberto Tan in On the move
- Radio 1 NOS Nieuws, 28 October 6.00-9.30 hrs, interview with Marc-Robin Visscher and blog ‘Wereldverbeteraars op de digitale snelweg’
- Erwin Blom, 28 October, ‘Bij het heengaan van digitale pioniers’
- Parool, 29 October: ‘Sociaal betrokken voor je scherm’

More later on this blog!

The Digital Pioneers team

- How and why did you start OpenCarData?
“Back in 2002 we did a study for The Netherlands Media Art Institute regarding the technical, economical and cultural implications of our cars evolving into networked devices like computers, printers, etcetera. The Opencardata tagline – Reinventing the Wheel – really says it all. Our cars – uniquely – have not been touched by the revolution that has shifted reality in the rest of the world: internet. Technologically the basics date back to the original invention of the gasoline combustion engine by Daimler & Maybach in 1889! Sadly our cars today are still isolated data-deposits waiting to be excavated. Opencardata wants to make a start to network our cars because we believe it will make them smarter”.

- What can we do with OpenCarData?
“Opencardata collects, stores and disseminates – real world – OBD-II auto-data. OBD (On Board Diagnostics) is a universal car computer system – built into vehicles from 1996 onwards – to monitor the performance of our cars. As such Opencardata is a real-time health check of an individual car or our entire global fleet. We provide software and an API to encourage developers to create custom OBD-II applications and management tools.

We have started with one particular application ourselves that we call EmissionProfiles. In contrast with the  European Union legislation for car energy labelling, EmissionProfiles render a vehicles’ real-world carbon emission on location. … but many more useful, playful or economical applications can be envisioned and we hope that the development community will get excited by this new data-source”.

- How does OpenCarData stimulates social innovation?
“We believe that the stakeholders in Opencardata are diverse and many: drivers, owners, manufacturers, repairers, governments, telecoms, etc. All of them will gain different knowledge and advantage by tapping into this new data-set. Just to mention some examples:
- driver communities may be helped by knowing which make/model/year car shows particular faults or needs typical repair, which will affect purchase decisions.
- (local) governments have access to real-world, real-time aggregated pollution data and can (re-)plan infrastructure around this.
- fleet managers may steer their employee drivers towards eco friendly driving styles so that each driver individually can help reduce the global carbon footprint
- manufacturers have location-based aggregated performance data to analyse… etc etc … the use cases are limitless.

But what’s most relevant is this: once the community grows, every one has access to a data-set that simply did not exist before. Each person can create automotive solutions based on his own innovations. This may fundamentally shift our automobility”.

- What does it mean to win the Living Lab Prize in de European Satellite Navigation Competition?
“The Galileo Masters is the annual most prestigious European Satellite Navigation Competition. The GNSS Living Lab Prize that we won is a special topic prize within the Galileo Masters and allows us to validate our innovation in a Living Lab reality check. The European Network of Living Labs (ENoLL) is a community of Living Labs with a sustainable strategy for enhancing innovation on a systematic basis. The overall objective is to contribute to the creation of a dynamic European innovation system. ENoLL aims to support co-creative, human-centric and user-driven research, development and innovation in order to better cater for people’s needs. Winning this prize will help us to improve the innovation and to bring it to the market”.

- What are you going to do at the State of Social Media Summit
“We will demonstrate the EmissionProfiles application. Summit visitors will be invited to drive one lap – in a car equipped with Opencardata Technology – and compete who can emit the least amount of CO2 during the lap. This playful competition will – we think – inspire people to be aware of their driving style and motivate them towards making change”.

Meet Stef and Selene at the Summit and go for I ride to test the software yourself and win some great prizes yourself!

- Register for the Summit
- More info about the presentations

Image: OpenCarData.

During the Summit, Digital Pioneers will present their projects and ideas every hour in the Hall of Trouw Amsterdam. On Thursday 28 October 16.15 hrs Johannes la Poutré will tell us all about measuring air quality and his experiences as a Digital Pioneer. We interviewed Johannes shortly about himself and the project MIMAQ, which stands for mobile individual measurements of air quality…

- Please tell us a little about yourself…
“Hi, I’m Johannes la Poutré. I’m intrigued by new inventions and ways to combine and extend them. From that perspective I got involved with the Internet in the early days and kept following its newest developments closely. Today this brings me in the field of Augmented Reality where I’m working now for TABworldmedia.com”.

