Ushahidi, one of the winners of USAID's 2008 Development 2.0 Challenge, was highlighted by the World Economic Forum as a "disruptive innovator" in information technology for not only developing groundbreaking products and services, but also redesigning business and society.

The Global Development Commons is delighted to hear reports coming in from far and wide that Maker Faire Africa went off without a hitch and ignited innovation in Accra, Ghana.

Come to Kelele, the first annual African Bloggers conference in Nairobi, Kenya October 29th-November 1st 2009. Kelele will be held in a diffrent African City each year and organized by a local committee. This year, the theam is "Beat Your Drum".

The Global Development Commons congratulates Pascal Katana, a Fourth Year Student at the Department of Electrical and Information Engineering at the University of Nairobi, Kenya on his two new inventions which will enhance food security and renewable energy usage.

Loretta Malondo steps onto the family’s water pump to water the family’s tomatoes, kale, cow peas, corn and sorghum. The pump’s innovative hinge technology leverages a person’s leg strength to gather water from seven meters underground, enabling her to prepare for the unreliable rainfall in Matunda, Kenya.

The Commons is excited to see that USAID partner Western Union has announced it will be certifying mobile platform vendors to provide money transfer services- traditionally only available at Western Union outlets- through mobile phones.

Maker Faire Africa (MFA), a celebration of African ingenuity, innovation and invention, will take place August 14-16 at the Ghana-India Kofi Annan Centre of Excellence in ICT in Ghana's capital, Accra. This event is free to the general public.

Presenters Discuss: the overall strategic approach to mHealth taken by the Millennium Villages Project and use the experiences of pilot testing and implementing mHealth activities and applications in Ruhiira Uganda (Uganda, Africa Region); the present use of mobile phone technology in the microfinance industry (MFI) and new and expanded applications for mobile-based services (India); why the mHealth Alliance was created and how it will develop and incubate the framework and solutions for the nascent mHealth sector (global); and how rapid HIV tests and handheld technologies are being used for population-wide door-to-door HIV screening (Kenya).

After trekking to New York City for MobileActive’s last Mobile Technology for Social Change (M4Change) event, I was thrilled to take the metro down to Google’s DC offices for last week’s M4Change barcamp.

A Telecommunications Policy Agenda for the Obama Administration