Droid Does… (aka the Disaster Communications App)

July 14, 2010

Access to communications technology is AWESOME, but not everyone has it. Cell phone towers are expensive and developing, remote, rural, and/or disaster ridden areas often don’t have those resources. Expose an already weak communications infrastructure to the destruction of a natural disaster, and you have our collective nightmare: Asia circa 2004, Haiti, and the site of the next international incident. When chaos strikes, the speed and proficiency of local relief effort coordination translates directly to saved lives. With those critical moments in mind, Paul Gardner-Stephen (a post-doctoral fellow at Flinders University in Adelaide, Australia) founded The Serval Project. The project goal is to, literally, give voice to communities outside the grid. The Awesome Foundation for the Arts and Sciences granted the project $1,000 in May 2010 to fund the adaptation of the Android OS for disaster relief communications. Paul and his colleagues have spent the past few months writing software to create instant, decentralized, P2P phone networks. The equipment requirements are used Android handsets and Village Telco’s “Mesh Potato” (a lightweight, low-cost, and low-power unit that serves as a building block for ad hoc networks). A key feature of Gardner-Stephen’s system allows users to send and receive messages using their… read more →

Grassroots Mapping Fellowship Party (BOS) 6/11/10

June 11, 2010

Aerial maps? (check) Balloons? (check) Beer? (check) The only thing left on our checklist is you. Come meet Jeff Warren and hear about how his work makes it possible for Louisiana citizen mappers to capture powerful images of the Gulf Coast oil spill. WARNING: you may want to make your own satellite and/or join the 108+ backers who’ve given Grassroots Mapping the green light on kickstarter.com. 6:30p – 8:30p – Design Annex – Union Sq, Somerville, MA 8:30p – The discussion & beverages will move next door to Cantina La Mexicana (247 Washington Street, Somerville, MA)