Reframing the Work of Rural Community Development: Case Studies in Innovative Rural Business Strategies

Much of community development work in this country is understood in urban terms - densely populated areas with attendant economies of scale, housing issues that can be addressed largely in isolation of economic development and infrastructure issues, micro-level service area focus without the need to address regional economies and housing markets, even simple communications and relationship-building opportunities.None of this is terribly surprising. After all, the community development field grew out of urban activism and experience.The translation of urban revitalization strategies and lessons learned into a rural community development model inevitably highlights the challenges unique to highly varied rural markets. The service area is typically numerous communities, sparsely populated, covering great distances. Absent are highly visible corporate headquarters and other traditional opportunities for local private partnership. Smaller municipalities are less likely to offer a full range of services to complement any nonprofit service delivery system.At first glance the challenges facing rural development seem daunting. Needs -- or everything that seems to be so glaringly absent -- outweigh assets. However, rural markets are well worth a second look. In the few years since NeighborWorks America launched its Rural Initiative, we've uncovered astonishing examples of innovation with enormous community impact in some of the most challenging markets in America.We think these innovations are well worth sharing. Rural markets are often the emerging markets for expanding regional economies. The closer we look at the work being done by community based organizations, and in particular, chartered members of the NeighborWorks network, the more we realize that these organizations function as front line economic engines for increased homeownership, infrastructure improvements, job creation and retention.This report documents the compelling attributes of six business strategies that are successfully transforming diverse rural markets across America. Our hope is that this exciting new information, the first of a series, will stimulate numerous and varied adaptations within the community development field and spur additional investment in rural development by the private and public sectors

New Media Art/ New Funding Models

Investigates the current state of funding for new media artists, with an emphasis on the support structures for innovative creative work that utilizes advanced technologies as the main vehicle for artistic practice

Government By and For Millenial America: A Blueprint for 21st Century Government

Using this generation's unique ethos and commitment to pragmatic problem-solving, Millennials across the country have collaborated to design their vision for a 21st century democracy and reject the idea that our system is too broken, too stagnant, and too outdated. They have identified the parts of the system that need to be fixed while articulating what a true democracy should look like. Government By and For Millennial America, the third installment of our blueprint series, tackles some of the most fundamental, divisive, and difficult questions on the purpose of government in furthering our country's progress: how can we hear from more voices? How can we be more transparent? How can government be more egalitarian? How can we both support individual communities and the common good of every American? Most importantly, this pursuit is grounded in one fundamental idea that defines America's distinctive pursuit of self-governance: in the words of our namesake, Let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and senators and congressmen and government officials, but the voters of this country. - President Franklin D. Roosevelt We set out to craft a blueprint, and discovered, in conversations with over a thousand young people across the country, that the Millennial generation is not yet ready to give up on America's ever evolving experiment in a government by and for the people

Silicon utopias: the making of a tech startuo ecosystem in Manchester (UK)

‘Silicon utopias’, the hope for a green, affluent and happy future through the creation of new tech-businesses, are today informing many urban development processes globally. In this contribution, I look at the recent remodeling of Manchester (Northern England) as an entrepreneurial city. In particular, I present a specific government investment scheme and its relation to the work of a group of local lobbyists who have been promoting a new tech startup community in the city since 2012. Stemming from this empirical example, I explore the interplay between local entrepreneurial dreams and the state’s promotion of startups. The paper concludes with the argument that an anthropologically informed concept of cynicism can contribute to a nuanced reading of silicon utopias and dystopias

Investing in Broadband Evaluation: Guiding Policy & Innovation for the Future

How we address the broadband challenge has been called the most important infrastructure challenge of the new century by the National Broadband Plan. High-speed Internet can connect remote communities, help coordinate and streamline health care services, enable our children with unparalleled access to learning opportunities, and spark and support innovation in numerous fields. The challenge, however, is understanding what works and why across all of these important uses of broadband technology. Program evaluation can answer this need, especially if it is built into new programs and policies from the start

