I KNOW you’ve been hassled by beggars about 100 times at least in your life. And nothing drives me crazier than people standing around begging. I absolutely NEVER give them money.

So, do you think that makes me an a-hole? Because I’m not. I’ve donated more to charity than most people will in a lifetime. What it makes me is not a sucker.

Let Me Explain

The following series is a set of photographs of some beggars in China. A reporter followed them around and took pictures of them at work.

At first we see a man who appears to be practically near death being cared for by his loving wife. So many people feel bad for them and stop to help.

After a little while, they get up to move to another location.

Here they are, back at work again.

After a while, I guess they have to set something up for their next score?

Then they are on the move again.

This time, to grab a decent meal before they go “back to work”.

I know, you’re thinking this is not common, right? WRONG!

Video Proof

Here are two different stories from the US of undercover TV reporters documenting the reality behind begging and panhandling in America. If you do a search, you’ll find plenty more!

How to Be a Great Beggar

Now, a video that tells you everything you need to get out there and start earning today! Just trade in your dignity for some cold hard cash.

Bottom Line

So, what’s the bottom line here? Did you hear the lady who works for the homeless shelter tell you – do not give panhandlers money? I mean that kind of says it all. But hopefully you now understand why.

I know that when you see them your mind is racing. “I wonder what’s wrong? How did they get that way? I feel sorry for them.” But as long as you are aware that they are working hard to engineer that response from you, you can resist it!

People who start begging become addicted to the easy cash, and very rapidly stop even trying to accomplish any noble goal they had before they started. So next time, just ignore them or tell them you only donate to national charities.

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As nations, the USA and Russia have often found themselves on different sides of various socio-political philosophies. And at times, an uneasy peace seems to exist between the two greatest nuclear powers the world has ever known. But despite all obstacles, the people of Russia reached out to Americans with a gesture of hope and kindness when President Putin dedicated an extraordinary monument as a gift in honor of those who perished in the September 11, 2001 attacks.

“To The Struggle Against World Terrorism” is a 100 foot high, bronze sculpture conceived of by Russian artist Zurab Tsereteli. Zurab is the President of the Russian Academy of Arts and Director of the Moscow Museum of Modern Art (among other things).

I suppose that only a man in a position such as this wields the necessary power to convince a government and it’s people to get behind a gift of this magnitude. Its certainly akin to the Statue of Liberty, a gift from the people of France.

The “The Tear of Grief memorial” as it’s come to be called, is located in Bayonne, New Jersey across the water, 10 miles from the site of the twin towers and within view of the Statue of Liberty. The sculpture is in the form of a 100-foot (30 m) tower made of steel and coated in bronze, split with a jagged opening through the middle.

Inside the opening hangs a large stainless-steel teardrop, 40 feet (12 m) high, in memory of those whose lives were lost during terrorist attacks in the United States. The eleven sides of the monument’s base bear granite name plates, on which are etched the names of those that died in the September 11 attacks and the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.

Tsereteli has not disclosed the cost of the sculpture except to say that he was paying for labor and materials. A lawyer for the sculptor released the cost of the figure at about $12 million. This being the case, I’m not really sure how much of the cost was born by the Russian people, vs. Tsereteli himself. But hopefully they’ll work that out in the traditional Russian fashion…

The following photos are courtesy of Joseph Hoetzl

And there are more on Flickr if you want to see them.

Here is the official Web site, but it’s quite weak so not really worth a visit at this moment.

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Wow! The New York Times hit a home run today with this editorial column from Warren Buffett. So, for all of you guys who are feeling scared and wondering what to do with the economy in the toilet right now, you might want to listen to one of the richest men ever to walk the planet.

Buy American. I Am.

By WARREN E. BUFFETT

THE financial world is a mess, both in the United States and abroad. Its problems, moreover, have been leaking into the general economy, and the leaks are now turning into a gusher. In the near term, unemployment will rise, business activity will falter and headlines will continue to be scary.

