oneVillage Foundation

We plan to use the virtual part of the conference--which will take place in a series of pre-conference events (see the chart below)--to communicate and promote the oneVillage “Village Economy” concept to conference participants. We feel this dovetails very nicely with the work that Dr Raoul Weiler is doing with the Digital World Conference. The Conference focus is on developing ICT to bridge the digital divide. However it is not just about technology, but also about exploring how existing best practices can be rapidly adapted/adopted/replicated at the grassroots level to promote education in emerging economies, and of course sustainable development in emerging as well as affluent economies.

Our particular contribution to the conference will focus on the need for effective approaches to address rural development. We see ICT as an enabling tool to ensure that rural revitalization efforts are successful and ecologically sustainable. We think this is to key global sustainability because it will take the pressure off burgeoning cities in non-affluent regions of the world by reducing migration from rural to urban regions.

WRI Conference Smart Mob
We hope that you will help us to organize this into a concerted smart mob. Yes there has been a lot of talk about this but here we have an opportunity to actually develop an organizational model to do it using the existing ICT we have as well as seeking out better systems such as social networking tools like the Living Directory.

We see the WRI Conference as an opportunity to connect the grassroots with important decision-makers. These decision-makers are often cut off from the everyday challenges of the people they are seeking to serve (those who actually live in the bottom up economy). In the process of creating those connections, we want gain the momentum to actually do what we want to do which is build unity centers!

It is a great opportunity we feel to raise awareness as to the relevancy of our work among decision makers who will participate at the conference as well as others from all walks of life. We hope as I mentioned above to have an affinity group in the Living Directory to help build community (organize the smart mob by assigning people to focus on particular people and issues related to the conference) towards this effort.

In the meantime, we encourage you to sign up to participate in the discussions going on online in preparation for the Eradicating Poverty Conference on Dec 12th-14th.

How to Participate in the WRI Virtual Conferences:
The WRI conference has instructions on how to participate: http://povertyprofit.wri.org/resources/virtual.html

We encourage participants to participate widely in the discussions by subscribing to both the Social Edge and GKD-managed forums.

To join the Skoll Foundation's Social Edge discussion, browse to the Social Edge page and fill out the registration form to become a member of their online community. When the Virtual Conference begins, there will be dedicated links directing participants to the posting area.

To join the Global Knowledge for Development follow the instructions below:
Anyone who has electronic mail with Internet access can subscribe to the GKD List. To join please send an
e-mail to:

majordomo@mail.edc.org

Do not enter a subject. In the body of the message, type the text:

subscribe gkd

Do not put anything after GKD. You will receive a Welcome Letter to the List.

Virtual Conference Discussion Topics:

November 8
Cross-Sector Partnerships
How Can ICT Create New Business Partnerships?

November 15
Cross-Sector Partnerships
Tomorrow's Solutions: What New Technologies and Business Models are On the Horizon?