I'm covering two events - First the GlobalNet 21 Meet-up called "The Path To Development -Trade or Aid" (yesterday evening) and secondly the March First Thursday meeting (this afternoon) which predictably did not go as planned - but was a great session involving people from three continents, eight countries and a confusing number of time zones. First Thursday was supposed to last for "about an hour' - on permaculture (especially kitchen gardens and jatropha), but went on longer, and then turned into to Special Interest Group, on Skype, about appropriate power. We started at 12.00 noon (London time) and rounded up some time after a participant in Kuala Lumpur commented that he was sorry he had to leave, as he had exams in the morning and, for him, it was already around 12.00 midnight.
Meet-up
There is more on the Meet-up website about The Path To Development -Trade or Aid", so I will just mention some people I'm expecting to connect with again:
- Bunmi Williams - one of the speakers, who spoke passionately about aid not working, and is currently reading for a Masters in Charity Management.
- Kesia Hanson - who is creating an open video blog called Shoot2Change and wants to include Kelechi Micheal's video about Fantsuam Foundation
- Daniel - who asked some brilliant questions, raised interesting points, and had to leave early (but not before we had exchanged contact details).
- Toni - who is currently studying public relations, who gave me great encouragement, and I hope may give me some tips as well on presenting Dadamac to people.
First Thursday
The First Thursday chat got inextricably entwined with a chat that was being held in a neighboring chat room when some people got confused about finding their way in. As Marcus (our permacultue expert) had been called away by circumstances beyond his control, we were able to cope with the extra visitors dropping in, and they added a welcome extra dimension to our discussions. Some stayed with us to learn from the team in Nigeria about their experiences of permaculture, and then discuss power generation. The chat archive is here. Thanks, as ever, to Andrius Kulikauskas for making the worknets chatroom available to us.
The people dropping in to First Thursday "by mistake" were on their way to (or from) a link-up to http://destinations.uk.com/gold/broadcast/ which was part of "get online day" (more details at http://destinations.uk.com/gold/)
It's a regular event and new people are welcome
First Thursdays happen on the First Thursday of the month at 12.00 GMT. There are full details of how to take part in the February First Thursday blog