So … I’ve been buying American stocks. This is my personal account I’m talking about, in which I previously owned nothing but United States government bonds. (This description leaves aside my Berkshire Hathaway holdings, which are all committed to philanthropy.) If prices keep looking attractive, my non-Berkshire net worth will soon be 100 percent in United States equities.

Why?

A simple rule dictates my buying: Be fearful when others are greedy, and be greedy when others are fearful. And most certainly, fear is now widespread, gripping even seasoned investors. To be sure, investors are right to be wary of highly leveraged entities or businesses in weak competitive positions. But fears regarding the long-term prosperity of the nation’s many sound companies make no sense. These businesses will indeed suffer earnings hiccups, as they always have. But most major companies will be setting new profit records 5, 10 and 20 years from now.

Let me be clear on one point: I can’t predict the short-term movements of the stock market. I haven’t the faintest idea as to whether stocks will be higher or lower a month — or a year — from now. What is likely, however, is that the market will move higher, perhaps substantially so, well before either sentiment or the economy turns up. So if you wait for the robins, spring will be over.

A little history here: During the Depression, the Dow hit its low, 41, on July 8, 1932. Economic conditions, though, kept deteriorating until Franklin D. Roosevelt took office in March 1933. By that time, the market had already advanced 30 percent. Or think back to the early days of World War II, when things were going badly for the United States in Europe and the Pacific. The market hit bottom in April 1942, well before Allied fortunes turned. Again, in the early 1980s, the time to buy stocks was when inflation raged and the economy was in the tank. In short, bad news is an investor’s best friend. It lets you buy a slice of America’s future at a marked-down price.

Over the long term, the stock market news will be good. In the 20th century, the United States endured two world wars and other traumatic and expensive military conflicts; the Depression; a dozen or so recessions and financial panics; oil shocks; a flu epidemic; and the resignation of a disgraced president. Yet the Dow rose from 66 to 11,497.

You might think it would have been impossible for an investor to lose money during a century marked by such an extraordinary gain. But some investors did. The hapless ones bought stocks only when they felt comfort in doing so and then proceeded to sell when the headlines made them queasy.

Today people who hold cash equivalents feel comfortable. They shouldn’t. They have opted for a terrible long-term asset, one that pays virtually nothing and is certain to depreciate in value. Indeed, the policies that government will follow in its efforts to alleviate the current crisis will probably prove inflationary and therefore accelerate declines in the real value of cash accounts.

Equities will almost certainly outperform cash over the next decade, probably by a substantial degree. Those investors who cling now to cash are betting they can efficiently time their move away from it later. In waiting for the comfort of good news, they are ignoring Wayne Gretzky’s advice: “I skate to where the puck is going to be, not to where it has been.”

I don’t like to opine on the stock market, and again I emphasize that I have no idea what the market will do in the short term. Nevertheless, I’ll follow the lead of a restaurant that opened in an empty bank building and then advertised: “Put your mouth where your money was.” Today my money and my mouth both say equities.

Warren E. Buffett is the chief executive of Berkshire Hathaway, a diversified holding company.

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Ok, there has been a lot of bad financial news lately, and it can be a real downer and a non-productive waste of time to worry about it. Instead, I would like to focus on some organizations who are using their power for AWESOME and who demonstrate that the power to do good is stronger than the power to do bad. (Keeping in mind that not all charities are good.)

When we focus on what is most important we can make a real difference, so to get us started, here is a little video to put things in perspective. For any of you who have not yet seen it, it starts sad and then makes you truly grateful for what you have by demonstrating the power we really do have over the world around us.

“…new studies are reinforcing the simple wisdom that beyond a certain very basic level of material wealth, the only thing that increases individual happiness over time is helping other people.“

Their project is to find an idea that will help the most number of people in the world, and implement it. More of a think globally, help globally idea.

