PICnet Blog

I just had a great online discussion with PICnetter Tim, who rightfully thinks I’m crazy for the hours I put into my work. Luckily, Tim and I were able to see eye-to-eye on a leadership development method called servant leadership. During the conversation, I thought about my CEO title, and how it seemed to connote and over-emphasize a top-down hierarchical structure at PICnet.

While I enjoy the title and the perks, like the CEO parking space (my bike in the office) and the CEO airline upgrades (every seat on jetBlue is first class), I believe a better term to associate with my position is “custodian” or possibly “steward”.

I mean, look at this photo here. That’s me, Ryan the Builder, with PICnet’s good friend Susan Finkelpearl of Free Range Studios. What word comes to mind there, “CEO” or “custodian”?

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So now that Joomla! has decided to go Mootools, we have done some really cool stuff with it. Unfortunately I can’t give you any links because of NDA legal reqs, but one of the cool things I have done was extended the Mootools Accordion to allow for Show All/Collapse All. To my surprise it was very easy to do in Mootools. Creates a really nice effect.

We’ve finally been able to get our registration system up and running for Joomla!Day USA West today, and while there’s still some glitches (we’re on it!) you can successfully register for the event now.

Register at the Joomla Day USA Web site

We’re really excited to see everyone there, but remember, attendance is limited to the first 125 registrants.

Thanks to everyone who’s helped in the promotion of this day (especially Peter Russell), and all the help from my fellow PICnetters to make this a reality. Additionally, kudos to our friends at Aspiration for providing their facilitating skills!
Looking forward to seeing you all at the un-conference.

In an effort to help spread the word of open source content management systems (CMS) and constituent relationship management systems (CRM), I was asked to give a talk at OneWorld on March 28, 2007 to the OneWorld Peer Learning Exchange. Roshani Kothari from OneWorld was gracious enough to write up some great notes on it (see below) as well as post a podcast of this.

Listen to the MP3 of the talk

Thanks to Roshani for her hard work to make these OneWorld Peer Learning Exchanges occur, and to my co-presenters Alan Rosenblatt and Guy Stevens for their contributions.

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There’s quite a number of photo galleries available for Joomla, with ports from stand-alone systems to full Joomla components. Every so often there’s a marriage between a great gallery and a Joomla extension that seems to have the right touches. The latest of these is SlideShowPro, built in conjunction by our friend Casey Lee from JoomlaShack.

Now to be clear, SlideShowPro has been created as a stand-alone Flash-based system by Todd Dominey down in Atlanta, Georgia. What is most impressive about it, aside from the stunning looks of a typical interface with it from the front-end, is the ease in which you can manage images and their metadata.

While there are some features that need to be mastered from Flash (that’s right, dig up your Macromedia, er, Adobe suites) this seems to be a good fit for organizations that really want to have an eye-popping slideshow system based in Flash.

Congrats to Casey for a job well done on the integration project.

When a Non-Profit Soapbox client gets an intro like this from a media outlet, it’s great:

When the subject is the environment, Diane MacEachern has long been ahead of the times. Thirty years ago, she earned a master’s degree in natural resources and the environment. And 20 years ago she helped design and build the energy-efficient house in the Washington, D.C., area where she and her family live.

Now she hopes to be in the vanguard again. Next week she is launching a national campaign and a website, BigGreenPurse.com, urging women to shift at least $1,000 of their annual household spending to green products. On average, people spend $18,000 a year on groceries and household goods.

When you wake up to find it lands on the homepage of the CS Monitor, it’s amazing!

A greener planet begins under the kitchen sink

Congrats to Diane MacEachern for all her hard work in helping women make this world a better place.

Last week, Peter Russell from Joomla Juice, the leading Joomla podcast, interviewed moi regarding our efforts in putting together the first Joomla! Day in the United States, as well as the effects of Joomla and open source in the non-profit sector.

Listen to the show directly from the player on the Joomla Juice site or subscribe to the podcast (highly recommended).

Notes include:

• Open Source Matters Board
• N-TEN’s Non-Profit Technology Conference (April 4-6, 2007 - Washington, DC)
  
• Joomla Tuesdays
• Penguin Day 2007 (April 7, 2007 - Washington, DC)
• European Commission
• Joomla!Day USA West (May 11-12, 2007 - Mountain View, CA)
  
• The GooglePlex