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Panic Button: Lessons for the Tech-for-Good Sector

70 pointsby jacobrover 7 years ago

8 comments

ballenfover 7 years ago
This was a design-by-committee project that didn&#x27;t have a clear singular problem it was trying to solve. Reading their goals they intentionally mixed the simple aspect of a &quot;911&quot; for human rights workers with a mishmash engagement-type soft goals.<p>Just looks like a recipe for failure regardless of funding.<p>Another way to look at it, it was a success if measured in terms of raising awareness of the problem.
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mcguireover 7 years ago
&quot;<i>Despite our best efforts, we have not been able to secure any substantial external funding for the project since being awarded £100,000 as runners-up in the Google Global Impact Award in June 2013. In part, this is due to what in hindsight was a short-lived boom in funding and excitement around “tech 4 good.”</i>&quot;<p>There&#x27;s a lesson here somewhere for those who are optimistic about changing the world.
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wpietriover 7 years ago
I really appreciate it when people produce thoughtful looks at project failure like this. If I had Too Much Money, I&#x27;d definitely fund an annual prize for the best startup-ish project failure reports. There&#x27;s no better source for information on advancing the state of the field, but so much is lost when companies just quietly shut down.
sametmaxover 7 years ago
Open source : <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;PanicInitiative&#x2F;PanicButton" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;PanicInitiative&#x2F;PanicButton</a><p>Donc si c&#x27;est vraiment utile, ca ne disparaitra peut etre pas
5_minutesover 7 years ago
Also to note is that organisations like Amnesty are incredibly inefficient and big money wasters. Paying mid level employees 5000k net + 2000 for rent is not exceptional. So I&#x27;m skeptic when they need &quot;more money&quot;.
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7ewisover 7 years ago
When it said:<p>&gt; help us use technology to prevent unlawful detentions<p>I thought they were talking about the Firefox Extension called Panic Button from ~10 years ago that we used in school to hide games and show an education site &#x27;Preventing detentions&#x27;!
TekMolover 7 years ago
I don&#x27;t get it. The reasons they give are:<p>1) Only had £100,000<p>2) Would need more money to make the app deal with false alerts.<p>3) Would need more money to &quot;keep up [...] our engagement with users.&quot;<p>What does this mean?
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wpietriover 7 years ago
The followup article has much more useful detail: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.theengineroom.org&#x2F;panic-button-lessons-learned&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.theengineroom.org&#x2F;panic-button-lessons-learned&#x2F;</a>
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