But Google is not the only one seeking answers. There are a lot of charitable organizations seeking to really make a difference in the world. And you can help! Just pick something that you are passionate about, and give of your time, energy or financial support. I’ve gathered a list of several to help get you started.

Heifer International

Gifting breeding animal pairs globally.

For over fifty years the Heifer Project has been providing families in developing countries (and parts of the US) with breeding pairs of animals: cows, goats, pigs, rabbits, water buffalo, ducks, and so on. Even in the world’s poorest regions the cost of a cow or goat can exceed a year’s income, preventing many families from acquiring animals. When a family receives a breeding pair they get meat, milk or eggs, but more importantly, they now have a source of income as the offspring are sold.

The deal with Heifer Project is that the recipient must agree to give one breeding pair of offspring away to another family, thus paying the gift forward. Therefore a small amount of money contributed now will multiply manyfold as families gain food, pride, a source of income, and the means to help someone else. It’s hard to imagine a better gift, or a more practical, proven lever in making a difference in communities of need.

Here is the full gift catalog. It is very affordable. And here is a video demonstrating the power of a project like Heifer:

Incidentally, are you tired of the fat cats getting fatter from your money? Well if you think globally then you ARE a fat cat. If you are able to read this post you have electricity, computer access and are probably able to drink a tasty beverage at the same time that you are reading this in the comfort of your electricity filled world. That is more than the majority of people on Earth.

So, here are several ways that you can invest in the betterment of others that need your help and will actually pay you back not only financially but also spiritually.

Opportunity International

Donate to fund microlending.

Micro-financing is quite the rage in international circles for one very amazing fact. The payback rate on tiny loans to the workers in developing countries is greater than the payback rate for large loans to their home countries.

In other words, from an outright profit perspective, you are better off loaning money to a Bolivian peasant than to the Bolivian government. Furthermore, there is now no doubt that Bolivia itself, and any other country, is much better off if investment goes directly to their poorest citizens than to the government.

Several non-profits, starting with the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, have pioneered micro-credit loans on a large scale and for large investors. The easiest way for a helpful citizen to contribute funds to a wide variety of micro-loan programs in different parts of the world is through Opportunity International.

Here is the story of Alba from Honduras and how Opportunity International helped change her life:

Opportunity International has been providing micro loans for 30 years, even before the term microcredit was coined. They work through Trust Banks, groups of 20-30 (mostly women) borrowers who meet weekly for encouragement and to cross-guarantee the loans.

TrickleUP

Donate to fund grants to start businesses and provide training.

Rather than dispense loans, Trickle Up issues outright grants, but with strings attached. They provide seed capital and training for micro-enterprise hopefuls. Maybe someone with ambitions for a food stall, or a repair shop. A typical deal is a $100 conditional grant. Unlike in a micro-loan program, grantees don’t have to pay the money back, but they do have to get trained.

Here is a video that demonstrates the power of this program:

Grantees must commit a minimum of 250 hours in the first 3 months to their venture, reinvest at least 20% back into it, and keep an account ledger, among other conditions. Last year 10,000 business started via Trickle Up donations, and 30,000 budding entrepreneurs benefited from this global program. There is huge emphasis on training for very basic business skills. And follow up expansion grants are offered, too. About 70% of grantees are women.

Grameen Foundation

Inspried by the original Grameen Bank in Bangladesh. Minimum contribution, $100.

One of the Grameen Bank projects is Village Phone – cell phones that women buy on loans and then can rent to others for income.

“The Village Phone program in Uganda, the first of GF’s efforts to replicate the pay phone program outside Bangladesh, continued exceeding expectations in 2005. More than 3,500 microfinance clients have bought and now operate a Village Phone as “Village Phone operators.”

Besides the boost to operators’ incomes, the program is creating a national telecommunications network. Of Uganda’s 56 districts, 53 now have at least one Village Phone operator. Often, Village Phone is the first local telephone that villagers have. Having a quick means to communicate has contributed to higher levels of productivity, savings, and safety for entire communities.

