I am watching (and reporting) the live stream on the 1%EVENT from my laptop.
Interviewer at the 1% EVENT in Amsterdam: “It’s almost a festival, isn’t it?”
Interviewee at the 1% EVENT in Amsterdam: “Yes! There is too much to do, too much to choose from!”
And it’s even worse online, where I am. It looks all festive and impressive on camera, in Amsterdam. I can’t stop going from Ramallah to Caïro to Nairobi back to Ramallah and up to London and… But well, I basically just see people working (everywhere), discussing (Ramallah, London, Buéa), and sometimes eating (Nairobi – of course). Time for some Amsterdam again, then. I tuned in to the inspiration stage for the talk of Gijsbert Koren.
He’s from Enviu – innovators in sustainability – and develops sustainable and social innovations and brings them to the market. Basically they co-create innovative businesses. One of the projects he showed was a sustainable dance-club with a floor that generates energy when people dance on it. But they are currently also into apps for sustainability, trying to change the mobile phone industry into a more sustainable one, through co-creation and making use of open source.
They arranged a competition, and the ‘number 1′ will actually be developed (I think, my connection got really bad halfway through his story). The ‘numbers 2′ and ’3′ you may just as well steal, yes please he said, cause they are all open source and could be fun anyway.
Number 3 for instance is called ‘Dude, what’s in my food?’ and helps you know what is actually in your food. So if you have a neighbor coming over for dinner and he’ll die when eating peanuts, you could just go to you supermarket, take out the app to scan the ingredients you had in mind, and it’ll tell you if you are kind or are not so kind to the neighbour with it. And you could change the menu.
The neighbors were also part of App number 2 Gijsbert Koren talked about. This app (I think it was called ‘neighbor buddies’) connects neighbors and helps them communicate their needs to each other. So they can more easily start sharing. Their lawn mowers. Their cars, maybe. Or they could help each other out feeding each others cats or mothers-in-law.
Some cynics – like the presenter of the inspiration stage – would argue that the doorbell should be sufficient. But – as the audience put it – one does not always know the ones living around one too well… apps might actually really help with that.
Then, at last, the number 1 app. It’s an actual Help App, as it helps crowd-sourcing emergency assistance. When someone has a heart attack, the ambulance in Amsterdam can be there in 10 minutes. But the first 6 minutes of a cardiac arrest count for much of the chances of survival. How to tackle the challenge? If some accident happens, you press this app for help, it calls the emergency services but ALSO let’s all people around you know there is trouble. They have indicated that they can help in certain situations, and if they think they can be of help: they get directions to the incident too. Or they could make up a step by step ‘what to do’ for anyone near. The app is actually a network of people who want to help: professionals, amateurs, anyone. And very fast.
I was inspired. Do you want to know more? They’ll probably tell you all about in on Twitter.
