Fred Benenson’s great Interactive Telephony Project, CommitteeCaller.com was just featured on BoingBoing. Here’s hoping our Asterisk server can handle the load of people wanting to talk to Congress. Congratulations Fred!




Link

Grass Type is a virtual mat of grass that sways to the stroke of the mouse and imprints characters as you type on the keyboard

This project involves an observation on our current social arena involving our tendencies to overcommit in social situations, obligatory social gatherings, and our reliance on mobile devices. Using flash lite, php, and web/WAP interfaces, we plan to have a fully functional service that allows you to automate your cellphone to send you emergencies via text messages with a programmable time delay.

This project involves an observation on our current social arena involving our tendencies to overcommit in social situations, obligatory social gatherings, and our reliance on mobile devices. Using flash lite, php, and web/WAP interfaces, we plan to have a fully functional service that allows you to automate your cellphone to send you emergencies via text messages with a programmable time delay.

For any business to survive, the information and the constant communication with its buyers, suppliers, manufacturers or the sellers of raw material, is vital. This communication channel is often asymmetrical in the case of people with micro or self-run businesses. While bigger businesses have in place complex SCM systems that tracks every product created and sold or distributed, micro businessmen rely on make shift methods such as taking notes, memory and the\”what you see is all we have\” method. Often Micro-entrepreneurs spend a lot of time travelling in order to gather information and find the suitable sellers and buyers.They also rely on middlemen as a communication channel – the link between them and their customers – who often holdback vital information. This project looks at providing micro entrepreneurs a streamlined SCM solution that is mediated by the high penetration of mobile use. Mobile phones have served to provide the first reliable access to telecommunications.This project aims at providing better opportunities to micro businesses in the following ways :
1. Increase awareness of opportunities for trade
2. Shorten the time taken to fulfill orders
3. Substitute for travel or complement it by improving coordination of
visits or just the placing of the orders via the phone.
4. Reduce communication costs in terms of time spent travelling,
transportation costs, and the opportunity cost of income foregone
when travelling
5. Improve product quality, and increase customer satisfaction.

The Invention of Murder is based on the death of Mary Rogers in 1841, which was one of the first widely reported murders in the popular press, helping to shape crime reporting for over a century. The game is the offspring of Clue and alternate reality games, with a touch of The Amazing Race: players visit locations, search for clues, and trade info with each other in a race to solve the crime.

The year is 1841, and players are working as cub reporters for the New York Herald, racing to be the first to uncover the truth behind the crime of the century – the murder of Mary Rogers, the beautiful cigar girl whose body had been found floating in the Hudson days before. As they visit the places Mary might have been on the day of her death, they call in to the news desk to check their suspicions against the mounting evidence, and search for other players to determine which of the possible murder weapons have been found.

The Invention of Murder is based on the death of Mary Rogers in 1841, which was one of the first widely reported murders in the popular press, helping to shape crime reporting for over a century. The game is the offspring of Clue and alternate reality games, with a touch of The Amazing Race: players visit locations, search for clues, and trade info with each other in a race to solve the crime.

The year is 1841, and players are working as cub reporters for the New York Herald, racing to be the first to uncover the truth behind the crime of the century – the murder of Mary Rogers, the beautiful cigar girl whose body had been found floating in the Hudson days before. As they visit the places Mary might have been on the day of her death, they call in to the news desk to check their suspicions against the mounting evidence, and search for other players to determine which of the possible murder weapons have been found.

Calling Card Stories uses the functionality of a calling card system to tell stories. You start by getting a calling card with set minutes. You are then prompted to enter a pin upon dialing an access number. You use your available minutes to hear chapters of a story. The stories you will be hearing for this version of the project come from a series of recorded conversations between my family members living in both California and Mexico.

You may hang up at any time during the story, the calling card system will remember your most recent chapter location when you call back. If you reach the end of the story before your minutes run out, you are invited to record a response which will get posted to the Calling Card Stories (callingcardstories.org) web site.

Please note that there is a connection charge applied to your first minute of every call. Surcharges apply to calls made from payphones. A maintenance fee will be charged for every week you keep a balance on your card. You have 90 days to use your minutes before they expire. Other terms and conditions apply.

Calling Card Stories uses the functionality of a calling card system to tell stories. You start by getting a calling card with set minutes. You are then prompted to enter a pin upon dialing an access number. You use your available minutes to hear chapters of a story. The stories you will be hearing for this version of the project come from a series of recorded conversations between my family members living in both California and Mexico.

You may hang up at any time during the story, the calling card system will remember your most recent chapter location when you call back. If you reach the end of the story before your minutes run out, you are invited to record a response which will get posted to the Calling Card Stories (callingcardstories.org) web site.

Please note that there is a connection charge applied to your first minute of every call. Surcharges apply to calls made from payphones. A maintenance fee will be charged for every week you keep a balance on your card. You have 90 days to use your minutes before they expire. Other terms and conditions apply.

Committee Caller is a dynamic web application integrated with an Asterisk PBX that allows users to specifically target representatives of particular committees in Washington DC using the phone. The application automates the tedious process of finding and calling phone numbers of committee members and their legislative assistants while also allowing for call quality tracking.