Grameen Bank and its founder were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts, so that tells you something signifigant about this group:

Namaste Direct

This is one of the most direct person-to-person micro-lending programs. When you give to Namaste Direct, you are informed of the person who receives your loan, how they used the money, and their progress.

ND can also arrange a visit to the lendee — this will turn your loan into a life-changing experience for you as well. But because of this directness the giving area is limited — currently to Mexico and Guatemala. No minimum contribution.

FINCA Village Banking

FINCA makes loans directly to the poorest villages. They aim their lending to 10-50 neighbors who come together to form a village banking group, and who in turn decide who should get what and how much.

FINCA specializes in small loan amounts ($50-$500) for the very poorest. The minimum contribution to their program is $50. While a few hundred dollars is powerful, with only $5,000 you can start a whole village bank for micro-loans, thereby compounding the power of micro-finance to an entire small community.

Here is Natalie Portman explaining her experience with FINCA.

Unitus

Minimum contribution, $100.

Unitus, like Accion below, funds other local micro-finance programs, rather than direct loans to individuals.

“Unitus seeks to identify highest-potential emerging MFIs (Micro-Finance Institutions) and help them to achieve exponential growth.”

http://www.unitus.com/sections/involved/involved_cu_main.asp

Accion

Accion provides technical assistant to local micro-lending institutions.

Minimum contribution, $50.

“ACCION is leading the effort to make micro-lending financially self-sustaining. Micro-lending programs have the potential to cover their own costs. The interest each borrower pays helps to finance the cost of lending to another. In most poverty alleviation efforts, every person helped brings the program closer to its financial limits.

Successful micro-lending programs, on the other hand, generate more resources with each individual they help. As a result, well-managed micro-lending programs generate more income than they spend. Once they become economically viable financial institutions, they have the ability to access a virtually unlimited source of lending capital – the billions of dollars invested in the world’s financial markets.

Several of ACCION’s partners have already made the transition from nonprofit, charity-dependent organizations to banks or other regulated financial institutions.”

ACCION has a series of informational videos here.

Modest Needs

Grants small one-time cash gifts to those who require help to get them through a tough time.

A need, if honored, is granted within 72 hours, with no strings attached. Modest Needs does this with commendable efficiency via the web (it’s not hard to be broke and still get online), heart-warming sympathy (every request is read by a volunteer), and impressive reach (220 requests granted this year, or 7% of the million dollars sought for).

Modest Needs’ entire finances are completely transparent on their website. Since their inception they have spent $0 on fundraising and $0 on advertising. They are astoundingly thrifty (total annual cost to run this charitable operation: $24,000). The rest of the small change they collect goes to those to whom small change can make a big difference.

Here is their public service announcement:

This article was co-authored by Karen Rhodes and John Pozadzides. All comments are welcome and appreciated.

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Today’s post is unfortunately a sad one. We lost a very close family member this weekend to a long battle with a number of ailments including Cancer. It was one of those situations where our loved one was taken decades before her time, but at least it was not something that just occurred suddenly.

It’s been a very sad weekend, but at the same time one that reminds me how precious life is. I also came to the personal realization that grief is for the living, not the dead. We have to continue on through this world forever missing a part of ourselves that can never be refilled.

This weekend also reminded me of a commitment I made some time ago to help Stanford University’s Folding@Home project which researches fundamental causes of diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Mad Cow (BSE), CJD, ALS, Huntington’s, Parkinson’s disease, and many Cancers and cancer-related syndromes. Cancer and Parkinson’s have both impacted my family and I believe that with enough emphasis we can cure these crippling diseases.

And you can help Stanford’s research by simply running a tiny piece of software on your computer that only uses the spare cycles when you don’t need them.

Folding@home is a distributed computing project — people from throughout the world download and run software to band together to make one of the largest supercomputers in the world. Every computer takes the project closer to its goals. Folding@home uses novel computational methods coupled to distributed computing, to simulate problems millions of times more challenging than previously achieved.

