Ushahidi, one of the winners of USAID's 2008 Development 2.0 Challenge, was highlighted by the World Economic Forum as a "disruptive innovator" in information technology for not only developing groundbreaking products and services, but also redesigning business and society.

The ninth annual Tech Museum Awards, which celebrate social entrepreneurs and innovation, were held on November 19 at the San Jose McEnery Convention Center.  Fifteen "Tech Laureates" were selected from the fields of environment, equality, economic development, health, and education; five won cash prizes of $50,000.

Google continues to expand into Africa with Google News Senegal, or rather, Google Actualités pour le Sénégal. The service pulls news from major Senegalese newspapers, ...

The Global Development Commons is delighted to hear reports coming in from far and wide that Maker Faire Africa went off without a hitch and ignited innovation in Accra, Ghana.

The Commons is excited to see that USAID partner Western Union has announced it will be certifying mobile platform vendors to provide money transfer services- traditionally only available at Western Union outlets- through mobile phones.

Mobile VoIP is about to become mainstream. Skype, Fring, Nimbuzz, Truphone and others are all offering mVoIP through your cellphone's Internet connection.

Pop!Tech is a one-of-a-kind conference that brings together a community of remarkable people to engage in  an ongoing conversation about science, technology and the future of ideas.

Today is International Women's Day and we are celebrating by featuring innovative women in the MobileActive.org community who are making a difference by using mobiles for social impact. Many of these social innovators are indeed focusing their work on improving the lives of women - their health, incomes, and social and political well-being. We salute you all!

The United Nations' Web4Dev Conference is taking place this week in New York and even if you aren't able to attend, you can still be a part of the action.

The Red Herring recently published this article by Alex Gronke about connecting Africa. This paragraph in particular caught my attention: "It’s called the last link. The roughly 5,000 miles of coastline between Djibouti and South Africa is the longest stretch of land untouched by submarine fiber-optic cable. That means the sub-Saharan African countries bordering the Indian [...]