Digital Impact was created by the Digital Civil Society Lab at Stanford PACS and was managed until 2024. It is no longer being updated.
September 4, 2014
For 20 years, Northern Uganda has suffered from a violent conflict which only ended in 2005, leaving a vulnerable and fragile state. Since then, Uganda has seen a proliferation of resource flows into the northern districts from donors, government, and NGOs. Alongside the increase in resources and providers, however, the data have become increasingly […]
September 3, 2014
Today we take a look into a recent examination of child welfare data from Marquis Cabrera in a recent article in the Huffington Post. Cabrera – the founder and CEO of Fosters Skill, Inc, a charity working to support foster children – interviews Dr. Benjamin de Haan, Executive Director of Partners For Our Children […]
September 1, 2014
In my last blog for Markets for Good I wrote about the importance of data to Riders for Health and our programmes. In seven countries across Africa our technicians are managing and maintaining vehicles so health workers can reach people with reliable health care in even the most remote places. The blog had some […]
August 29, 2014
Daniel Ben-Horin of Tech Soup Global looks at what we can learn from the sharing economy, in this recent SSIR article. He makes a clear distinction between the “idealistic” attitude prevalent in the social sector, and that of the “materialistic” side of sharing and being open, but driven by personal gain. Referencing problems like […]
August 28, 2014
As of August 26, The Ice Bucket Challenge has raised over $88.5 Million Dollars to fight the horrible disease, according to the ALS Association web site. Just one week ago, donations totaled $22.6 million. In just seven days, donations have skyrocketed by an average of $9 million per day, now totaling $88.5 million. Click the image below for […]
August 27, 2014
“What if software akin to the program that recognizes faces in Facebook photos could detect cancer in an x-ray?” This is the question asked by Elizabeth Dwoskin in this recent article in the Wall Street Journal. In her post, she looks at Enlitic, a new big data startup who are aiming to drastically improve […]
August 26, 2014
“You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” – Buckminster Fuller Today’s social and environmental challenges seem to be more complex and intractable than ever before. Will we be able to resolve critical global issues such as climate change, […]
August 21, 2014
In order to avoid giving offense to living persons, Mark Twain embargoed his autobiography for 100 years. Among those he would have offended were America’s first titans of industry, the “robber barons” who were his contemporaries. From the man who coined the term Gilded Age, I guess this is no surprise. But what did […]
August 20, 2014
The divide between shared data for better programs and the right to data privacy is a fine line to tread. As such, we were particularly interested to see Nicole Wallace of The Chronicle of Philanthropy publish this article on new shared, sensitive research. Crisis Text Line (CTL) are a nonprofit who offer access to […]
August 18, 2014
Looking for a good way to waste millions of dollars? Earlier this year, the World Bank (WB) released findings from an internal study that looked at how often WB’s core “knowledge products” – research, policy and technical assistance reports – were cited or downloaded. The purpose of the study was to gain a better […]
