Re: Project PM Africa Development Program
Subject: Re: Project PM Africa Development Program
From: Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com>
Date: 10/1/10, 10:03
To: Campbell Vertesi <campbell@vertesi.com>

Campell-

Thanks for getting back to me and for agreeing to help us go forward with the Africa project.

If you'd be interested in contributing to the science journalism project as well, you can do so without any time commitment; I can add you to our e-mail discussion group on that, which currently includes Mano Singham of Case Western, Todd Essig of Psychology Today (who also helped to set up the first online degree program and a pre-web discussion network for scientists), Robert Luhn of the National Center for Science Education, and a couple of our Project PM guys. This would allow you to keep up with what we're doing and weigh in when you see fit.

Also, would be interested in sitting in on one or more of our Wednesday evening meetings via Gchat whereby I and a few of our administrators decide on how to proceed with our various projects and with Project PM as a whole? If so, you can either monitor the proceedings or join in as you'd like; it's very informal.

 Let me know. At any rate, I'll add you to the Africa discussion  e-mail list, which will begin in about two weeks.

On Thu, Sep 30, 2010 at 4:51 AM, Campbell Vertesi <campbell@vertesi.com> wrote:
Hi Barrett - 
Thanks for getting in touch with me.  Obviously I haven't taken the time to dig in on the documents since the summertime, but I'm still very interested.  I would love to be on the mailing list, that might be an easier way for me to contribute to the discussion.  Science education is actually something I personally feel very strongly about, but I suspect that my skill set is more closely related to the Africa project. 

It's an interesting idea, to offer "internet mob consultancy."  I would love to learn more about it.  Please do subscribe me to the email discussion list, and keep me appraised of any documentation you've got.  As always, the devil will be in the details.

Thanks

C
----
Campbell Vertesi
Bass

http://campbell.vertesi.com



On Thu, Sep 30, 2010 at 6:15 AM, Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi, Campbell-

Barrett Brown here. Sorry for the long delay in communicating to you on this, and thanks once again for the contributions you made earlier this summer during our initial discussions of the Africa program. 

We've finally gotten our ducks in a row on Project PM and specifically the two programs we'll be launching to begin with, those being the science journalism project and the Africa project to which you've contributed thus far. In addition to the dozen or so folks whom we've chosen to work on Africa, I've also managed to put together an informal network of charitable organizations and individuals with relevant expertise and resources, including a couple who operate on the continent itself. If you're still interested in pursuing this with us - and I hope that you are, as your contributions to the shared document were particularly helpful - then let me know when you get a moment, and I'll have you added to the e-mail discussion list that will begin about two weeks from now and which will produce a firm idea of what information and design schemes would be most useful for a sort of pamphlet for distribution on the local level, as well as what sort of incentive program or other spur to action would best encourage recipients to share this information with neighboring communities. Having gotten a better sense of how we would proceed on that front, we'll begin taking a look at what methods would have the highest dollar-to-benefits impact in the region, as we plan on providing free consultancy to donors and charities once we've gotten to the point at which we're confident that our collective membership is such that they'd be able to produce better plans for development than those which are currently pursued by NGOs, governments, etc. We have a sort of process in mind for making that determination which I'll discuss with you and everyone else in greater detail soon. Meanwhile, I've also been setting up the rudiments of a fundraising network that I'm now confident will provide us with resources sufficient for us to implement fund-dependent programs on our own, although it's still likely that we'd fund existing programs instead, at least  in part.

I've begun to ramble and write run-on sentences so I'll wrap it up by again thanking you for your past contributions. Get in touch when time permits, if you would.


--
Regards,

Barrett Brown
512-560-2302




--
Regards,

Barrett Brown
512-560-2302