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Development in the 21st century demands access to information. At a time of tight budgets, libraries offer a more efficient, smarter way of doing development. Most countries around the world, regardless of their size or level of development have public libraries. Beyond Access is starting a movement to make them all hubs for economic and social change. We believe that libraries power development.

The Sunlight Foundation is a non-profit, nonpartisan organization that uses the power of the Internet to catalyze greater government openness and transparency, and provides new tools and resources for media and citizens, alike. We are committed to improving access to government information by making it available online, indeed redefining "public" information as meaning "online," and by creating new tools and websites to enable individuals and communities to better access that information and put it to use.

Everyone, everywhere should have access to the information they need to improve their lives. In the 21st century, cost-effective and successful development efforts rely on access to information. However, many donors and governments overlook the potential of public libraries. We believe that libraries power development.

More than 1.3 billion people worldwide have no access to electricity, and 1 billion more only have intermittent access. Some 2.5 billion people - almost half of humanity - rely on traditional biomass for cooking and heating. Others consume significant energy from unsustainable sources.

The purpose of Data.gov is to increase public access to high value, machine readable datasets generated by the Executive Branch of the Federal Government. As a priority Open Government Initiative for President Obama's administration, Data.gov increases the ability of the public to easily find, download, and use datasets that are generated and held by the Federal Government. Data.gov provides descriptions of the Federal datasets (metadata), information about how to access the datasets, and tools that leverage government datasets. The data catalogs will continue to grow as datasets are added. Federal, Executive Branch data are included in the first version of Data.gov.

Without access to sustainable energy, there can be no sustainable development. One person in five on the planet still lacks access to modern electricity. Twice that number, three billion people, rely on wood, coal, charcoal or animal waste for cooking and heating. In a global economy, this is inequitable - and unsustainable.

The site, accessible at www.clustermapping.us, provides cluster initiatives and other economic development organizations an opportunity to register in a national database. The registry allows initiatives to showcase their activities and events to a wider public, search for appropriate partners across the nation, and learn from best practice examples of their peers. The site also provides free access to a rich database on the profile and performance of clusters and regional economies.

Mutual Awakening is a powerful spiritual opening that occurs between two or more individuals who have turned toward each other in a gesture of profound sensitivity and vulnerability. This profound level of connection brings us into an inner world that exists between us. This shared inner space, sometimes called inter-subjectivity or 'we-space,' is a new frontier in consciousness. Most of us have very little access to it, but over the course of the next few decades our society will develop a capacity for experiencing inter-subjectivity that will rival our current access to individual consciousness.

The Internet Archive, a 501(c)(3) non-profit, is building a digital library of Internet sites and other cultural artifacts in digital form. Like a paper library, we provide free access to researchers, historians, scholars, the print disabled, and the general public. Our mission is to provide Universal Access to All Knowledge.

Placekey is a free, universal standard identifier for any physical place, so that the data pertaining to those places can be shared across organizations easily. However, Placekey goes beyond just an identifier. It's a movement of organizations and individuals that prize access to data. Placekey members want geospatial data that is easily joined and combined...because real answers come from combining data from many different sources. It is a philosophy that data should be easy to access, and data should not be hoarded. These members believe that data, when combined, can do massive good.

The World Bank is the largest single source of development knowledge. The World Bank Open Knowledge Repository (OKR) is The World Bank's official open access repository for its research outputs and knowledge products. Through the OKR, The World Bank collects, disseminates, and permanently preserves its intellectual output in digital form. The OKR is interoperable with other repositories and supports optimal discoverability and re-usability of the content by complying with Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI) standards and the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH).

OuiShare is a global community and think and do-tank. Our mission is to build and nurture a collaborative society by connecting people, organizations and ideas around fairness, openness and trust. We believe that economic, political and social systems based on these values can solve many of the complex challenges the world faces, and enable everyone to access to the resources and opportunities they need to thrive. OuiShare activities consist of building community, producing knowledge and incubating projects around the topics of communities and the collaborative economy, as well as offering support to individuals and organizations through professional services and education. Started in January 2012 in Paris, OuiShare is now an international leader in the collaborative economy field. A non-profit organization which has rapidly evolved from a handful of enthusiasts to a global movement in dozens of countries in Europe, Latin America and the Middle East, our network of expert Connectors engage hundreds of members and contributors worldwide.

The Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index® is the first-ever daily assessment of U.S. residents' health and well-being. By interviewing at least 1,000 U.S. adults every day, the Well-Being Index provides real-time measurement and insights needed to improve health, increase productivity, and lower healthcare costs. Public and private sector leaders use data on life evaluation, physical health, emotional health, healthy behavior, work environment, and basic access to develop and prioritize strategies to help their communities thrive and grow. Journalists, academics, and medical experts benefit from this unprecedented resource of health statistics and behavioral economic data to inform their research and reporting.

Since our founding as a multi-partisan and non-profit organization in 2005, The Davenport Institute (formerly Common Sense California) has worked to engage the citizens of this state in the policy decisions that affect our everyday lives. It is our firm belief that, in today's world of easy access to information, and easy connectivity to others, California's municipal and education leaders are seeking ways to involve the residents of their communities in the important issues they confront. Done legitimately, this new kind of leadership produces better, more creative policy solutions and better, more engaged citizens committed to the hard work of self-governance.

The "Los Angeles Research Collection" empowers citizens and researchers to use the tools of interactive "time mapping." With HyperCities, you can explore social, cultural, and political history in Los Angeles over time. The site can be accessed from a web-browser in any school, community center, government office, home, and academic setting, allowing citizens to delve into and create their own collections of mappable knowledge and cultural heritage. Community-generated content exists side-by-side with scholar-produced research data, thereby creating new interactions between traditionally separated domains of knowledge.

National Priorities Project is a national non-profit, non-partisan research organization dedicated to making complex federal budget information transparent and accessible so people can prioritize and influence how their tax dollars are spent. Read on to learn more!

Positive Deviance is based on the observation that in every community there are certain individuals or groups whose uncommon behaviors and strategies enable them to find better solutions to problems than their peers, while having access to the same resources and facing similar or worse challenges. The Positive Deviance approach is an asset-based, problem-solving, and community-driven approach that enables the community to discover these successful behaviors and strategies and develop a plan of action to promote their adoption by all concerned.

We unite entrepreneurs with the potential to address major problems at scale. Problems like poverty, lack of education, and access to clean water. We then swarm them with hand-picked mentors, funders, and a global network to help grow their impact. Our goal? For each venture to impact 1,000,000 people.

The TOD Technical Assistance Initiative is a project of the Federal Transit Administration administered by Smart Growth America that provides on-the-ground and online technical assistance to support transit-oriented development, improve access to public transportation, and build new economic opportunities and pathways to employment for local communities. Learn more about the project >>

Across the U.S., local governments are beginning to include goals and objectives that promote public health into their comprehensive plans. These long-term plans impact how people make choices of where to live and how to get around, their ability to access healthy foods and opportunities for physical activity, and affect broader issues of social equity, clean air and water, and more.