It is the end of the year, and everyone is talking about the highs and the lows of 2006. This has been an eventful and interesting year for me, for NTEN and for the NPTech communities. There is energy and conversation that makes me hopeful most days - it seems to be picking up steam. We, civil society technologists - techies for good as the media likes to call us -- are a field, here and increasingly globally as well.

So, for this week's round-up for the Nonprofit Carnival here are my picks for the week, in somewhat random order, following my currently jumbled musings in a brain that is screaming for some space and reflection.

First of all: I am thrilled to report that Michelle Murrain is back. Michelle writes the excellent ZEN and the Art of Nonprofit Technology blog (and I had something to do with naming that baby) and was on sabbatical, of sorts. An amazing woman, she is a NPTech consultant and mover and shaker to watch. Welcome back, Michelle. And while you peruse her latest, check out her short but succinct post on women and tech a while back. For me personally, this will be a major theme in 2007 and I am looking forward into delving into the key issues with the strong women who are part of this community.

And speaking of women, there is the formidable Beth Kanter, colleague, collaborator, intemperate blogger, and occasional co-conspirator who blogs over at BethKanter.org. I can not say which is my favorite post of the year (and Beth did not tag it) - Beth's brain is faster than the wind and her output prolific, even if we not always agree. (Second Life is one topic where we diverge). My favorite post this last week is her missive on the upcoming LASA conference in the UK and the 'role of the technology steward' -- it captures perfectly Beth's overactive, insightful, innovative mind. Beth, I appreciate you.

Last women of the week who is getting celebrated is Nancy White, long-time NTEN member, who won the 2006 Edublog award. Nancy does some amazing thinking on her blog. And, she writes on where I want to see more: Technology for Communities, a blog about the use of tech in communities of practice. Since we are one here (you, this, we!), I want to hear more about the use of tech in this context. It relates to knowledge management, community, online behavior, and much more; all topics we need to urgently think more about.

My current thinking centers a lot on community and what that means not only for communities of practice but for nonprofit organizations (who serve communities, after all) - and how the ongoing hype about Web 2.0 plays into it. We have all fallen victim to it in one way or another here in the world of NPtech - just see the hoopla about Second Life that has made me cringe. See Clay Shirky's scathing post on the media hype. Spot on. My former board member and colleague Jonathan Peizer has a post about the Web 2.0 hype on his blog where he says:

"I am just not ready to give into a rose-colored panacea that seemingly lulls me into a false sense of who is in charge and the life-changing benefits of a "thing". Just because a new form of interactive, networked and seemingly grass-roots technology is introduced, we must not forget that however easy, cool and innovative it seems, it is still only a process. Who controls the discussion and subsequent actions using any technology [process] is a separate issue. When the world actually becomes a better place for most people, by a measurable factor, and our control of the Information Age is identified as a significant contributor that helped people make better life decisions - for themselves, their communities and the planet - then I'll be a true believer."

Amen to that -- which is why I personally continue to do what I do, albeit with a growing sense of realism, and, yes, cynicism at times, even though I, like Jonathan who implies it elsewhere in host post, have not lost the sense of excitement of what is possible - the opportunities we still have to realize the potential of technology while creating social change and making the world a better place. Stubborn, stupid even at times when I am tired, but still there.

There has been, one some of the NTEN lists, a conversation about the 'openness of open source communities.' I have been watching some mailing lists of open source developer communities and have studied open source development communities for years, and have been astonished at how women, in particular, are treated at times - to the point where female developers use ambiguous or non-femal names when posting so to be treated with respect. For nonprofit techies (where there are lots of women, typically) who want to adopt open source tools for their work, this can be a show-stopper. My colleague and friend Cheekay Cinco who blogs at APC Women's GenderIT wrote some time ago about about women in open source, often (and not elegantly) referred to as 'FLOSS' - free/libre open source software. I was astonished that in the conversations on the lists in the NTEN community the gender dimension of participation in open source communities did not come up.

Cheekay writes:

"FOSS has the potential to change the way women relate with ICTs [information and communications technologies], allowing for more control over the tools they use. As users, women will have the freedom from steep licensing fees and the opportunity to influence software development to meet their needs. As developers, the open principle behind FOSS encourages a more collaborative environment, in which women may discover more freedom to create applications and solutions. However until women are recognised as equal partners, users and developers in FOSS, these potentials will remain at rest."

Really not unlike nonprofit users and developers of technology. GenderIt has a section on open source and women in civil society. Read it.

And then read Passionate Users' post on How to Build A User Community.

Bottom line: Be nice, or leave. (Nod to Ami.) Or, as Anil Dash puts it: "Don't be an ass" as policy! I love it."

And since we are a lot of women here at NTEN, we'll enforce that one.

A few side notes:

Cary Morrow and her crew (another excellent woman, incidentally) at Technology in the Arts has a new blog. One of her writers has some thoughts about using social networking spaces for the arts.

He notes the New Orleans Video Access Center's use of video on You Tube to start a discussion of how New Orleans should be rebuilt.

And two more on open source communities and institutions: Evaluating a Community - by (what turns out, who knew?) my neighbor the next town over, Seth Gottlieb, and a paper by my UMass colleague Charlie Schweik on design and instutional principles of successful open source projects. Maybe these two should meet since they are only about nine miles apart.

And lastly, while not blog-related, noteworthy: Fahamu is launching a new project in Kwaulu Natal where rural women will use mobile phones and SMS to "access information to and report incidences of violence against women and children, as well as violations of women's right to land." Since one of my strong interests is focused on mobile phones in international civil society work, I and my colleagues at MobileActive will be watching and learning.

Happy New Year from all of us here.