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Youth in Focus
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Bilingual Handbook
Social Media Course
Calendar
Boss's Letter Malware
Computer Speed
Dollars
Linkage
What's Hot

By using My Neighborhood Maps, you can now easily locate a publicly accessible computer or media lab in your neighborhood by visiting Seattle.gov and entering your address or selecting your neighborhood. Select "Community" and check the "Computer/Media Center" icon. This will take you to a screen where you can view all the computer and media centers in your area. Hovering over the computer icons will display a link to their website, an address for their location, and the distance from the location you entered. Try it out!

What do youth have to say about youth violence? Here's a chance to be heard with an online survey and live TV show sponsord by the Seattle Channel, City Club and City of Seattle. Go to see more at the Puget SoundOff youth site. Fill out the survey from there and then watch on SeattleChannel.org or cable channel 21 on Tuesday, November 10 at 7:00 p.m. to see Seattle Speaks: Youth Violence. The show will also feature online live polling and email questions. This is an opportunity to be part of the change!

Submit a two-minute video by November 11 for a chance to win a PC for yourself and $7,000 for a local community organization. This is sponsored by Microsoft as part of the Windows 7 release. More on the contest can be found here.

Washington State Governor Gregoire has issued her selections for broadband project applications which should be funded by the federal stimulus funds in round one. See the press release here. Ten projects were selected from a much larger pool of federal applicants. The state choices become part of the federal review of applicants. The Department of Commerce is now expected to announce round one grants between December and February. Word is that the second and third rounds are likely to be consolidated. Communities Connect Network and others are working on round two applications, while awaiting potentially revised application guidelines.

If you're a community information provider, teaching a class in social networking, or just trying to understand web 2.0, try this out: The Association for Progressive Communications (APC) recently co-produced training materials on Web 2.0 and social media for development for the FAO Information Management Resource Kit (IMARK). This and other topics are available for free online and in CD format on the project's web site here.

Doug Schuler, founder of Seattle Community Network and former Seattle Citizens' Technology Advisory Board (CTTAB) member, has released a new book, Liberating Voices: A Pattern Language for Communication Revolution. Schuler presents 136 language patterns showing how information and communication (whether face-to-face, broadcast, or Internet-based) can be used to address urgent social and environmental problems collaboratively. See more at MIT Press.

Free cable broadband Internet service is available for organizations providing technology training to community members. The free service is offered within the Seattle city limits, based on the City's cable franchise agreements with Comcast and Broadstripe (Millennium). For more information and to download a short form to make application, go to our tech web. If you have questions, email Derrick Hall or call (206) 233-5061.

Back issues of Brainstorm including techtips and linkage are now available in our online archives. Previous TechTips and Linkage are also available. Click to revisit all previous issues.

Image by Sarah L, Youth in Focus Student

Youth in Focus is providing an after school arts mentoring program in South Seattle. They offer a variety of photography classes, service learning opportunities and entrepreneurial opportunities to youth, ages 13-19, who come from disadvantaged backgrounds.

Last year, the organization received a Technology Matching Fund grant for the Digital Photography Lab Improvement Project. With $13,000 in funds, they upgraded their lab with eight 20-inch iMac computers to facilitate high quality training for youth in digital photography skills. They trained 48 youth in advanced digital photography over the nine-month project and developed a new student-run portrait studio. In addition to learning tech skills, the students also gained self-confidence, artistic skills, social skills, job skills and an awareness of the power of their own voices.

Student work from the summer 2009 advanced digital photography class, along with students' artists statements, can be seen at YIF's online store.

For more information on the program, contact Bob Perkins.

The City of Seattle is releasing its 2009 report on Information Technology Access and Adoption in Seattle. The full report will be online this month, but here are a few tidbits. While this is a Seattle survey, the data is very relevant to other communities as well, and the report offers insight into what will help reduce barriers to computer and Internet adoption. There's a lot in the report, so we'll include snippets each month in Brainstorm. Contact the Community Technology Program staff for more info.

Even in high tech Seattle, significant disparities continue in technology access and adoption. Income and education were the strongest predictors of technology access at home. Age, ethnicity, language spoken at home, employment status and disability status are also relevant.

Sixty-two percent of those with disabilities have Internet at home as compared to 87 percent of those without disabilities. People making under $30,000 are only two-thirds as likely to have home Internet as those with household income above $40,000. People with no college education are a third less likely to have home Internet service. Less than half (44.6 percent) of the Latino/Hispanic households and only about two-thirds (66.6%) of African Americans have Internet at home, compared to almost 90 percent of Caucasians. Focus groups showed that immigrant and refugee communities also have lower rates of technology adoption.

bilingual online job seeker's handbook

Are you working with limited English-speaking clients looking to find a job online? Neighborhood House and Asian Counseling and Referral Services have created an Online Job Seeker Handbook designed to help people, especially those new to online job seaches, navigate this complex, yet frequently used method of recruitment. The online handbook provides step-by-step instruction on getting ready to apply for jobs online, searching and applying for jobs on the Internet and using email to communicate with potential employers.

