With over 100 active groups and nearly 5,000 users, NTEN's Affinity Groups platform is an incredible resource for those in the nonprofit tech community. There are a variety of discussions constantly taking place, ranging from the very basic and elementary aspects of technology in the nonprofit sector to the more sophisticated and technical.

A simple but informative discussion in the DC 501 Tech Club recently centered around different internet connections for nonprofits. Although it is only beginning to operate in most urban areas, Verizon's FIOS service received praise for its high bandwidth (up to 20Mbps). DSL was also recommended as a possibly cheaper alternative, depending upon distance to a CO. Cable was recommend multiple times as well, although participants noted that while it generally has higher possible bandwidth than DSL, its speed can vary depending upon neighborhood usage. T1 lines were said to be very expensive and generally slower (albeit asymmetric so upload and download usage do not affect each other), but extremely reliable.

The success of your work depends, in part, on making sure you deliver services in the ways your constituents want and can use. Joyce Raby, a Program Services Analyst with Legal Services Corporation, knows that technology is often the best and most efficient way to deliver services, and that you need to look at technology differently when your services are targeted to low income people.

Read on for a quick look into Joyce and her work, and learn more about this topic at Joyce’s session “How Low Income Individuals – Your Clients - Use Technology” at the NTC on Thursday. April 5th, at 1:30 pm.