Over a year ago I established a Folding Team for HTMLHelp.com and since that time 22 people have contributed, moving the team almost into the top 1% of contributing teams to the project.

So, my question now is, won’t you please lend your spare computing cycles to the Folding@Home project? All you need to do is install this small program, and in the settings enter your name as well as the HTMLHelp Team ID 51056. There is software for Windows, Linux, Mac and even the Playstation 3.

The more computers you can install it on, the better! You can see that my brother is kicking my butt because he installed it on a bunch of machines at his office and I simply couldn’t keep up. As long as you use the same name, and put in the right team number you can get credit for work units across any number of machines. And there are plenty of bragging rights up for grabs!

PS – As a little extra incentive I’ve already decided that next month’s Member of the Month prize is going to be awarded to one or more of the contributors to this project, so feel free to get started now if you are so inclined!

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Folks, I’ve been saying that if you haven’t already, you NEED to see An Inconvenient Truth. If it doesn’t change the way you look at the world, then you probably have no heart. (Grin!)

I also previously reported that Gore had been Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize. This is not just because he made a movie and won an Oscar, it’s because he has devoted his private life to the cause of climate change – and like it or not many, many, many people happen to agree with him and are happy he is carrying out this work.

So, today Albert Arnold (Al) Gore Jr. was jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize 2007 along with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC):

“for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change”

It’s too early to see the announcement on video, but Nobel has a YouTube channel which will no doubt post the video of this announcement shortly. View it here.

Now I will admit, I am a convert. I am a wealthy capitalist pig. I own a big truck that gets 13 MPG, and I use way too much electricity in my house. I also make lots of garbage. But when I saw Gore’s movie with my family – it completely changed the way I look at the world. There have maybe been a total of 5 pieces of literature in my life that have done that.

It has been my experience that the people who don’t give Gore the credit he now deserves have not taken the time to hear what he has to say, or do some independent research to verify whether he is a nut-job, or a visionary.

In addition to An Inconvenient Truth, I also recommend studying the IPCC Report: Global Warming Consequences. These two sources of information may seem one sided, so after you’ve seen them both I encourage you to seek opposing views and then evaluate which one seems to have greater merit. I’ve made my choice.

Other articles to research:

• A Beginner’s Guide to Giving a Damn About Climate Change
• Presidential Candidate Positions on Global Warming
• Simple Things You Can Do To Stop Global Warming

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I was so amazed at what I’m about to share here that I struggled for some time to come up with the right title. Other titles I considered:

• Florida Man Saves the World
• Man Cures Cancer and Solves Energy Crisis With One Invention
• Accidental Discovery Eliminates Need for Oil
• Saltwater Combustion – The Incredible Energy Solution

In the end, no title seems worthy of this discovery. And I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if it changed the world.

A retired TV station owner and engineer in Florida by the name of John Kanzius who was suffering from cancer treatment related insomnia woke up one night at 3AM with an idea he believed could ease the suffering of cancer patients. The concept was to inject nano sized bits of metal into the human body which would embed themselves only in cancer cells, then zap them with radio waves which would kill them – leaving only the healthy tissue.

RedOrbit reported:

Smalley, one of the world’s top minds in the field of nanotechnology, has already started work on trying to determine whether Kanzius’ theory –which uses directed radio waves — can be partnered with the use of carbon nanotubes to target and destroy cancer cells.

His Rice University-based team plans to work with researchers at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston to marry the two disciplines.

Results from the early rounds of research could be completed within six to 12 months, said Paul Cherukuri, a Rice University researcher and a member of Smalley’s team.

“Until we do the experiments, we won’t know. But it holds so much excitement,”Cherukuri said. “This is such an exciting possibility that so many people are just slapping their heads saying, ‘Why didn’t I think of it already.’”

According to TMCnet:

…a new round of tests at University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston appears to be putting Kanzius’ theory on the medical fast track –and is prompting talk that the treatment might work on a wide range of cancers.

