A Personal Technology for Good Redux: Call for Code

The Endpoint Imperative: In a Software World, Hardware Does Matter

By G C Network | January 9, 2018

Hardware matters. From productivity to security to innovation, make sure your machines can keep up. Intel’s Sarah Wieskus joins The End Point Imperative: A Podcast series from Intel to discuss…

IT Transformation with Watson

By G C Network | January 5, 2018

Credit: Shutterstock by Kevin Jackson & Dez Blanchfield   IBM recently launched an exciting new project in the form of a podcast series produced and hosted Dez Blanchfield, appropriately titled the…

The Endpoint Imperative: A Form Factor Renaissance

By G C Network | December 22, 2017

Workplace expectations are changing, and along with them, the devices we use to do our jobs. In this episode of “The End Point Imperative”, Intel’s Sarah Wieskus tells us about…

Cloud Storage 2.0 Set To Dominate Market

By G C Network | December 19, 2017

The enterprise data storage marketplace is poised to become a battlefield. No longer the quiet backwater of cloud computing services, the focus of this global transition is now going from…

Top “Cloud Musings” Posts For 2017

By G C Network | December 17, 2017

    ( This content is being syndicated through multiple channels. The opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not represent the views of GovCloud Network, GovCloud…

The Endpoint Imperative: ID’ing and Overcoming the Stumbling Blocks to Digital Transformation

By G C Network | December 6, 2017

Digital Transformation is the No 1 priority for organizations large and small. It’s imperative that IT remove any obstacles to digital transformation success – including outdated PCs and mobile devices.…

Industry Verticals Tackle Unstructured Data

By G C Network | December 1, 2017

  Organizations around the world are struggling to cope with the current data explosion. A vital characteristic of this data is that it is unstructured and represents things like email,…

The Endpoint Imperative: The Perimeter is Dead; Long Live the Perimeter!

By G C Network | November 27, 2017

Cloud, mobility and the Internet of Things have obliterated the traditional perimeter that protected organizations. The result: Higher productivity, but bigger challenges for security, data protection, and mobile device management.…

The Data Storage Explosion

By G C Network | November 25, 2017

Cloud computing innovation will power enterprise transformation in 2018.  Cloud growth is also driving a rapid rise in the storage market, exacerbating the enterprise challenge around storage cost and complexity.…

Digital Transformation Drives Mainframe’s Future

By G C Network | November 15, 2017

  Digital Transformation is amplifying mainframe as mission critical to business growth more than ever before. With 70% of the world’s corporate data and over half of the world’s enterprise…

In 2013 I had the opportunity to manage a $2M demonstration of how cloud computing could be used to support natural disasters. In that NCOIC Geospatial Community Cloud (GCC) demonstration, multiple regional clouds were managed using a cloud brokerage platform in a simulated response to a massive earthquake. Modeled after the disaster that struck Haiti in 2010, the project showed how interoperability and movement of data in an open, cloud-based infrastructure could be used to deliver a global, multidisciplinary disaster response capability. The relief simulation also showed government leaders how data sources from a variety of organizations coupled with cloud technology could improve capability and effectiveness while reducing cost, time and risk. These were critical lessons that, back then, I looked forward to maturing.

Now it’s 2018, and technology advances have continued to revolutionize our society.  The democratization of data and information have since changed our lives in many unexpected ways.  A sad fact though is that, although some government leaders have tried, our global society has not yet found a way to institutionalize the lessons we learned back then.  While cloud computing continues to upend industry norms, the disaster response community is still stuck with antiquated processes and technologies.  This unfortunate reality is but one reason why I have decided to put my energy behind the “Call for Code” initiative.
 
IBM is the founding member of the Call for Code Global Initiative, which was created by David Clark, a renowned leader in cause-related initiatives. David Clark’s work includes iconic people and humanitarian organizations, such as President Nelson Mandela, Muhammad Ali, Prince, the United Nations, Amnesty International, and The Anne Frank Center.  The Call for Code Global Challengeis designed to leverage technology for good by asking software developers to create solutions that significantly improve preparedness for natural disasters and relief. This competition encourages developers who want to pay their skills forward for a specific mission to alleviate human suffering.  A broad cross-section of experts humanitarian and international organizations are supporting this initiative which includes the United Nations Human Rights Office and the American Red Cross’
GRAMMY nominatedsongtress Andra Day

International team. They will also benefit from the inaugural Call for Code Global Prize Event & Concert on October 13th, United Nations International Day for Disaster Reduction.  The initiative also boasts some star power with GRAMMY-nominated singer and human rights advocate Andra Day, whose 2015 global smash hit song “Rise Up” quickly became the voice for the voiceless, leading a celebrity coalition.

 

Another motivation for joining this initiative was a recent video from Brad Kieserman, Red Cross Vice President of Disaster Operations and Logistics.  In that video, he highlighted the importance of visualizing data in a way that helped responders make better decisions about the movement of resources during a disaster.  His vision of using technology to address unmet disaster need for me pointed out the value of the cloud as the application delivery platform and data repository.  The same value proposition we proved back in 2013.
 
Brad Kieserman, Red Cross Vice President of Disaster Operations and Logistics
Over the next few months I will be blogging, tweeting, podcasting and vlogging on the many “Call for Code” activities and events.  Please join me in supporting this effort by retweeting, liking and reposting this content to your friends.
Let’s all work together to help each other when disaster strikes.

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