Critical Exposure Wins TBGives $10k Web Consulting Prize
The Bivings Group is proud to announce, after much difficult deliberation, that Critical Exposure has won the TBGives $10,000 web consulting prize.
Critical Exposure uses the art of 
photography to teach DC youth imperative lessons about art and community leadership. The organization empowers students through documentary photography and encourages them to become advocates for change in their communities.
Congratulations to Critical Exposure, and thank you to all of our other fantastic applicant organizations.
TBGives Winner to be Announced Wednesday
Two panels here at The Bivings Group have pored over more than 50 submissions from fantastic non-profit organizations all over the Washington, D.C. area and narrowed our search down to six finalists.
Due to the heavy competition between all of the applicants and the excellent qualifications of our six finalists, we’ll need one more day of deliberations.
The final winner of the TBGives $10,000 web consulting prize will be notified and announced by close of business on Wednesday. Please check back!
Google Earth Unveils Technology to Prevent Deforestation
During the UN Climate Change Conference held in Copenhagen this week, Google unveiled an advanced Google Earth prototype that allows satellite imagery to show and measure the progression of deforestation in regions around the world. Google teamed up with software experts Greg Asner, from Carnegie Institution for Science, and Carlos Souza, from Imazon (both institutions with forest data programs used in Latin America) and created a “cloud-based computing” technology that gathers all satellite imagery data for a region and displays them in a user-friendly format.
Google offers before and after stills of the technology on their blog:
BEFORE: Deforestation in Rondonia, Brazil (1975-2001) using satellite imagery
AFTER: Deforestation in Mato Grosso, Brazil (Augustin 2009-September 2009) using SAD technology created by Carolos Souza. Red signifies recent deforestation.
AFTER: Deforestation in Rondonia, Brazil (1986-2008) using CLASlite technology created by Greg Asner. Progression of deforestation color-coded
This technology will enable organizations and researchers monitoring deforestation to gather data in a matter of seconds, as opposed to the days of weeks it would originally take.
As stated on the Google blog:
“On a top-of-the-line desktop computer, it can take days or weeks to analyze deforestation over the Amazon. Using our cloud-based computing power, we can reduce that time to seconds. Being able to detect illegal logging activities faster can help support local law enforcement and prevent further deforestation from happening.”
Google hopes to release this technology to the public during the coming year.
If you’d like to learn more about how current Google Earth technologies can promote environmental awareness, please take a look at the video Bivings produced for Wild Australia. Using Google Earth video and b-roll footage, we created a short video showcasing the ecology of the Southwest Marine region of Australia.
Thanks for Your TBGives Submissions!
The Bivings Group would like to thank all of the non-profit organizations that submitted applications for TBGives’ $10,000 web consulting award.
We’re happy to report we received over 50 applications from worthy businesses small and large from across the Washington, D.C. area.
Our judging panels are currently reviewing all submissions and will select six to ten semi-finalists by next Wednesday, Dec. 9. A final winner will be chosen and announced on Tuesday, 15th. Please check back here for final contest results!
Twitterslurp hits Barcelona at PdF Europe
The Bivings Group powers the Personal Democracy Forum website and is proud to run Twitterslurp, a Twitter hashtag aggregator tool being used by those attending and monitoring this year’s European Personal Democracy Forum Conference, currently being held in Barcelona.
Use #pdfeu to join hundreds of attendees of the conference, which focuses on the many connections between politics and technology and the leaders of both industries across Europe.
Speakers, participants and sponsors are using Twitterslurp today and Saturday to share ideas on the conference’s most compelling topics and panels, including Friday’s opening address on how President Obama’s technology team helped him win the American presidency and Saturday’s keynote on mobile platforms for change.