As if curing cancer isn’t enough, someone heard about his experiments and decided to ask if the machine might work for desalinizing salt water. When John tried it he discovered something much more significant. The process caused a reaction which freed up hydrogen molecules, allowing the water to burn.

Considering that Salt Water is the most abundant resource on the planet, John may have just accidentally discovered the holy grail of energy production. A practically free replacement for oil, gas, coal and any other harmful fuel. This reminds me of the plot for one of my favorite movies, The Saint, where a scientist invents cold fusion and gives it away to the world.

Here is a good intro video:

What is also quite amazing is the fact that John is so laid back about it all.

As far as I’m concerned, this is the most amazing discovery I think I’ve ever seen, and John Kanzius’ name may end up in the history books along side Ben Franklin, Alexander Graham Bell, DaVinci, and the rest of the great inventors.

Read more:

• Houston cancer center starts testing radio-wave theory
• Nobel Winner Boosts Kanzius’ Cancer Theory
• Patient becomes unlikely inventor of cancer-fighting technology
• Santorum promises to seek help for research
• Water into fuel?
• Fla. Man Invents Machine To Turn Water Into Fire
• How John Kanzius’ push to cure cancer may have discovered alternate fuel
• Florida Man Invents Machine To Cure Cancer
• Homemade Cancer Zapper Promising New Treatment?
• Possible cancer breakthrough “invented” in Florida garage
• Cancer Fighting Device Cooked Up in Kitchen

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In case you ever lose your dog, your watch, or your mind you can hop on over to The Found Bin and post a message or search for your found item.

The site is completely free and it seems to be full of philanthropic minded people. So, even if you forget the URL just remember it exists and you can always come back here and do a site search for “lost and found” to get back to it.

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Freedom. It’s nice, right? It ought to be… the freedom we enjoy was paid for with the blood of our forefathers, and is maintained by the blood of our siblings. And no freedom is more precious than that of speech. From it all other freedom flows.

Unfortunately there are still many oppressive regimes that do not offer the luxury of free speech, and people are being tortured and killed for speaking out against injustice. (As I’ve often noted.) This is why I have decided to put my money where my mouth is and provide financial support for the Freenet Project.

Overview

Freenet is free software which lets you publish and obtain information on the Internet without fear of censorship. To achieve this freedom, the network is entirely decentralized and publishers and consumers of information are anonymous. Without anonymity there can never be true freedom of speech, and without decentralization the network will be vulnerable to attack.

One prominent feature of the current Freenet Project is that in order to join the network you must enter through someone you trust, or at least someone you know. This is called “Darknet” and it ensures that the people you are connecting to aren’t the very people you’re afraid of. In some places merely using Freenet can land you in jail… or worse.

The one drawback is that it can be a little difficult to get connected (which is not so bad when your life depends on it). For this reason, the project is being expanded to include a feature whereby users, at their sole discretion, can opt to let Freenet find neighbors for them. This will be called “opennet” and will trade some security for convienence in order to allow more people to participate.

Time Magazine had the following to say in 2000:

The implications are profound. Dissidents in totalitarian states could use Freenet to post samizdat that once had to be cautiously hand-circulated. Whistle-blowers could safely bring smoking-gun documents to light.

But Freenet could also be put to less high-minded use. Critics say it will be a boon to drug dealers, terrorists and child pornographers. And it poses a new threat to intellectual-property rights. With Napster, at least there’s a company to sue and a way to trace individuals who have downloaded CDs. If Freenet catches on, it may be impossible to find anyone to punish.

Rationale for Support

More than a decade ago when I founded HTMLHelp.com I had a vision of the Internet as the “great equalizer”. I believed that it would free us from the content filtering imposed by mega-media companies and governments. It turns out this has been true for most of us – but not all.

I view supporting the Freenet Project as a logical extension of that original dream, this time to include people who were previously unable to freely participate.