- How and why did you start MIMAQ?
“Last December the International Climate Summit was held in Copenhagen, Denmark. For that occasion a group of volunteers teamed up to create a proof of concept: the Copenhagen Layer, where local air quality was measured ad visualized in augmented reality. The MIMAQ project takes this concept to the next level, focusing on the measurement of air pollution on a very personal and hyper-local level. User participation is encouraged by recruiting volunteers and asking for their personal opinion and feedback. We hope to refine the measurement network so it can provide real time data complimentary to the expensive measurement stations which are currently deployed”.

- What can we do with MIMAQ?
“Volunteers do continuous measurements during their outdoor activities and get an idea of their exposure to air pollution. Others who are in the same local area are able to see the last pollution levels around them on their smart phone in augmented reality, or on a map from everywhere. This way you get an idea how clean (or bad polluted!) your daily commute, your running training round or any outdoor activity really is”.

- How does MIMAQ stimulates social innovation?
“Using MIMAQ, participants and observers get the tools to verify the official statistics of air pollution for their area. The project also creates awareness of the invisible, local air quality. We hope people will start asking questions like “should I really keep my car engine running while cleaning the wind screen?” or “is this the best route between home and school or should I take the long way through the park instead?”".

- What are you going to bring and get at the State of Social Media Summit?
“We will bring a lot of experience dealing with the often complex implementation process, how to involve external parties and what to expect from them. We are always looking at parties interested to team up for the next phase, getting ready for a bigger scale and improving data quality (calibration and interpretation of sensor data)”.

Interested in hearing more about MIMAQ, Johannes and measuring air quality? Meet Johannes at the Summit!

- Register for the Summit
- More info about the presentations

Photo by Kennisland.

We are very honored that Alan Crabbe is coming to the Summit to inspire us with lessons learned from the brand new crowdfund platform Fundbreak. Crowdfunding can ofcourse be one of the solutions to the funding problem. Fundbreak has been a succes in Australia and has been introduced recently also in the UK. We spoke briefly with Alan, so here’s a sneak preview for his keynote on Thrusday 28 October, 15.30 hrs in Trouw Amsterdam…

- Can you tell us something about yourself and your ambitions for the future?
“I am a Northern Irishman living in Sydney. I love the outdoor life and have a real passion for working with visual artists and musicians. My new love is FundBreak and it has become my addiction. My ambition for FundBreak is to become the most admired crowdfunding platform in Europe, Australia and in the rest of the world”,

- Why did you start Fundbreak and how is it different from other crowdfund platforms like Kickstarter?
“Last year we had the opportunity to work on a project with a number of visual artists in Australia and learned quite a lot about the creative industry. It became obvious that a large number of artists in Australia were struggling financially. At this time we spotted an art project in Europe that successfully used the power of the crowd to raise capital and get things moving.

This lead us to setting up an Australian platform to raise funds for any project within the creative industry. In effect, FundBreak provides the creative industry an alternative funding source and a tool to engage the fans, friends, family and community. Due to the explosive growth of social networking websites like Facebook and Twitter, it has become much easier and convenient for creative individuals, groups and organisations to involve an audience and independently sell or promote projects.

The FundBreak web platform operates using the same ‘all or nothing’ crowdfunding model as Kickstarter. The key difference with FundBreak at the moment is our approach to the creative industry. We collaborate with creative groups and organisations in the local market so we can provide valuable advice and support for our project creators. We treat each project individually and work to ensure that each project has the best possible chance of success”.

- For whom is Fundbreak and how does it work?
“Fundbreak is a platform and community for creative projects and ideas. It has been specifically developed for artists, musicians, filmmakers, journalists, designers, entrepreneurs, inventors, event organisers, software developers and anyone with a creative idea to raise funds, engage fans and reward supporters. Anyone with a project or idea can post a project on the FundBreak platform.

