Gavin Clabaugh, board member emeritus of NTEN and CTO at the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, was named one of the 50 most influential people in the nonprofit sector by the Nonprofit Times. This honor is bestowed to those individuals “for the impact they have now and for the innovative plans they are putting in place to evolve the charitable sector.”

In addition to Gavin, Daniel Ben-Horin, President of Compumentor, was honored again this year for his innovative work with Compumentor and Techsoup.

Both are very dear colleagues and friends, and we congratulate them for the recognition of their great work in the NPTech field!

The results of our technology service provider survey are in! In late 2006 we surveyed tech providers across the country - the first step in the TechImpact research project to help us understand what technology assistance means for nonprofit capacity.

We wanted to understand:

• Who is providing technology assistance to nonprofit organizations? Who do they serve?
• What services do providers offer? What approaches do they use to deliver technology assistance?
• Where are technology providers located? Where are they delivering services?
• When do providers employ evaluation strategies to understand the effect of their work?
• How do providers implement strategies to foster key outcomes for organizations, and how do they successfully achieve those outcomes (e.g., improved efficiency and effectiveness)?
• How do providers measure the success of their projects?

Personally, I think the best part of any NTC is the people that you meet. So, we want to help you get a jump start on that! If you're coming to the NTC and want to connect with other registrants before you get there, join the NTEN NTC 07 list.

So I did a little Alexa sleuthing (yeah, yeah, Alexa is not definitive but nonetheless interesting) about 'social networks for good' for our next newsletter which will focus all on "communities for a cause." That with the NTC coming up - our own little 'community for change', of course - for ultimate bonding. Call is cross-marketing...

The picture is rather fascinating, comparing some of the more well-known sites Facebook, the overhauled Ning, MySpace, Idealist, and the new Change.org.

I am seeking some very good stories from YOU for a piece on ABC News/vcast TODAY that will feature "technology for good' or how nonprofits are using tech to make the world a better place. Here is what I am looking for:

Nonprofits are getting more and more savvy in using tech - and deploying techies who are doing good in the world. In April, more than 1,000 of these "Techies for Good" are coming to Washington DC.

Is the web -- many small pieces loosely joined - making old grantmaking practices in advocacy and democratic engagement obsolete? What does grantmaking in an interactive world look like? The rise of collective knowledge, organizing networks, and the transparency that millions of eyes and voices generate is changing politics (remember Macaca?), economic paradigms, how corporations conduct business, and yet has made precious few inroads into how we, as a third sector, operate -- and that is especially true for funders.

In a world more connected than ever, we are already seeing the next big social transformation - as messy and as iterative and lose as all the movements in history, with strong and persuasive visions but at best highly informal plans. 'Social change' in a connected world is based on an entirely different paradigm than that of the 'strategic plan' and clear 'year-end metrics' that funders demand. In a highly fluid, networked, and iterative world, funding by 'blueprint' becomes meaningless. Read more.

Happy International Women's Day! As women in tech, Holly and I toasted each other with great coffee -- and all of you other techno babes. We are hailing from Portland where we have a brandnew office (see photos from the trusty Macbook Pro of our view!). We are getting pings from all over the country from our women colleagues in tech - Usha, Beth, Joyce, Michelle -- saluting you all in the NTEN community! Special greetings to our board chair (yep, an extraordinary woman) Lynn Labieniec from Beaconfire.

Around the world, International Women's Day (IWD) marks a celebration of the economic, social, cultural and political achievements for women.

The line-up of books focused on nonprofit tech continues (and all of our NTEN authors will be at the NTC, ready to sign and read!) with a NEW one that I was part of at the very beginning a few years back:

Nonprofit Technology: Emerging Research for Usable Knowledge by Michael Cortess and Kevin Rafter are the editors;both are at the University of San Francisco.

The announcement of Google to offer Google Premier Apps, a suite of on-demand Google services such as its calendar, email, IM, VOIP, docs and spreadsheets bundled for $50/year. A free version targeted at educational institutions — Google Apps Education Edition — offers the same features as the premier edition except for the storage size. There is also the free Google Apps Standard Edition with less features.

This is not only starting to seriously compete with Microsoft but has the potential to tip the way we all operate. Salesforce.com's success and growing adoption by the nonprofit market is already showing that the on-demand nonprofit working in a hosted environment for critical business functions is here to stay. This true especially for office productivity, communications, and other core functions, such as CRM.