Sustain Arts/SE Michigan: A Portrait of the Cultural Ecosystem

This report discusses the potential use of data in arts organizations for strategic purposes. Data currently available on the cultural sector can lead to useful insights about the increasing proliferation of small arts organizations; the almost monolithic focus of private foundations on supporting a highly select group of large, well-established arts organizations; and the fact that established arts organizations are poorly positioned to satisfy emerging consumer preferences for cultural experiences. Such insights should provoke frank discussion and galvanize field leaders to advocate appropriate actions, both in response to existing disconnects and proactively, in anticipation of coming change. The data that are now available to the field are not perfect. In fact, that's part of the story that needs to be told about the cultural sector. Systematic data collection on artists, cultural organizations, and audiences receives only a token amount of government funding. Instead, it is left largely up to private organizations to document trends in both the nonprofit and for-profit cultural arenas. This leads to multiple non-overlapping data collection strategies, making it difficult to construct a coherent picture of the field. There are gaping holes in the puzzle, and the tales we tell with existing data must be told with caution

Breaking Barriers to Renewable Energy Production in the North American Arctic

As climate change continues to affect our lives, the communities at the northern extremes of our world have witnessed the changes most profoundly. In the Arctic, where climate change is melting permafrost and causing major shoreline erosion, remote communities in Alaska and northern Canada are particularly vulnerable. Furthermore, these communities have limited access to electrical grids and bear oppressive energy costs relying on diesel generators. While some communities have started to incorporate renewable energy into their hamlets and villages, progress has generally been limited with the notable exception of Canada’s Northwest Territories and some coastal communities in western Alaska. During its latest stint as chair of the Arctic Council, the United States outlined community renewable energy in the Arctic as one of its primary goals. This Note focuses on regulatory and practical policy solutions to make that goal possible. It draws on examples from industrialized countries, such as Canada and the United Kingdom, as well as examples from developing countries, such as India and Peru, to examine solutions for the technical, economic, regulatory, and community engagement problems that Arctic communities in Alaska face when setting up new energy projects. Additionally, this Note describes the current political structure of Alaskan villages under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act and argues that Alaska Native Corporations should play a role in developing clean, cheap energy sources for their shareholders. Finally, this Note argues that public-private partnerships, like the non-profit Arctic Energy Alliance in the Northwest Territories, shows that clean, renewable energy projects for rural Arctic villages are possible throughout the Arctic. This Note draws lessons from other communities throughout the world and attempts to apply them to the unique situations that remote northern Alaska communities face regarding access to clean, renewable energy

Chasing Sustainability on the Net : International research on 69 journalistic pure players and their business models

This report outlines how online-based journalistic startups have created their economical locker in the evolving media ecology. The research introduces the ways that startups have found sustainability in the markets of ten countries. The work is based on 69 case studies from Europe, USA and Japan. The case analysis shows that business models can be divided into two groups. The storytelling-oriented business models are still prevalent in our findings. These are the online journalistic outlets that produce original content – news and stories for audiences. But the other group, service-oriented business models, seems to be growing. This group consists of sites that don’t try to monetize the journalistic content as such but rather focus on carving out new functionality. The project was able to identify several revenue sources: advertising, paying for content, affiliate marketing, donations, selling data or services, organizing events, freelancing and training or selling merchandise. Where it was hard to evidence entirely new revenue sources, it was however possible to find new ways in which revenue sources have been combined or reconfigured. The report also offers practical advice for those who are planning to start their own journalistic site

Bringing America Up to Speed: States' Role in Expanding Broadband

Describes innovative state programs to expand access to high-quality, high-speed broadband; the National Broadband Plan -- a partnership of state, federal, and local governments; providers; and nonprofits -- and roles and challenges for states

Philanthropy and Social Media

We define social media as online or digital technologies that serve to connect people, information and organisations through networks. The term evolved as a way to -distinguish the emerging online -information platforms from traditional "broadcast media" -- TV, radio, film, newspapers -- by highlighting that these new tools -were "socialised" and allowed the audiences to contribute to their content. Social media have therefore become defined in relation to these existing media channels, but in fact they have their ancestry in existing social technologies, like the telephone and the letter. If traditional media connect people to information, social media connect people to people