The project creator must set a funding goal, a deadline to raise the funds (currently a maximum 50 days) and at least one reward. A reward is a tangible or intangible perk you offer in return for the support you receive. Supporting funds usually comes from your fan base, friends, family, social networks and perfect strangers that simply like your project. If the project reaches (or exceeds) its funding goal before the deadline, all the funds will be transferred directly to the project creator. Otherwise, the funds raised are returned to the supporters. This is the “all or nothing” model of crowdfunding”".

- What are the most common issues that you see related to crowd funding?
“Since crowdfunding is a relatively new concept, project creators need to understand the keys to success. The act of crowdfunding is an effort and requires commitment and dedication to succeed. Sending an email to your mailing list and hoping that people will flock to fully fund your project on day one very rarely happens. Successful crowdfunded projects will provide project updates, show appreciation, spread the word through the social networking websites, engage supporters and show passion and determination to make the project happen”.

- Why would people in the Netherlands have to join the Fundbreak platform?
“During the last 2-3 years we have seen two very significant effects. The financial crisis and the explosive growth of social networking. Crowdfunding platforms like FundBreak provides a practical and effective way to involve communities and social networks in a creative way. Creative individuals, groups and organisations can use the platform to engage supporters and raise funds for great projects”.

- How does Fundbreak supports social innovation on the web and when would Fundbreak be succesfull in your opinion?
“Every project relies on community engagement. And it might sound obvious but I think it is quite simple, a supporter must connect emotional with the project creator or the project itself. If there is no connection, project creators must offer supporters great rewards as incentives. To be successful, project creators must engage people and invite supporters to be part of something great”.

If you want to hear more about the possibilities of crowdfunding for your project and want to discuss the state of funding creative & innovative civel society media projects? Join Alan Crabbe and us on Thursday 29 October, 15.30 hrs! After Alans talk there will be a panel discussion with Roy Cremers (voordekunst), Klaas Kuitenbrouwer (Virtueel Platform) and Anna Chojnacka (1%Club) on the future of funding and the pros and cons of crowdfunding.

- Register for the Summit
- More info about the programme of Day 1

During the Summit, Digital Pioneers will present their projects and ideas every hour in the Hall of Trouw Amsterdam. On Thursday 28 October 14.15 hrs Sara Mattens & Jeffrey Croese will tell us all about de Bijlmer and how to make virtual artworks with the tools they designed within the Virtuele Straat van Sculpturen project. We interviewed Sara and Jeff shortly about themselves and the project…

- Please tell us a little about yourself…
“We are Jeffrey Croese and Sara Mattens, together we form vinger.nl. As a creative studio we work on strategy and concept and give ideas shape in the form of film and design. We do diverse projects, mainly in the cultural, artistic and social domain. Ofcourse we do not stand alone and work with a whole bunch of other creatives, no fingers no fist..”

- How and why did you start The Virtual Street?
“We started www.devirtuelestraat.nl because of the Street of Sculptures, an international art biennale in the public space of the Amsterdam Bijlmer. Our project is part of the first biennale in 2009. In this project we wanted to link fysical and virtual worlds and present the work of both local and international artists in the context of our fine but underestimated neighbourhood, the Bijlmer”.

- What can we do with www.devirtuelestraat.nl?
“People with an interest for art -whether they are makers, lovers or wanderers- are welcome on the Virtual Street. Artworks in public space of Amsterdam Zuidoost are digitally disclosed and more information, audio and visuals are offered. Also Bijlmer artists are invited to participate by making artworks especially for the virtual domain. An important aspect here is to develop means that enable visitors to leave their creative traces aswell.  www.thevirtualstreet.nl is open to everybody anywhere, and on the streets of Bijlmer people can also use their smartphones to discover the Virtual Street in AR by the Layar app”.

- How does  www.devirtuelestraat.nl stimulates social innovation?
“We aim at an active and fun form of art experience and creation in the Bijlmer. We now have a platform for virtual and fysical art in and by the Bijlmer”.

- What are you going to bring and get at the State of Social Media Summit?
“We are excited to introduce our project to the public of the Summit. Not only because we believe in it, but  also because we need a lot of knowledge, skills and help to make it happen in a meaningfull way”.

Interested in hearing more about Jeff & Sara and making virtual artworks? Meet them at the Summit!

- Register for the Summit
- More info about the presentations

Photo by Kennisland.