After careful discussions with my friend Ian Clarke, and as a demonstration of my support for this project, I have awarded Freenet $10,000 towards advancing the software to it’s next release. Additionally, advertising revenues from One Man’s Blog for the remainder of 2007 will be donated to the Freenet Project.

I’m not doing it for the tax benefit, but to draw attention to a cause that is very much in need, and worthy, of support. As an example, see the Freenet China news page which subverts the governments attempts at censorship.

I would encourage you to provide financial support to the project as well. Freenet serves as a modern day equivalent of the Underground Railroad, and this is your opportunity to help procure freedom for those who can’t help themselves. Please, donate whatever you can to this 503c non-profit organization. Even $5-$10 helps considerably.

From the Founder

Here is a video of Freenet founder Ian Clarke delivering a lecture about the project. It gives an overview and discusses the challenges of free expression that people face:

Try it Out

If you are interested in actually trying out Freenet, first download it here, then read the Wiki about how to get it running. If I know you personally, or you are a prominent netizen that I can research thoroughly, you may send me a request and I’ll serve as your entree into the Freenet.

Please note, some people are having a hard time connecting to the Freenet. The funding which I’m providing (and hopefully YOU) is being put to use specifically to solve this problem and to enable even more people to gain access to freedom of speech.

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Six months ago I blogged about Gapminder – a non-profit site funded by Google that shows some of the most interesting statistical analysis on the planet. Well, I just discovered that Hans Rosling, founder of Gapminder, gave an awesome demonstration of its use at the TED conference last year.

This discovery was followed by the discovery that all of the speakers from the most recent TED conference were video taped and each of their speeches is now available to be seen by everyone.

Folks, this is a remarkable opportunity to listen to some of the world’s greatest thinkers. It would be like having access to Socrates, Plato, Einstein, Newton, Pasteur, and other historical geniuses all in one place, and at one time. No kidding.

Here is Hans’ discussion of the Gapminder tool as an example of what you can expect from watching the other speakers:

Now please, make the time to go and watch as many of the other videos as you possibly can. Speakers include:

• Bono – U2 leadman and TED award recipient.
• Economist Bjorn Lomborg makes a persuasive case for prioritizing the world’s biggest problems.
• Dr. Dean Ornish tracks the dramatic rise of obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease across the globe.
• Richard St. John compacts seven years of research into an unmissable 3-minute slideshow on the real secrets of success.
• Musician and activist Peter Gabriel is co-founder of the international human-rights organization Witness.
• Aubrey de Grey believes we can live for centuries, if we approach the aging process as “an engineering problem.”
• Dan Gilbert is a psychology professor at Harvard, and author of “Stumbling on Happiness”.
• Jimmy Wales is founder of Wikipedia, the self-organizing, self-correcting, ever-expanding encyclopedia of the future.
• Sirena Huang is an 11-year-old concert violinist.
• Nicholas Negroponte is former Director of the MIT Media Lab, and founder of the non-profit, One Laptop Per Child.
• Larry Brilliant is an epidemiologist who led the successful WHO campaign to eradicate Smallpox.
• Al Gore, in his own words, “used to be the next President of the United States of America” but has since changed professions.
• Tony Robbins is father of the life-coaching industry.
• Plus almost 50 more!

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In the past I’ve sent you off to compare your salary with Michael Jordan and Oprah, but now how about using this little site to see how you stack up against the entire population of the planet!

The Global Rich List site will show you how you compare to the rest of the world based on your annual salary. While this is not nearly as important a measurement of your wealth as your net worth, it’ll have to do for now!

It also appears that the number stops updating at an annual salary of $250,000. So you can play around with higher numbers, but they’ll all say the same thing after that point.

Here is a little blurb from the site describing why they put this together:

WHY ARE WE DOING IT?
We are obsessed with wealth. But we gauge how rich we are by looking upwards at those who have more than us. This makes us feel poor.

