The Center for Accessible Technology (CforAT) and California Emerging Technology Fund (CETF) today named TechSoup Global one of three winners of the 2009 California Digital Inclusion Program Award. The award recognizes nonprofits, government agencies, and corporations responsible for raising awareness of and improving web accessibility for Californians with disabilities.

TechSoup is a nonprofit that has many moving parts, programs, services, and functions. It's a lot of work to provide (what we hope is) good content, useful events, inexpensive or donated products from corporate partners, and more. With that, we need your help. There are many ways to get involved; check out the pages on the TechSoup Global site to learn about current job openings and internship opportunities. This post will discuss two of those opportunities in detail.

The TechSoup Content Team Is Seeking Volunteers and an Intern:

If you're in the Bay Area November 18-20, come check out Aspiration's 2009 Nonprofit Software Development Summit in Oakland. This is the third time Aspiration has hosted this event, and by the look of the session list, there will be no shortage of great discussions.

The conference isn't only for programmers. According to Aspiration, "The event will target a range of audiences, including users who know what they still need developed, developers writing code to support nonprofit needs, integrators deploying tools for nonprofit and social justice organizations, and individuals who just care about seeing better technology developed to address the broad range of issues we face as a global community."

One of TechSoup's Co-CEO's, Daniel Ben-Horin, has been selected to be an Ashoka Fellow. This is a great honor and I'm sure Daniel appreciates the recognition for his years of innovative social work and entrepreneurship. If you're not familiar with Ashoka's work and their fellows, here's some background from their website:

Ashoka Fellows are leading social entrepreneurs who we recognize to have
innovative solutions to social problems and the potential to change patterns
across society. They demonstrate unrivaled commitment to bold new ideas and
prove that compassion, creativity, and collaboration are tremendous forces for
change. Ashoka Fellows work in over 60 countries around the globe in every area
of human need.

All Ashoka Fellows must undergo a rigorous search and selection process in which they
demonstrate that they fully meet Ashoka’s selection criteria.

Daniel has been a leader and innovator in developing technology for social change — and through TechSoup, has helped put that technology into the hands of tens of thousands of nonprofits, libraries, and social benefit organizations around the world. I'm proud to be affiliated with him through TechSoup and can't wait to see what amazing work he continues to do with the support of the Ashoka Fellows program. Congrats, Daniel!

TechSoup is about to embark on a grand series of events to help nonprofits learn and demonstrate ways to effectively tell their stories. Some of my favorite causes have captured my loyalty and heart strings through amazing use of video and images. Last year, I blogged about what a hoot the AARP voting video was. I not only signed up for their list (even though I'm far from their 55-year-old target age), I also forwarded it to everyone in my address book. I did the same for The Story of Stuff and The Girl Effect, which we've also mentioned on this blog in the past. Elliot blogged about a group that gives cameras to local groups around the world in order to share their stories. Our partner in Canada featured tips on creating digital stories at a recent Net Tuesday event.

The use of telling stories through photos has also been discussed here various times, with tips on different photo-sharing and slideshow tools discussed. All of these are great examples of using video and images to tell compelling, poignant, and memorable stories about the important work nonprofits contribute for the benefit of the world.

These stories don't need to be fancy or expensive. You don't need a professional videographer or even a professional grade camera to capture video or photos. One of our newest partners, Flip Video, joined TechSoup's donation program this week and is offering low-cost, handheld video cameras to nonprofits for this very purpose. Learn how to use them as well as how to craft your digital story, with these three, upcoming webinars.

For the last three years, OneWebDay "has attracted a global network of partner organizations and individual activists committed to broadening public awareness of Internet and web issues while deepening a culture of participation in building a web that works for everyone."

This day is considered a day of action for digital inclusion, much like Earth Day has become a day of action for environmental issues. Grassroots organizers and individuals around the world are raising awareness, taking action, and encouraging change on a broad host of issues where web and Internet technologies are concerned. From expanding access to free WiFi, to creating public computing spaces, to expanding crowdsourced translation services for web content, OneWebDay is bringing together ideas and action for making the web truly a place for all.

In 2008, OneWebDay organizers documented volunteer-driven events in 34 different cities across the world. This year events are happening in over 50 cities in 20 countries!

OneWebDay is all about your passion for the web and your creativity. Visit the OneWebDay site to learn more and find out how you can participate!

Mozilla Service Week is here! We've blogged about Mozilla Service Week a few times in the past few weeks, but if you still haven't gotten involved, it's not too late. The Mozilla Blog has a list of projects and challenges that still need volunteers. If you need help at your nonprofit but don't know where to start, try Jayne's list of short-term assignments for tech volunteers. Beth has some suggestions too.

All week, the Mozilla Service Week site will be featuring volunteer success stories. You can also follow the action on Flickr and Delicious.

Are you participating in Mozilla Service Week, either with your nonprofit or as a volunteer? If so, come tell us about it in the TechSoup forums.

It's just 14 days until Mozilla Service Week; time to finish your requests for help or sign up to volunteer.

We discussed Mozilla Service Week here a few weeks ago, but it's worth another mention. Between September 14 and 21, tech experts all around the world will donate their time to organizations and individuals who need help accessing and using the Internet. It makes sense for Mozilla to take the initiative to put together a project like this; after all, it's largely volunteer efforts that have put together Mozilla products, translated them into dozens of languages, and built plugins to extend functionality in every conceivable direction. Imagine the impact that those developers, designers, and translators could achieve by focusing all of that attention on their own communities for one week. Mozilla has put Mozilla Service Week together in partnership with a lot of great organizations including Idealist, Social Actions, and TechSoup Global.

Volunteers have pledged over 6000 hours of work since the service week was announced, but of course, there's still room for much more. Check out the Stories section to see the broad range of projects being planned. Finally, don't forget to sign up as a volunteer or as an organization in need of help.

Update: Need help, but not sure where to start? Jayne Cravens offers this helpful list of short-term assignments for tech volunteers.

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Discuss This in Our Forums

Are you participating in Mozilla Service Week? Tell us about it in this Volunteers and Technology forum discussion.

In case you missed the announcement in mid-May, we have a new, special program for product donations called TechSoup Limited. Think of it as a mix between an outlet mall and an exclusive boutique. Products available
for donation in TechSoup Limited typically have limited quantities and fewer restrictions than some of the larger donor programs. 

The current TechSoup Limited category includes hardware, software and services from both new and existing donors. Some products unique to TSL include a HIPAA-compliant database (CTK Apricot), Microsoft SharePoint consulting (mindSHIFT), voice over email messages (GoldMail), VoIP handsets (GIPS), and more.

This post was authored by Andrew, and originally appeared on the TechSoup Canada Blog. TechSoup Canada is part of the TechSoup Global Network.

This week, TechSoup Canada was a proud participant in My Charity Connects, a conference about teaching charities about using online technology to improve their fundraising and marketing. Donnie Claudino (pictured), TechSoup Canada's Marketing Manager, brought a lesson about how to use storytelling in online media.

He began by sharing his own story: as an American, he found himself wanting to immigrate to Canada and used storytelling to land a job. He delivered his message in the form of a Web site and a video.

His strategy was simple: "I put myself out into the world," he said. The lesson: you can achieve goals by "showcasing the intimate stories of your organization."

Knowing your audience

Before starting, it's important to know who your audience is: are they visitors, volunteers, or prospective members? Similarly, you must determine what action you want these people to take: it can range from giving money or time to simply becoming engaged in a cause.

How can you learn about your audience? Simply ask them. This can be done through program evaluations, annual fundraising efforts, feedback surveys, or email and phone calls.