AshokaIn association with WeMedia, Ashoka's Changemakers.net is sponsoring a competition to suss out "the best new ideas for inspiring a better world through media and technology." Ashoka's Jenna Lawrence says that with "The Power of Us", Changemakers is:

running the equivalent of a business plan competition to provide up to $50,000 in funding for early stage business and non-profit ventures. The ventures must be related to media or technology. We will collect all entries through the Changemakers website and then there will be a live, pitch-it competition at a conference in Miami at the end of February.

The competition is also notable for its open process: you can read the applications from every organization entering (17 orgs from 6 different countries, as of this posting). You can learn more and enter at the Changemakers website.

News and buzz from people and organizations in the nonprofit tech sector.

Getting the Lay of the Land – Research on Critical Matters

• What should you invest in online communications when you don’t really know what will work? Convio’s Online Marketing (eCRM) Nonprofit Benchmark Index™ Study gives you some clues.
• M+R Strategic Services offers some insight into what works in online fundraising campaigns and tactics.
• Nonprofit Innovation can use a shot in the arm. Check out PolicyLink’s report Bridging the Innovation Divide: An Agenda for Disseminating Technology Innovations within the Nonprofit Sector. You can also read our blog post about the report. They’ve identified a lack of funding and information sharing as the key culprits.

Get Rewarded For Your Good Work

> The Florence and Frances Family Fund at Tides Foundation has announced the second Antonio Pizzigati Prize for Software in the Public Interest. If you have developed software that is available at no-cost to nonprofits and advocacy groups, has demonstrated its value to at least one nonprofit organization, and can serve multiple nonprofits apply here for the $10,000 prize. Applications are open until August 1st.

> Cisco’s 2007 Growing with Technology Award is open through June 22nd. The nonprofit category is for organizations that have fewer than 999 employees with a grand prize of $25,000. The first runner up gets $15,000. Cisco’s award “recognizes the creative ways that non-profit organizations are using the Internet and networking technologies to provide a broader geographical reach of services, expand or maintain services, or serve the organization’s employees or clients better.”