We wanted to do something which would help people understand, in real terms, where they stand globally. And make us realize that in fact most of us (who are able to view this web page) are in the privileged minority.

We want people to feel rich. And give some of their extra money to a worthwhile charity.

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MIT’s OpenCourseWare project aims to offer the complete course material for every class online, free of charge.

President Susan Hockfield offers this explanation:

“OpenCourseWare expresses in an immediate and far-reaching way MIT’s goal of advancing education around the world. Through MIT OCW, educators and students everywhere can benefit from the academic activities of our faculty and join a global learning community in which knowledge and ideas are shared openly and freely for the benefit of all.”

And MIT isn’t the only one… Other institutions offering online educational materials include:

• Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
• Tufts University
• Utah State University
• University of Notre Dame
• University of California, Irvine
• Carnegie Mellon

There are also a number of international universities participating in the OpenCourseWare Consortium.

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Did you know there are over 1,000,000 computers chained together across the Internet creating a giant super-computer attempting to break down the building blocks of proteins in order to find a cure for some of the world’s worst diseases. And you can join too!

I’ve started a team for this project, so if you decide to participate please enter my team number 51056 when you install the application. This will track all of our computational donations as one group and compare us to other groups as well.

My team name is HTMLHelp.com, obviously named after my other big volunteer project on the web.

Thanks for your support!

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Donors Choose is a site which brings together teachers in need of classroom tools and supplies with donors willing to help fulfill those needs.

According to the site:

Donors Choose is a simple way to provide students in need with resources that our public schools often lack. At this not-for-profit web site, teachers submit project proposals for materials or experiences their students need to learn. These ideas become classroom reality when concerned individuals, whom we call Citizen Philanthropists, choose projects to fund.

Proposals range from “Magical Math Centers” ($200) to “Big Book Bonanza” ($320), to “Cooking Across the Curriculum” ($1,100). Any individual can search such proposals by areas of interest, learn about classroom needs, and choose to fund the project(s) they find most compelling. In completing a project, donors receive a feedback package of student photos and thank-you notes, a teacher impact letter, and an expenditure report showing that their tax-deductible gift was spent as directed.

To learn more, visit the DonorsChoose.org site.

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Google teams with Gapminder to deliver an interactive service which allows you to see all sorts of interactive Global statistics ranging from life expectancy to internet usage and more.

Gapminder is a non-profit venture for development and provision of free software that visualizes human development. This is done in collaboration with universities, UN organizations, public agencies and non-governmental organizations.

“It all started in 1998 from an idea to enhance the understanding of world health. We developed prototype software showing time series of health statistics as moving graphics and varying life conditions as 360° photo panoramas from homes, schools and health facilities.”

I think it’s important, especially for those of us living in first world nations, to realize how different the world is in terms of access to basic needs ranging from medical care (physicians per 1,000 people) to communication (phone usage per 1,000 people, internet usage per 1,000 people) to sexual equality (ratio of girls to boys in school, % of women in the workforce). Sometimes it really puts things in perspective.

Check it out.

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Did you know there are over 1,000,000 computers chained together across the Internet creating a giant super-computer attempting to break down the building blocks of proteins in order to find a cure for some of the world’s worst diseases. And you can join too!

The project, run by Stanford University, is called Folding@Home, and you can donate your computer’s spare processing power to the endeavor by installing this tiny little application which will quietly run in the background when you aren’t using your machine. They have versions for Windows, Linux and Mac and you can even set the application to run as a totally cool screensaver so you can see it at work.

I’ve started a team for this project, so if you decide to participate please enter my team number 51056 when you install the application. This will track all of our computational donations as one group and compare us to other groups as well.

My team name is HTMLHelp.com, obviously named after my other big project on the web.

Folks, I absolutely believe we live in the era in which mankind will cure cancer. Projects like this bring the kind of computational power to the table to turn this belief into a reality. Please don’t wait until someone you know if affected. It’s costs absolutely nothing to start contributing now.

Thanks for your support!

John

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