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The Apple iPad, one of apple's hottest sellers, is seeing frequent use by those in the government sector. With the seemingly endless amount of apps available for use with the iPad, many help government workers to become more efficient. The apps that are seeing the most use include twitter, quick office, evernote and flipboard. Twitter is helpful to disperse quick messages to others in the work place, and obviously has social networking benefits as well. Quick Office is seeing a lot of use as a microsoft office productivity tool. Evernote allows the user to take notes, record sound bytes, add pictures and video, and other helpful pieces of information into one "note" that is easily dispersed to others in one piece, together. Flipboard is presented almost as a "personal magazine", where feeds from social networking sites and other sites the user selects appear directly on the iPad's interface.

Anyone who doesn't have a car can use this trip planner on the Rapid's website to get anywhere in Grand Rapids. Non profits could fine this tool very useful to help clients get from one place to another if they don't have reliable transportation. Hopefully a mobile app is in the works!

This article outlines 3 initiatives for open gov.from president government (transparency,collaboration,participation) but also takes an extensive look at the use of government websites overall

More follow-up on useful links to help a nonprofit organization use social media. A lot of the time, for any agency, posting event invitations is the best bet in getting a response from "fans" of your organization

The Cautious Patient Foundation is dedicated to minimizing the amount of people that die per year from medical error. Here, an organization that shares CPF's values can apply and recieve grants that help patients and healthcare providers to communicate better by using technology. This is an excellent example of NPO's using the internet to spread the word about their mission and gain funding

With the recent news that more e-books were brought than paperbacks in February, its no surprise that Amazon is allowing the Kindle to borrow e-books from more than 11,000 libraries across the U.S. in working with OverDrive, a huge supplier of e-books for public schools and libraries. Students and non-profits will now have greater access to e-books, but the limit on checking out books is a concern with HaperCollins announcing a new policy that requires e-books to expire after being check out only 26 times.

Forbes reports: "Someone has hijacked the tax identity of more than 2,300 tiny or defunct nonprofits, apparently taking advantage of a hole in a new electronic Internal Revenue Service filing system to list the same person as a charitable official at the same mail box drop in Las Vegas."

Even though I knew e-books were emerging on the market during the last few years to compete with paperbacks, I was shocked to read this news that e-books sold more than paperbacks last February. This shift from paperbacks to e-books marks a monumental shift in literacy and education in our society. This could also be a huge shift for education non-profits and public schools, especially well-off universities that have the money to use kindles and alike products. The next two years will see the biggest surge according to Barnes and Noble exec Marc Parrish. No doubt, this will change the way people and organizations read and get their information.

Another article on cloud printing

See photo at top left of article showcasing one of their high-tech, computer laden facilities on display for this article "What are the most significant security threats? What do we know about them? What don't we know? What is just around the corner that we should be preparing for now? These are the kinds of questions we ask ourselves every day. It's part of our intelligence-driven, threat-based, future-focused approach to defending the country from a range of national security and major crime threats. Today, the FBI combines its investigations and intelligence operations to be more predictive and preventative-more aware of emerging threats and better able to stop them before they turn into crimes. "

Speech by Steven R. Chabinsky, Deputy Assistant Director, Cyber Division, Federal Bureau of Investigation  - delivered March 23, 2010 "...to talk with you about the cyber threat, why it's important, and how you can help your organizations-and in doing so, help our country-rise to this enormous challenge. Some of you no doubt are on the front lines of the cyber security problem and are quite familiar with it, while others of you may only have passing familiarity with this growing problem. First, let me share with you the importance of the cyber security problem from the lens of the FBI. As you know, the FBI is a law enforcement agency that investigates hundreds of federal crimes as well as a domestic national security agency that combats terrorism, espionage, treason, and sabotage.

Overview "'give2gether' was founded in 2007 by three co-founders, two economic professors from NYU and UC Berkeley, and is based on ten years research on game theory applications and two years of Beta testing with selected non-profits." Offer a 10-day free trial of their service/product. Product Tour, Webinar, and live chat are available on their site.

This report indicates what trends dominate older users of social media. The main argument here is whether or not using social media to interact with NPO volunteeers and clients is worthwhile. The research indicates that it is a worthwhile endeavor. The important thing to bear in mind as far as older users are concerned, is making organizational web sites extremely accessible and user-friendly.

I think to a certain extent it is important to incorporate new social media into npo's its a easier way to reach out to volunteers and clients, its mostly about how you as a supervisor manage the usage from your employees.

Despite the outstanding growth of places like Facebook and Twitter, the majority of information on the internet is still shared via e-mail. Crafting a newsletter for your organization remains to be the easiest way to get in touch with contributors and other interested parties. The age discrepancy has to be something to overcome, and in that sense, e-mail still covers the largest percentage of users worldwide. As a young person, it may be hard to remove yourself from the Twitter and Facebook dominated world, but more times than not the old ways still work the best.

Earth Week"Downloading Software" - GO GREEN from TechSoup In honor of Earth Day, we encourage you to go green and download your software donations. Downloading is 90 percent greener than shipping products and it saves manufacturing and transportation resources

It is becoming more common to see non-profits using some form of social media when marketing for their organization. . Social media helps in creating relationships, in making their organization known, and by getting feedback from stakeholders. This has helped social media become a popular and effective way of fundraising for non-profits.

This strikes me as another press release. While interesting, I'd generally avoid linking to private company press releases, unless there's some clear innovation involved. A press release from Pew about a recent Internet study, or a Berkman Center release regarding recent research is OK. A private company press release should be viewed cautiously.

This nonprofit organization has a fascinating function to the businesses and and it has delivering a change to businesses and community as well. The Nonprofit organizations are businesses designed to make change, and not in the monetary sense. This Nonprofits derive their operating revenues from foundations, government grants, membership dues, and fees for services they provide.

This report from a Californian NPO resource company indictes some of the problem hindering board efficacy. Of note: Half of questioned board members are uncomfortable soliciting donations for their NPO. Can online giving help?