The bi-lingual handbook is free resource available in six languages: Amharic, Chinese, English, Oromo, Somali and Vietnamese. This project was funded through a 2008 City of Seattle Technology Matching Fund grant. You can visit and easily download a handbook in any of these languages by clicking here. For more information, contact Amy Kickliter.

malware conceals itself as boss's letter

Trend Micro threat analysts found spammed messages that pretend to be a letter coming from the "boss".

Bearing the subject "get back to my office for more details" and instructing users to read the attached ZIP file, which contains a letter. The ZIP attachment is, of course, not a letter but an .EXE file (info.exe) detected by Trend Micro as TROJ_CUTWAIL.GT.

Upon execution, TROJ_CUTWAIL.GT creates registry entries to automatically execute at every system startup. It also drops a Trojan dropper detected as TROJ_DROPR.ST. Cutwail is known as the 'spam engine' of the notorious botnet, PUSHDO, which spammed around 7.7 billion spam a day last Q2.

Users are advised to be wary in opening any attached file even if it comes from a person with authority or 'boss'. Trend Micro users are protected via its Trend Micro Smart Protection Network that detects TROJ_CUTWAIL.GT and blocks the spammed email message. Non-Trend Micro products users can use free tools like HouseCall to stay secure from this attack. For more information visit http://www.seattle.gov/informationsecurity/

Several webinars from Idealware:

Considering Social Media For Your Organization: Blogs, YouTube, Flickr, Del.icio.us, social networking, Facebook, oh my! They will provide a hype-free look at what these tools are and how they might help with typical nonprofit goals.
When: November 5, 1:00 - 2:30 EST
Register online: here.

Comparing Open Source CMSs: What do web site content management systems like WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, and Plone actually do? They will demo all four systems and compare them for typical nonprofit needs.
When: November 11, 1:00 - 2:30 EST
Register online: here.

Making The Most of Social Networking Sites: How can a nonprofit make the best use of social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn? They will talk through how they work, what's worth doing, and how other organizations are using them.
When: November 12, 1:00 - 2:30 EST
Register online: here.

Getting Started With Email Fundraising: How do you design and write an email campaign that will work? What tools can help you send emails and collect online donations? They will walk through what you'll need to know to design your own email fundraising campaign.
When: November 19, 1:00 - 2:30 EST
Register online: here.

speed up your computer

You may have noticed that your computer does not run as fast as it did when you first purchased it. When you first purchased the computer, there was nothing on it. During the normal operation of computer use, you may have installed other programs that may run even when not being used and you have stored files that may slow down your computer. It is recommended that once every 30 to 90 days you look at giving your computer a simple oil change, like changing the oil in your car.

1. Review your files that you no longer need and move them to a storage media such as CD or back up hard drive.
2. Delete your internet cache and history.
3. Remove software that is no longer needed or used.
4. Run a Defrag then check your hard drive for errors.
5. Run a spyware & virus checker to ensure you don't have any spyware or viruses.

Last but not least, if you have done all of the above and your computer still runs slow, it may be because you need more RAM. There are minimum RAM recommendations. Windows XP: 1GB or more; Windows Vista 32bit: 2GB or more; Windows Vista 64bit: 4GB's or more; Windows 7 32 & 64bit: 3GB or more. You can always look into your task manager by right-clicking on the task bar to see what is running on your computer. Every process and application takes up some sort of memory and you should have at least 50 percent of your memory available for normal computer usage.

Microsoft Suggestions
Speeding Up My Computer from HP

Agree or disagree with me? Drop me a note: Derrick Hall.

Alexander & Baldwin Foundation
Deadline: Ongoing
A & B Foundation provides cash contributions to organizations and projects that address significant community needs in the areas of health and human services, education community, culture and arts, martime and the environment. They will consider start up, general operating and special project needs as well.

Key Foundation
Deadline:Ongoing
Funds programs that enhance workforce development, financial literacy, and diversity through their civic programs, corporate contributions, and volunteerism. Funded over $33 million in grants since 2006.

Global Giving
Deadline: Quarterly nominations
Nominate your organization's project on Global Giving, on online marketplace that connects donor to the causes they care about. Listed projects are eligible for direct donations, while donors receive regular progress updates, allowing them to see the impact their dollars are making for your organization. Open Challenge events are held quarterly, so nominate your project now!

Extreme Ice Survey: Amazing time lapse video and photos of glacier movement.

Where's your bus right now? Find out with One Bus Away.

Tips for finding a web hosting service from Idealware.

Compare Windows 7 versions. Here's one site that has details about the differences between Home, Professional and Ultimate versions of Windows 7.

For fun: Everything Animated.

To subscribe or unsubscribe to Brainstorm, please email us, and we'll add you to our email notification list, or subtract you per your request. If you have ideas for future stories, please let us know and we'll try to accommodate them. We encourage you to visit the City of Seattle's Community Tech pages, seattle.gov/tech.