Ushahidi.com

 Crowdsourcing on web 2.0 is not just for business goals. The civil society sees a potential of the technology-empowered collaboration. Ushahidi is the example of crowdsourcing among citizen journlaists.

Since I have visited this website lasst time a year ago, Ushahidi project have attracted a good deal of advocaters. Currently, Ushahidi team supports several projects in different countries. Out of them, the kenya project, the initial mash-up that reports the history of violence occruing in Kenay in post-election period, is the prototype of political crowdsourcing.

This is an amazing case, in that the cause, processes, and the outcomes of the project are exactly mirroring the social construction of technologices. The converged media are appropriated by citizen journalists who are willing to report what is going on via camera, texting, or email. The volunteer engineers are also willing to support the project for technical updates. The product of the project is freely accessible to other parties who share the similar causes.  The political crowdsourcing is only available when the technological advantages meet the culture of collaboration and the culture of democracy.  It is a beautiful example.