An artisits impression of a possible public transport system for Berkeley California
Source: LOC
berkeley
Introduction Drupal Features Module at BadCamp 2010 in Berkeley
YouTube playlist and Drupal Features module project
The Features module represents, in some respects, the future of Drupal. The movement of “exportables” is fast becoming a rallying call.
Shawn DeArmond
At the recent UC Berkeley hosted Drupal unconference, BadCamp, a presentation on Mapping with OpenLayers on the Drupal platform.
The turn of the century has been marked by the emergence of a “kinder and gentler” project of development. From the recalibration of the World Bank as a “knowledge bank” committed to the eradication of poverty to the ambitious campaigns that imagine the “end of poverty,” a new global order is in the making.
Through ethnographic attention to the Washington D.C.-Wall Street complex, this talk examines the circuits of capital and truth that structure “millennial development.” In particular, it focuses on microfinance, which is an active frontier of “creative capitalism.” But microfinance is also the site of important experiments in poverty policy, from the massive civil society institutions of Bangladesh to the Hezbollah militia of Lebanon. It is thus implicated in the emergence of counter-geographies of development.
Webcast sponsored by the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre and hosted and co-sponsored by the Departments of Sociology, Anthropology, Geography, and the Liu Institute for Global Issues, Ananya Roy is Professor in the Department of City and Regional Planning where she teaches in the fields of comparative urban studies and international development.
Poverty Capital: Microfinance and the Making of Development, By Ananya Roy
This is a book about poverty but it does not study the poor and the powerless. Instead it studies those who manage poverty. It sheds light on how powerful institutions control “capital,” or circuits of profit and investment, as well as “truth,” or authoritative knowledge about poverty. Such dominant practices are challenged by alternative paradigms of development, and the book details these as well. Using the case of microfinance, the book participates in a set of fierce debates about development ‐ from the role of markets to the secrets of successful pro‐poor institutions. Based on many years of research in Washington D.C., Bangladesh, and the Middle East, Poverty Capital also grows out of the author’s undergraduate teaching to thousands of students on the subject of global poverty and inequality.
About the Author: Ananya Roy is Professor of City and Regional Planning at the University of California, Berkeley. She is also the founding chair of a new undergraduate curriculum in Global Poverty and Practice. At Berkeley, Roy is the recipient of the Distinguished Teaching Award and Golden Apple Award for Outstanding Teaching, the highest teaching honors bestowed by the campus and its students. Roy’s previous research has provided a close look at poverty and inequality in the cities of the global South.
Apr 062010
Algae! A truly green crop for a sustainable future.
Scenedesmus algae bottles
We are the Shipyard algae lab community.
We have created the world’s first community algae lab for the development of open-source, DIY-oriented algae technology, to facilitate the co-operative pursuit of this new form of agriculture — and we invite you to come learn how to raise algae and transform them into exciting products!
Source: AlgaeLab
Our first Algae Lab got started in April, 2008, when Aaron Wolf Baum, Ph.D., confabbed with Jim Mason, the founder and executive chief of The Shipyard and All Power Labs of Berkeley, CA, picked a 20′ shipping container for the portable laboratory and issued a call for budding algae enthusiasts. These intrepid individuals soon built the world’s first community algae lab. By removing the roof and replacing it with a rack for 16 2′x3′ ponds, and filling the inside with algae growth bottles, bubbling tubes and other laboratory equipment, they soon had a space for open-source investigations of algae technology.
Algae the new crop harvested by home-growers
Raising spirulina requires a complex mix of nutrients, acid/base balance, temperature and other physical requirements. But Baum says it’s the food of the future because it can grow in ultra-compact areas, cleans greenhouse gases, and reproduces in a matter of hours so it can be harvested every day.
While laboratory algae tanks can cost tens of thousands of dollars, Baum’s seven-hour workshops costs $150 and hand-built tanks go for $150, pretty much at cost.
“I think everyone was pretty thrilled, excited to get growing. It seemed like a lot more possible for the common person, even with no science background,” said Katia Sussman, 26, who attended a recent workshop in Berkeley.
Baum’s so serious about making algae accessible that he’s offered to help workshop participants install their tanks for free if they run into trouble.
Baum wants to continue to form the Linux of algae – a DIY community that uses low-cost materials and shares information. He has hundreds of people on his mailing list and fields inquiries from as far as Italy and Japan.
“Aaron could’ve made a lot of money but he’s committed to doing it open source,” said Mike Gittelsohn, a software engineer and fellow algae-phile. “A lot of companies want to keep their knowledge proprietary.”
Source: SFGate
Oct 262009
Carl Anthony is currently a Ford Foundation Senior Fellow at the University of California at Berkeley. Prior to that he was the Acting Director of the Community and Resource Development Unit at the Ford Foundation, where he also directed the Foundation’s Sustainable Metropolitan Communities Initiative and the Regional Equity Demonstration Initiative. He was Co-Chair of the Bay Area Alliance for Sustainable Development (BAASD) a multi stake holder collaborative bringing together business leadership, environmental groups, social advocacy groups, labor, faith based organizations, elected and other public officials. Anthony also served as President of Earth Island Institute. He has taught at the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture and Planning, the University of California Colleges of Environmental Design and Natural Resources. In 1996, he was appointed Fellow at the Institute of Politics, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University.
Source: The Real News
permaculturetv
niccolox
Kirstie Stramler
Eric Toensmeier
calea68
alexmccausland
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