Going immediately from the end of the conference of the International Communications Association to NetSquared was a welcome shift from theory and analysis to proaction and problem solving. The sessions at ICA were along the lines of ‘what defines a weblog?’ ‘does a blogosphere meet Habermas’ description of a public sphere?’ and on and on. The discussion was interesting, but I left the conference thinking, ‘well, now what?’

As it so happens, the theme of next year’s ICA conference is “the social impact of communication.” And if I could sum up NetSquared in a single question, it would be this: What’s the social impact of social media? Those of us who spend far too much time online (ie. everyone reading this), tend to focus on the latest and greatest, shiniest, newest tools being developed. Whether it’s the iPhone or Digg’s newest feature. We wax poetic about the potential of the tools, but rarely stop to think, ‘how would the world be any different – any better or worse – if Digg, for example, didn’t exist?

NetSquared was focused on getting things done from the very beginning and, at times, it felt a bit like a beauty pageant. 21 projects – selected from around 150 – were competing for the first, second, and third prizes from the technology innovation fund. The mission? To do good using Web 2.0 tools.

It’s easy to mock the idea of a bunch of middle class (mostly white) people meeting in Silicon Valley to try to brainstorm ideas to use the internet to make the world a better place. I mean, there is disease. Hunger. Homelessness. Civil wars. Gang violence. Is another website really going to have an impact on society’s biggest ills?

Venezuelan blogger and friend Iria Puyosa struggled with that same question:

Una pregunta que me ha acompañado durante todas mis incursiones en medios (masivos, alternativos, comunitarios o ciudadanos): ¿Tiene sentido práctico un proyecto de comunicación para el desarrollo en un contexto de pobreza crítica? ¿Acaso no es más urgente atender necesidades básicas de saneamiento ambiental, recolección de basura, suministro de agua potable, cloacas, cuidado pre-natal, vacunación, medicina preventiva, nutrición, control de la delincuencia? ¿Cómo justificar invertir en radios comunitarias o en acceso a internet cuando no se pueden cubrir necesidades básicas? Sólo se justifica está inversión si entendemos que la pobreza y la exclusión no sólo tienen una dimensión económica, no sólo se miden en acceso a bienes y servicios, sino que la pobreza y la exclusión también tienen una dimensión cultural, que se mide en acceso a información y conocimiento, en capacidad para poner a circular nuevas ideas y para participar en la toma de decisiones sobre asuntos públicos.

The projects at NetSquared ranged from developing a wikipedia for farmers in developing countries to an eBay-like marketplace specifically targeted to producers and consumers of organic produce. There is a toolbox and a catalog of the most effective tools for NGO’s and a nation-wide social network for the Big Brothers Big Sisters organization. Kabissa sets out to strengthen the social web in Africa, while Maps 2.0 hopes to provide valuable geospatial data to the NGOs and humanitarian organizations that desperately need it. MAPLight.org (recently covered by David Pogue of the NY Times) gives bloggers, journalists, and voters important data about politicians, campaign contributions, and policy decisions. If there is any hope for campaign finance reform, this is it.

It’s worth looking through all 21 projects. Not just because they’re interesting, but because they need your help. Most of the projects weren’t groups of techno-do-gooders looking for a way to blog their way world peace. (that’s me). They were the old school NGO’s and non-profits that have been around forever and finally see the light: their organizations need to adapt to a new era of communication if they want to remain relevant and efficacious.

I think the first time I interacted with Global Voices co-founder Rebecca MacKinnon is when she came up with the idea for a Blogger Corps – a group of bloggers that would volunteer their time to get established non-profits and civil society groups up and blogging. There were about 20 of us – most of us still young and still intoxicated with the idea of publishing to the world – and we set up a website where non-profits could request the services and know-how of us volunteer geeks.

The project completely fell through the cracks in just a couple month’s time. Blogging hadn’t reached that tipping point yet. It wasn’t mainstream enough and I think that most groups were still worried that it was a fad that they didn’t want to invest their precious resources in. At NetSquared, at least half of the projects were proposing – or reproposing – this idea of a Blogger Corps.

The problem is, rather than focusing on specific niche communities, they all wanted to build the Myspace or Facebook for non-profits. They had pipe dreams of building the one single network which would encompass every civil society group around the world. It’s a problem I brought up in our social impact review session. Let’s say I’m an environmental activist and I want to propose an annual no car day in my city. I’ve heard about the no car day in Bogotá, Colombia and I’d like to learn how they were able to get it passed so that I can do the same in my city. I’d also like to talk to other urban planners and environmental activists to see if they have any other related ideas I should be thinking about. Where do I go? Change.org? Omidyar? Changemakers? Social Edge? WiserEarth? Grassroots.org? TakingITGlobal? Nabuur?

If I dig through all of those sites with the help of Google, I’ll probably find the information and the people I’m looking for. But it would be so beautiful if the non-profits understood what the for-profits web companies have figured out: MySpace and Facebook and lots of other “socially networked profile aggregators” are already out there. Now web companies need to focus on specific services and give people widgets to take with them.

The websites I really like now are focused on very specific tasks. Dopplr for travel coordination. Doodle for meetings. Del.ico.us for social bookmarks.

Rather than most of the NetSquared projects hoping to create huge networks, I wish they would focus on solutions for very specific problems. As it turns out, the winning projects did exactly that. MapLight.org provides fascinating data about lobbying, campaign donations, and the way politicians vote. It’s a model website/service that needs to be spread all around the world. Freecycle.org is the bridge between one man’s junk and another man’s treasure (though Craigslist also has a free section). And the Participatory Culture Foundation makes it much easier for us all to become film and TV producers. (To find out how, check out Make Internet TV)

Lastly, before the conference even started, one of the project leaders, Gunner, started an interesting discussion about whether or not the prize money format of the NetSquared conference pitted the projects against each other against each other instead of encouraging collaboration. I couldn’t disagree more. There was too much duplication at the conference and I hope that at least some of the projects went home thinking, ‘I wonder if we couldn’t make a bigger social impact doing something else, or by joining another project rather than starting our own.’